Devicescape passed a cool milestone this week: 1 million registered users for the Easy Wi-Fi application.  Of course, as I write this, I’m immediately reminded of the scene in Austin Powers where Number Two has to disabuse Dr Evil that his $1M demand is impressive.  In the web world, 1M is “no big deal”.  After all, Facebook just published their user base and it was something insane, like over 130 million!

Still, in the world of Wi-Fi, we think 1M is a good number, and we’re certainly quite proud and even a little surprised.  It wasn’t that long ago that we were monitoring single digit daily registrations and logins.

So, many thanks to all of our membership out there.  Your feedback, enthusiasm and, yes, criticism, has been much appreciated and truly helpful in making more and more out of our service.

Now that we’re at this milestone, we’re thinking “what’s next?” and planning for the future.  We have lots of cool ideas in mind.  Please do try to drop us a line on what you’d like to see: leave a post in our forums, on the blog, or even PM us directly.  Thanks again.

First off, we’d like to say thank you to everybody who has downloaded the Easy Wi-Fi application, in either version, and especially to those who have left reviews at the App Store. Unfortunately, Apple doesn’t provide developers with any way to respond to the reviews that are posted there, so to those asking questions in that forum we’re sorry, we have no way to respond to you. If you’re still looking for an answer, please try our own discussion forum where we try to answer every question in a timely manner.

On to the reviews now though… I wanted to highlight some of my favourite reviews from the App Store, and perhaps answer some of the questions I see in there frequently.

Favourites:

From martino13:

Awesome
Incredible time saver. A must-have app.

From KennMSr:

It’s About Time
It’s a shame AT&T didn’t provide this app themselves when they release[d] the service, considering how many time the[y] released a teaser then retracted the service. …

From CieloBrezza:

Much needed for Wifi users
Awesome app, truely a must-download for AT&T iPhone users. Saves time and trouble.

And finally, from TradeYourselfIn:

Exactly as advertised
People need to read the damn description, before giving a perfectly fine app negative reviews

And now some common questions, starting with the new version for AT&T iPhone users:

Why Does It Not Work On My iPod Touch?
This application was specifically tailored to work with the free access to Wi-Fi hotspots that AT&T is including with their iPhone data plans. The plan is not available to anybody else yet. But, we haven’t left iPod touch users out: our original, multi-network version of Easy Wi-Fi does run well on the iPod touch, and supports AT&T Wi-Fi (including the free Starbucks accounts).

Why Do You Need My Telephone Number?
We need your AT&T iPhone number because that is your user name for connecting to the AT&T Wi-Fi network. We’re not going to share it with anybody, call you or send you text messages. We just give it to AT&T’s authentication system each time you try to log in so that they can confirm your account is enabled for free Wi-Fi and let you on to the internet.

Can We Have A Location Aware Hotspot Finder?
Consider it added to the list of enhancements. Not promising anything, but we’ll certainly look into it. The advantage to linking to the AT&T site is that, in theory at least, it should be the most up to date place to find a location near you.

For the multi-network version:

Why Doesn’t It Work on AT&T?
The short answer is that it does, and very well. The difficulty with AT&T is that they have many different user name formats and you have to get it right otherwise their authentication system will reject you. Perhaps the most common one we’ve seen comments about is the free access via the Starbuck’s loyalty cards. For that, enter your username followed by @attwifi.com (so, for example, mine might be john@attwifi.com had I been lucky enough to get ‘john’ as my Starbuck’s/AT&T user name - I wasn’t!). For everybody else, the domain you need to add is the same as the one you select from the drop down list on the login web page (other common examples are @att.net and @sbcglobal.net).

Does It Work On My Campus Network?
If your campus has a web form for you to log in with, then it is possible. If your campus is using IEEE 802.1X, then no (but your iPhone/iPod touch should be able to connect to those using its built in Wi-Fi software now). If you want to check before buying, drop by our forum and leave us a question, or perhaps download the free Windows or Mac version and try that. If your network is not in the list, we do have a form where you can submit new networks to us for addition (we have around 2000 networks that we support already, and we’re always happy to add more).

