Oh how we were conned! With the advent of computer-controlled traffic lights, it turns out more than 2,500 of the 3,250 pedestrian buttons in New York are deactivated. They’re only there because of the cost of removing them.

My partner is in Adelaide this weekend for the festivals, and filing stories for our web sites, so internet access was an issue to be considered. Of course, dialup is always available, but as she has a wireless enabled laptop, I thought I’d check out some wireless hotspots she could tap into. A quick bit of research, and I fell over an article which points out that Adelaide CBD is one big wireless hotspot.

“A network of 50 wireless access hot spots are peppered around central Adelaide – on lamp posts, traffic lights, under the canopy in the main shopping precinct of Rundle Mall, at the ultra cool Cibo coffee bar and the historic Adelaide City Council chambers. Each has a line-of-sight range of about 200 metres, and the resulting WLAN cable-free network, called citilan, is believed to be the largest in the world.”

Unfortunately it’s all pretty new, and as far as I can tell, only available at present to subscribers to either one of two Adelaide ISPs which are handling the technology end.

But what a fantastic idea. Basically, if you have a wireless enabled laptop or PDA, you can be online from anywhere in the CBD. Now that’s connectivity. And brilliant for small business, no longer having to worry about or pay the cost to organise broadband connections in an office. Or what about someone needing to make a presentation to a client – perhaps an architect or designer. Now you can say ‘meet you over coffee’ in a cafe, and be online and show your wares.

Wireless is a real opportunity, and with the cost now very low (after some high prices a couple of years ago), it’s a really viable idea. It certainly solved our network issues at home. Our home network (separate to our office down the street) now includes three laptops, a Mac G4, a wireless printer and all shared over a wireless network with broadband ADSL connection. Visitors do laugh, but that’s what happens when you both need computers for work, and have a daughter with a laptop. Cost to network – about $500. Including the wireless access point and wireless network cards for the laptops. That’s well within the budget of a small business. And our latest toy, an HP all in one printer/fax/scanner, cost less than $700 and is connected wirelessly as well, so it too can move around the house.

Residents in 19 USA states now have an extra line on their tax return form – asking them how much they’ve spent on online purchases for the financial year. States in the US are eyeing the $52 billion spent online, and wanting their share through sales taxes. Other legislation in the US prevents States levying taxes on out-of-state retailers, so the only way they can get their hands on the money is to ask the taxpayers to confess.

An exhibition on the fine art of hacking has opened in Madrid, Spain.

“Hackers: The Art of Abstraction explores the connections between hackers, artists and anyone engaged in any kind of creative work, an idea that the curators of the show say was inspired by McKenzie Wark’s The Hacker Manifesto. “

The musuem’s management is pretty ethusive about the exhibition’s subjects:

“I very much like Wark’s idea that everyone who creates anything is a hacker — programmers, artists, musicians, writers, engineers, chemists and so on are all hackers and, no matter how culturally diverse we may be, as creators we have convergent interests,” said Berta Sichel, director of the department of audiovisuals at the Spanish museum.

“I believe that hackers are the great intellectual adventurers of our time, but in mainstream culture hacking often has negative connotations,” Sichel added. “With this show we hope to refute the negatives and make people aware that in an age of increased surveillance, hacking can be a vital countermeasure and a commendable act of self-defense.”

A nice story from Iran about the intrinsic power of the internet. “Take one exasperated Iranian woman. Add a computer. Hook it up to the internet. ‘And you have a voice in a country where it’s very hard to be heard'”

“Initially created to defy the nation’s tight control on media, these web journals have turned into a cyber-sanctuary – part salon, part therapist’s couch – for the vast pool of educated, young and computer-savvy Iranians. “

The world never ceases to amaze. We think nothing of sliding a computer game disk in and playing whatever games we like. Spare a thought for the geeks in Greece. Playing computer games in public – particularly internet cafes – is illegal, after a law was passed a couple of years ago aimed at cracking down on illegal gamling. Unfortunately, what we would consider perfectly legitimate games wound up also being banned due to the wide embrace of the legislation.

“The law targeted rogue game hall operators who illegally turned arcade games consoles into gambling machines. But the blanket ban led law enforcement officers to start random raids on internet cafes in which customers played run-of-the-mill games such as chess, flight simulators or car races. “

Well it in’t just teenagers in trouble for using music without permission. Seems Apple may have a problem. The computer legend is being sued by music star Eminem for using one of his songs in a tv advertisement, apparently without asking him first.

A glitch on the Amazon web site last week had an unfortunate effect – it revealed the real names of some of the people writing reviews of books. Perhaps not such a big deal, except it became rather obvious that 5 star rating reviews were being written by authors about their own books!

The music industry made much of research a couple of months ago suggesting there had been a marked decrease in the number of people downloading songs, and citing this as evidence of the effects of their ongoing legal battles against the evil downloaders.

“But some experts and users say that file sharers are only being more secretive, and that file swapping is actually increasing. At least two research firms say more than 150 million songs are being downloaded free every month. “

It’s being suggested that the downloaders have just moved underground – they don’t own up when surveyed. Which makes a lot of sense.

Perhaps the final comments should be from a 26 year old financial planner in Boston, who says the lawsuit publicity has stopped he and his friends sharing, but not downloading:

“No matter what they do, it’s not going to work,” Spurr said. “To me the lawsuits are useless because the Internet is about sharing.”

Pepsi in the US is giving away 100 million free songs from the iTunes music download site. (You may remember they launched the campaign during the Superbowl using people who had previously been sued for downloading songs illegally). It seems Pepsi hasn’t quite got it right:

“One in three bottles is a winner, but it turns out that the markings can be read without removing the cap. Not only is it possible to pick out winning bottles in advance, but careful scrutiny can reveal the full 10-digit redemption code, meaning that no purchase is required to get a free iTunes single, courtesy of Pepsi. “

Oops.