Sept/Oct 2004

Where exactly do you find a wireless hotspot if you want to log on to the Internet whilst on the move? A new online service called Totalhotpots aims to help you. It has been set up with the help of Multimap online mapping technology, and uses Multimap's "where's my nearest" system to identify locations.

Users enter a country, street, town and/or postcode or zip code more or less anywhere in the world, and select a search radius. This then produces a map that plots the location of the venues found.

A list also appears beneath this map, giving the venue name, distance from location entered, and an icon indicating the location type (café, hotel, restaurant, pay phone, sports centre and so on). The system also gives contact details, the name of the Wi-Fi operator and the charges. Users click on the item that best fits their needs to access a more detailed map of their chosen venue's location and further contact details.

A chart on the site lists the number of hotspots in key UK cities, and a quick look at the site as we went to press showed that London led with about 800 sites, but no other city had even 200. The top places in descending order were Bristol, Manchester, Nottingham, Birmingham, Glasgow and Edinburgh, all with 100 or more. At under 100 spots came Leeds, Cardiff and Sheffield.