Clark was recently in an airport when his cell phone was running low on power. He immediately looked for an outlet to charge up. But revenue is down for airport operators, so they covered up all the outlets to prevent people from running up the electric bill!
The Wall Street Journal now confirms this was not exactly an isolated incident.
In many cases, people are buying one cup of coffee at coffee shops that offer free wifi and sitting there all day long. They're using the electric for their laptops and cell phones, tying up seats and basically using the space as a free office.
In a battle of wits with customers, businesses are now locking up their outlets and banning all-day sitters during peak hours.
The good news is this just a temporary phenomenon. Affordable mobile web surfing that can beat any coffee shop's free wifi is coming.
Clear,
Metro PCS and
Cricket are among those offering laptop cards for hi-speed surfing at flat rates.
Meanwhile, Verizon is currently testing 60Mbps Long Term Evolution (LTE) cellular service that will allow you to surf at 4G speeds. The technology is expected to offer far more capacity than the kinds of laptop cards that tend to bill at $60/month with usage caps and possible massive overage charges.
In other news, there's new technology coming for laptops to light up the screen. The technology will use so little energy that it will be possible to go 12 hours between charges. The same OLED (organic light-emitting diode) screen technology is now already in use in some cell phones.