It’s Not Working For Me, Where Can I Get Help?
Head on over to our forum to see if anybody else has asked the same thing, and if not post your question there. We try to respond to everything within a business day, though sometimes it might take us a little longer.

A new version of Easy Wi-Fi specifically for iPhone users with AT&T plans went live in the app store over the holiday weekend. This version is trivial to set up - you just need to enter your 10 digit AT&T iPhone number into the settings page - and simple to use: connect to the Wi-Fi network, launch the app and it will log you in. Much simpler than typing your phone number in each time, waiting for the SMS from AT&T and then clicking the link in that to get connected.

In addition to all the AT&T Wi-Fi network locations (like Starbucks), it will also connect you to all the networks that have just click through web pages in our list of supported networks. And we’re working on an option to allow you to unlock this version and add more networks, using our web portal.

By the way, if you already have the original, multi-network, version of Easy Wi-Fi, then you don’t need this one: you can simply add the AT&T Wi-Fi (iPhone) plan to your Devicescape account and you will have the same capabilities.

Do you run a Wi-Fi network? Would you like a version like this specifically tailored for your network? If so, contact us and we’ll talk about what we can do for you.

It’s Thanksgiving week here in the US, and while I’m a Brit, I’m always happy to celebrate somebody’s holiday with them! So, for those who will be enjoying large meals and catching up with their family over the long weekend, I wish you all a happy Thanksgiving. And for everybody in our global community, whether you’re on holiday or at work, I thought I’d throw out some statistics about Wi-Fi usage, internet usage and Devicescape usage that I thought were interesting.

Mobile Internet
I was presenting at a JETRO Houston event last week where one of the many interesting things I learned from my co-presenters was that in the late teen to early twenties age range, more people access the internet through a mobile device than with a computer or laptop. And the next couple of segments in that chart weren’t far behind either.

Japan has a great mobile data infrastructure to support this of course, and a lot of public access Wi-Fi networks, all of which help to make mobile access simple. The real surprise for me though was the low number of smartphone users (around 2% of mobile subscribers). I’m sure with the popularity of devices like Apple’s iPhone that will change, but just think where those usage statistics are headed if you give people devices capable of a much richer internet experience.

Mobile Wi-Fi
Two very mobile Wi-Fi applications have been making the headlines recently: in car Wi-Fi (from Autonet Mobile) and the recent press flight Virgin America hosted to show off in-flight Wi-Fi access using Aircell’s gogo service.

While I saw a number of stickers advertising the Autonet in-car Wi-Fi at the San Francisco Auto Show last weekend, I didn’t manage to find a signal to connect to so I couldn’t try it out.

Glenn Fleishman over at Wi-Fi Net News was one of the folks on the plane for the Virgin flight however, and he has written up a number of pieces about his experiences, including one live from the flight. I also exchanged some Twitter messages with him while he was on board about the fact that he was using ssh over the link and reported that it was very usable.

Devicescape Usage
It has been a busy couple of months at Devicescape since the launch of Easy Wi-Fi for iPhone and iPod touch in Apple’s App Store, and Nokia increasing the number of their S60 platforms that have the option to download it right there on the phone. With the many new users finding Devicescape Easy Wi-Fi for the first time, we’ve had a noticeable increase in the traffic on our forum (which we’re very happy to see), and also a lot of new networks being sent in for us to add support for.

We have almost doubled our network count (i.e. the number of SSIDs we recognize as hotspot networks) in the recent weeks, and while a lot of those were additional SSIDs for existing services, we also have a very steady stream of user requested networks that we’re working as fast as we can to add.

One interesting number I thought I’d share with you is that we’ve now seen successful connections from our rapidly growing user base at over 80,000 different locations around the world. Including cases where the user didn’t have an account to access the network, or we didn’t know about the network at the time, our users have visited over half a million different hotspot locations!

