When people contemplate Internet and telephone access on planes, the normal issues that get raised are the cost, and whether this will lead to an increase in noise levels as everyone makes "I'm on the plane" calls. An article at AVN (a very NSFW link) raises another issue which comes up less often but is equally hard to solve: should airline staff also be responsible for ensuring that passengers don't access wildly inappropriate content such as porn movies while flying? While it might be hard to imagine someone paying a fee for Internet access and then using that time to view some adult action, the near-universal recognition of the "mile high club" concept suggests it's not totally out of the question. In fact, the problem already exists insofar as people can watch DVDs on their laptops when on board. Is it OK to watch Snakes On A Plane (in either version) during a flight? In the absence of an industrial relations ruling, we'll throw this one over to readers as a weekend contemplation issue. Should airline staff be authorised to tell people what sites they visit, or can we rely on the social contract? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Not getting the bit transfer rate you used to at home? The New York Times covers how to troubleshoot a slow home network, including rebooting your router and changing the Wi-Fi signal's channel to avoid interference with neighbours and other devices.

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I've always been pretty suspicious of the networks labelled 'Free Public Wifi' that seem to spring up whenever I open my notebook in airports, and mildly curious as to why they're so prolific. Sure, I've occasionally tried one when there's no other visible network and I'm keen for connectivity, and it turns out that's the whole problem, as Lisa Phifer at TechTarget explains:

After you deplane at the next city and open your laptop, your Wi-Fi card tries to automatically reconnect to "Free Public Wi-Fi." Others sitting around you see this SSID being advertised by your laptop, and try to connect to you. This cycle repeats itself, spreading "Free Public WiFi" SSID from traveler to traveler, city to city.

Handy do-it-yourselfer computerguru365 turned a network-capable laser printer into a wireless printer by mounting a small Wi-Fi router inside its case. This is a really cool mod: After installing a network card, he found space inside the printer to mount a small router (running the DD-WRT router firmware, no less), wired up and mounted LED lights, and tucked both the power and Ethernet cable hook-ups inside. This project's not for the timid, and not really necessary, as you can just set the router on top or near the printer—but the result looks really good. (Of course you'll get better bandwidth by keeping the antenna outside the printer.)

Coffee chain Starbucks' well-publicised woes, which include plans to shut down almost three quarters of its Australian stores, are also going to impact the Australian Wi-Fi scene. Liam Tung at ZDNet ran the numbers and worked out that Canberra won't have any Starbucks' Wi-Fi hotspots left, while the fate of stores in other states is uncertain. The Wi-Fi at Starbucks is provided by Telstra (and hence comes at a cost), but wireless access has always been a selling point of the Starbucks coffee/office experience. (Rival Gloria Jeans, a much bigger presence in the Australian market, partners with Optus for Wi-Fi.)
While the disappearance of those stores won't massively undermine the Telstra Wi-Fi footprint - McDonald's and Telstra's CBD systems in Sydney and Melbourne are much more important it's potentially a major nuisance if you've come to rely on the option being around when you need to get some quick access on the road. It's also bad news for anyone who bought an iPhone from Telstra and planned to make extensive use of the free Wi-Fi option to help offset Telstra's painfully expensive plans.
Aussie Wi-Fi lost with Starbucks' stores [ZDNet Australia]

Windows only: Avanquest Connection Manager, previously a $US30 app, is now a free utility that could be seriously convenient for laptop users. The app lets you create profiles for your different wi-fi or LAN connections, changing email, printer, and network drive defaults depending on where you hook up, along with security settings and other concerns. The app's basic connection-chooser is also more user-friendly than Windows' own somewhat plain built-in version (though that might be what some road warriors like about it). The trade-off for its "free"-ness appears to be ads for other Avanquest software scrolling across the top, but I find them pretty easy to ignore. Avanquest Connection Manager is a free download for Windows systems only.

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Users who buy an iPhone from Optus or Telstra will get free Wi-Fi access at those telcos' hotspots, but what if your iPhone is jailbroken or with another carrier? Hotspot provider Tomizone is trying to tempt iPhone users by offering free access to iPhone users at its network of hotspots for three months from July 11, the iPhone launch date. Tomizone relies on individuals and businesses signing up to act as individual providers, so the current coverage map looks a bit thin (though the company claims 600 locations in Australasia). It could be a useful option if you're out and about and don't want to use up your download cap. Basic access prices post-deal or for laptop users are also reasonable, at $3 an hour or $4 for a day pass.
[Tomizone]

Tech site Ars Technica runs down the basics of securing your home wireless network with the most secure and up-to-date methods. The main takeaway is that when you enable encryption on your wireless router, use WPA encryption instead of WEP, because it's better and stronger.

Unlike WEP, WPA uses a 48-bit initialization vector and a 128-bit encryption key. More importantly, however, WPA uses what's called the Temporary Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP). Whereas WEP recycles the same key for encrypting all the packets flowing across the network, WPA's TKIP changes the encryption key every single time a packet is transmitted. This, combined with the use of longer keys, prevents a hacker from compromising a router simply by passively observing a large enough set of packet transmissions.

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US-centric: Our gadget-obsessed brothers at Gizmodo report that many AT&T hotspots—including Starbucks and Barnes and Noble—have started offering free Wi-Fi access to iPhone users. With a little ingenuity, the same free Wi-Fi access can be granted to your laptop.... Read More »

US-centric: The Wi-Fi Hotspot Finder webapp displays free wireless internet hotspots in your area on a Google Maps mashup. To use it, just give it your address, city, or postcode and it'll display many of the nearby hotspots. This... Read More »