WiFi in Sydney. Available, but sparse, expensive, restricted
November 5th, 2008I was just in Sydney, but left earlier than first planned, in part because it was hard to get internet access! Not something I expected before I got there, even though internet access was similarly expensive/absent in New Zealand.

WiFi options
One place to get online in Sydney Apple Store in Sydney on George street. It’s great, you can use their computers for web browsing etc. pretty much until you get tired of standing up. They also have unencrypted WiFi that doesn’t redirect you to a nag screen when you first try to go to a website. The only WiFi access point like that I’ve seen in New Zealand or Australia. I could get online with my iPhone via WiFi there. Some people even brought their own (Mac) laptops there to get internet access!
A bunch of cafés in Sydney (and Melbourne) offer free wifi through a network called uConnect (map of hotspots). But beware - it is only available until 19:00. At some cafés, a Starbucks I went to for instance, wifi from Telstra (the government monopoly) is available, but the prices are outrageous. $8 AUD for 30 minutes. There’s a restaurant called wagamama, that gives you a coupon when you buy something a limited time. At one point their coupon printer system broke down though, so I couldn’t use their internet. Why not just have a WPA password and give it to customers?
The current incredible situation
In Auckland there was an internet connected computer in the lobby of a hotel I was staying at, set up where you could pay NZD $10 (about $5 USD) to use the computer for 30 minutes if I recall correctly! In one hotel in Sydney you could pay $10 AUD for 1 hour of wifi access. When I ordered the hotel it said wifi included with all rooms - that is you have wifi access to a login screen. But to actually use the internet you need to buy a code, which can only be bought during the opening ours of the hotel front desk.
Compare this to when you could be online flying 10km over the Atlantic in an airplane for US $9.95 for 30 minutes! I did that once flying from Seattle to Copenhagen once on SAS just for the fun of it. There is something wrong if the internet prices in a café or hotel in a big city are not drastically lower than on a satellite based connection offered in an airplane years ago.

Alternative: 3G
Virgin Broadband seems to have a good offer for pre-paid 3G internet access.
I had hoped to buy a 3G USB modem with a SIM card with pre-paid internet access. The only problem was that no one had any USB modems from Virgin Broadband in all of Sydney. Neither did Optus - the operator whose network Virgin is using. In the Virgin Broadband store they said they had SIM cards I could use, if I had an unlocked 3G modem, but unfortunately I didn’t. The only place I could find an unlocked 3G modem was on eBay, but that was too cumbersome.

Better in “2nd/3rd world countries” with less bad regulation
You might wonder why Internet access is better in say, the Philippines and South America, than it is in Australia and New Zealand. My guess it has something to do with telecom regulation and Telstra - a government controlled telecom monopol.
The Great Chinese-style Firewall

If that wasn’t enough, Australia’s Labour government is planning to introduce filtering and surveillance similar to what is in place in China. Read more at nocleanfeed.com.