By locations here, we’re talking about access points actually, so the number of physical addresses is probably a little lower since many of the more popular locations, like airports and larger cafes, will have more than on access point installed to provide full coverage. But that’s still a lot of places!

Last week’s announcement of AT&T buying long term partner Wayport for $275 million cash illustrates the increased strategic role of Wi-Fi for service providers as they push out media-centric services to users.  With today’s robust Smartphone market and increasing consumer data usage, carriers are looking for way to offset huge cellular investments and pushing out longer term 4G deployments like LTE and WiMax.  Wi-Fi can provide excellent coverage indoors and in congested areas as a complement to cellular, at a lower cost of carriage.  Moreover, Wi-Fi provides a high-performance, low cost network connection for many different types of device and applications.

Much like the AT&T acquisition is a solid proof point to the co-existence of 3G and Wi-Fi, Devicescape has also experienced increasing consumer and OEM demand for Wi-Fi on handsets.  As more and more service providers embrace Wi-Fi in their strategies, the requirements are flowing down to handset vendors to integrate Wi-Fi and supply devices with both types of radios.  Importantly, the Wi-Fi has to be extremely easy to use and integrate tightly with the operators networks, as well as the traditional Wi-Fi locations of home and office.

This is all happening at a great time for Devicescape!  Our Easy Wi-Fi for the iPhone has been available for a few weeks at the iTunes App Store, and is generating a lot of interest among service providers and handset vendors.  The application has held the number 1 position for several weeks as the most popular paid Wi-Fi application at the store.  We’re seeing demand for versions of Easy Wi-Fi which integrate with one operator network exclusively, simplifying use for those users who only care about fast access to one network.

Yesterday AT&T finally announced the free Wi-Fi access for their iPhone customers in the US. That opens up the Wi-Fi networks in Starbucks, McDonald’s and many other places to iPhone users, giving them high speed access from their phones while they sip coffee or enjoy a their lunch. Using Wi-Fi is much better than EDGE (as those of us with first generation iPhones, or who live in areas that don’t yet have 3G coverage can confirm), but it is also usually faster and more reliable than the 3G network as long as you have a strong signal.

Unfortunately, the official AT&T way to get this free access involves jumping through hoops each time you want to connect in a new location. Assuming you have the attwifi SSID already in your preferred networks list (i.e. you’ve connected to it once before, and not told the iPhone to forget the network), then you will need to do this:

1. Fire up mobile Safari and load a page so that you get the special iPhone captive portal page.
2. Enter your 10-digit mobile number and check the box to agree to the Acceptable Use Policy. Tap ‘continue’.
3. Wait for a (free) text message from AT&T containing a link that is only valid at your current location for 24 hours.
4. Switch to the SMS app, and view the link in the text message from AT&T (which will close the SMS app and take you back to Mobile Safari.

That’s a lot of steps just to get some Wi-Fi access! Luckily, Devicescape’s Easy Wi-Fi knows how to get you online using your phone number too. For a simple one-time setup, you get much faster access to the AT&T network:

1. Install the app, tap the ‘My Wi-Fi’ tab to get to the Wi-Fi accounts panel, tap ‘+’ to open the search.
2. Search for iPhone.
3. Choose ‘AT&T Wi-Fi (iPhone)’ from the results and enter your ten digit phone number.

Now, each time you want Wi-Fi at an AT&T location, simply tap the Easy Wi-Fi icon on the iPhone and you’ll be logged in within a few seconds in most cases. No need for SMS messages, no need to enter your phone number each time.

If you have an iPod touch too, then sign up for a Devicescape account, register both devices to it and you can use your iPod touch instead of your iPhone when you’re in the hotspot, leaving your phone free for making calls while you surf (just remember that you can’t connect both at the same time - the accounts only allow a single device to be logged in at a time, and even after logging out on the AT&T network it can take up to 15 minutes for them to allow a different device to get online using the same user name & password).

