Last month we took a quick trip east to the Boston area. Two technology trends struck me.
First, the NY State Thruway now has free wifi at all of the service areas along Rt 90. I noticed this on a trip in April and thought it was cool, but wasn't all that sure when I'd ever want to use it. Now I know. Just outside Buffalo on the May trip I realized I'd forgotten to download the NYTimes crossword before leaving home that morning. So when we stopped, I signed on to the Service Area wifi and downloaded the crossword while Michael ordered his coffee. Back in the car, we were able to complete the crossword offline while driving.
I can think of other times it might be useful, too, like booking a hotel from the road. In the past couple of years I've been in more than one situation where I had to make or change hotel reservations while enroute and it's been a pain to do it by phone. I'm hoping next time I have to do this I'll be near a Service Area with wifi.
The other trend I've noticed lately is that hotels are providing computers in the lobby for guests to use for free. I'm a little perplexed by this. Why, when laptops are cheaper than they've ever been and more and more people are buying them, are hotels adding lobby computers? Is it easier or cheaper for the hotel to provide a computer than to support guests who are trying to use their own computers on the hotel network? Or is there some other reason? I'm curious about this.