Hello Everyone,

Those of you with mulitple devices using Devicescape may have noted some inconsistency in our naming convention.  When we first started with the Devicescape automated login product we wanted simply to have the product and the company name be completely consistent.  Hence, “welcome to Devicescape” and “Download Devicescape onto your device”, etc.

Unfortunately we faced naming issues, first on the Nokia devices and next on the iPhone, and ended up deciding to use the “Easy Wi-Fi” product name for those platforms.  Now, with the Easy Wi-Fi application the most popular WiFi app on the Apple App Store (!) and just about every Nokia N and E series phone showing “Easy Wi-Fi” we’ve decided to rationalize all of our products under this name.

It’ll take a month or so to make it through all of our clients and web site, but expect to see Easy Wi-Fi being the consistent name.  Hope you like it!

So, while we’re on this topic, we made a few other changes too.  In line with this mission of making Wi-Fi, well, easy, we’ve decided to consolidate all of our various technologies into one product.  We haven’t yet released it, but this 3.0 version of Devicescape is primarily targeted at our OEM customers: the makers of PCs, handsets and new WiFi capable devices (that’s when the bulk of Devicescape’s business comes from).

We feel that mobility is critical for these types of products, and WiFi will be used in the office, at home, and of course at public networks.  Therefore, our OEM version of Easy Wi-Fi, version 3, will include:

* Our enterprise-class security supplicant
* Optional Cisco CCX support
* Our home consumer oriented, “push-button” Wi-FI Protected Setup
* The automated hotspot login and provisioning system
* A framework to allow integration into the device’s connection manager

There are a bunch of other great enhancements we are making in 3.0, but we’ll disclose those later.

I’m excited to announce the availability of Devicescape for iPhone and iPod Touch on Apple’s App Store.  Thanks to all of our users out there who have been so patient: it took us a lot longer than we thought to figure out how to make this release!

As you can see in this screen shot, the new version looks quite a bit different.  Because of Apple’s current limitations on running in the background you need to launch the app to login.  But you can manage your account and check your usage history directly, which I think is quite handy.

If you’d like to check out the application, search for “Easy WiFi” on iTunes  or download it directly from the App Store.

Wanted to keep you all posted that we’re working hard on an official release of Devicescape for Apple’s App Store.  All being well this will make it out there in the very near future.  The exact acceptance process and timeline is a little bit unclear.

I’m very excited about the new application as it’s much improved, with plenty of handy new features which improve usability.  The team here has done a very nice job.  The current limitations of Apple’s SDK don’t allow us to work in the background so you need to start the application and hit “login”.  Still, that’s a lot nicer than wrangling with Safari and tedious login pages.

Many thanks to the hundreds of thousands of you with the current “hacked” version, for your enthusiasm and patience.   Watch this space!

If you haven’t been swept away by the flash flood of green tech and green groups sprouting up these days, you must be living under a rock. Everywhere I turn, there is a new green company and a new green trend. Just last week at the Connections Digital Living Conference, a company that shared the stage with us was successfully touting it’s eponymous Green Plug technology. That same week I was invited by Premier Power to a party at a green bar, the Temple, where, according to the invite…”Green is Glamorous.”

Is it a bubble? Almost certainly there are bubblicious aspects to what has been happening - lots of money flowing into an unproven and low P/E industry, but greener technology is an essential ingredient in the future of technology if not the future of the entire planet.

I’ve heard some great ideas - and my favorites so far are the ones that are simplest. Easier ways to recycle. Solar powered NOCs. Universal plugs for devices and gadgets that save waste (and the amount of weight I have to pack when I travel). Solar powered device chargers. Solar powered Wi-Fi access points. And just so I don’t focus exclusively on a theme of devices and Wi-Fi here - I must admit to be a fan of the green bar

Here’s a short list of companies and blogs I consider worthy of your consideration:

Green Wi-Fi
Solio
Premier Power
Temple
Vertography
Green Plug

Check these out and let me know your favorites too.