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My OS X Odyssey 266 essay, "Another Way Of Delivering Free OS X Version Upgrades Badly Needed," inspired a link and thread of commentary over at OSX Zone. As I asserted on Wednesday, "Apple seems to assume that everyone has broadband, but the fact is that some 75 percent to 80 percent of Internet users are still on dial up connections, and that's not likely to change for years yet. For many, there is no practical alternative. The nearest broadband access to me is 50 mi. away." To which an OS X Zone reader named Bo responded:
"Many people may not be near an Apple store but , a Starbucks with HotSpot ought to be closer. Even 1 hour out, minutes to download & 1 hour back is a heck of a lot of time saved.
"Anyone can walk into Starbucks, if it has the T-Mobile service, and sign up for a free 24 hour pass (or the $3/15 minute plan) and then you download at about 6 megs/minute. $3 max to do the download if you sign up. Free if you sign up and then cancel inside of 24 hours."
Frankly, I haven't a clue where the nearest Starbucks would be located. I know that there are some in Canada, but whether the Canadian franchises offer the HotSpot service is another matter. Just for fun, I went to the Starbucks website , and ran their locator engine to try and discover how long a drive it would really be. I entered my address and postal code, and was both surprised and amused when a map snippet of some very familiar territory appeared in the Webpage: 
Not bad, although I actually live about a mile off this little map in the direction of the arrow pointing north. The Sonora Road is a dirt thoroughfare of seven miles or so length connecting Port Hilford and Sonora, and it's completely uninhabited. Not a single house or other building on the entire stretch. Wine Harbour is a former gold mining ghost town, with perhaps 20 permanent residents. The road that shows up one the east side of the map paralling the harbor is there too. My great grandparents lived out there, although nobody has for about 70 years or more. In my lifetime, it's been only an access road for hauling logs. I've been out there on a bicycle, but the road eventually peters out onto dense brush. The real hoot was the message that appeared on the Starbucks page informing me that: 
Since things don't look too realistically promising for a local Starbucks in the foreseable future, especially not one with HotSpot service, since the nearest broadband availability is 50 miles distant, I decided to try a more likely location search. I entered my former post box address in downtown Halifax (the capital city of Nova Scotia, about 150 miles from where Iive, and a 3 hour drive over not very good roads), where several competing broadband services are available. The search engine quickly produced a decent map of the city center, but apologetically informed me that there was no Starbucks near that location either, but they "plan to open a store at this location "coming soon," which means it's safe to assume that there are no Starbucks outlets in the province of Nova Scotia (although there are some 70 Tim Horton's coffee and doughnuts franchise outlets in Halifax). 
OK, I'm being a bit sarcastic, but the fact is that there are an awful lot of Mac users who have neither access to domestic broadband nor a conveniently located Starbucks outlet or other cyber-cafe facility. As another OS X Zone poster noted:
Well said. A third commentator observed:
Also see Eric Strobel's letter that appears below. Seriously, the community where I live has a winter population of perhaps 30 people, which doubles or more in the summer cottage season. We have no broadband, no cable TV access, and get 1.1/2 broadcast channels and decent daytime reception on two radio stations -- one AM and one FM. It is 12 miles by road to the nearest village, meaning a hamlet of about 350 pop. with a bank, post office, and grocery/general store. No broadband service available there either. For that you have to go to the nearest town, Antigonish, pop. roughly 5,000, 50 miles away by road. The nearest city is Halifas, as noted, 150 miles by road, which is also where my nearest Apple dealer is located. 
Cutting to the chase, If you have broadband, or even access to a handy Starbucks HotSpot facility, I'm happy for you. I would sign up for broadband service today if it were available here. I'm not holding my breath. Our choice of dialup ISPs was recently reduced by 50%, to one. And millions of Internet users worldwide are in the same boat. The naive or oblivious-to-reality assumption that everyone has access to broadband is creating an increasing first class and second class netizenship discrimination dynamic. To some degree this is inevitable, but companies that create Websites, for example, that are only practical to access with broadband (and don't offer alternative dial-up friendly content) should be aware that they are shutting out three quarters of potential visitors. As for the 76 MB OS X 10.2.4 Combo Updater file download that sparked this thread, Apple does offer a CD option -- for $19.95 plus taxes and shipping -- a gouge ripoff price for a "free" update that is obviously much greater than the actual cost, as evidenced by the fact that Netscape offers CD browser version updates for $2.99, postange and handling included.
Odyssey - great tip from MacOS X Hints Classic Vicomsoft FTP Client Preference Management Updates at Apple stores From Eirik Paulsen Hey, Mr. Moore. On a side note to your response to Eric Strobel today: "It would be a nice service for Apple Stores and authorized dealers to offer. However, most such establishments are in places with broadband coverage, so there might not be a lot of demand." We live on the west side of the Santa Cruz Mountains in southern San Mateo County, CA -- a scant nine miles (as the crow flies) from Palo Alto and Stanford and the rest of Silicon Valley. No broadband is available up here in the hills. No cable television, either. Given that our south and southwest exposures are uphill through redwood trees, there's no chance of satellite access either. I'm on the very edge of Silicon Valley, my Internet access is limited to painfully slow dial-up on aged copper lines that drop connections every time a tree limb falls (which is often...in all seasons). So, you don't have to live on the nether side of nowhere -- or Nova Scotia ;) -- to be stuck with slow web access. On the other hand, I have web access. And a Mac. And I live in a valley full of hundred-foot-plus trees.... But this is turning into a count-my-blessings tangent; so, I'll stop now. Eirik
Hi Eirik;
See my commentary above.
Incidentally, I recall reading somewhere about a year ago that some 70-odd percent of
Your valley sounds more interesting, however.
Speaking of count-your-blessings, I can walk for more than a mile in a straight line (or as straight as one can travel in the woods) and still be on my own land. I can look out my living room window and see the Atlantic ocean, where there's a sand beach half a mile away, and I have a lovely lake in front of my house.
My neighbors on either side are out of sight (they're good neighbors). The view in any direction these winter evenings when the moon is high and full are breathtaking. It's quiet and peaceful. The air is clean and clear. You can see the stars and constellations. 
Not having access to broadband or cable is a small price.... Charles From Jenny Morgan Charles, Some of us could use one of your famous tutorials on the whys and wherefors to FTP clients. As in, why do I want to use one? WHy not? Why are there FTP sites anyway... seems to me that any website can allow file transfers. Please enlighten us unwashed types. -Jenny Morgan ps: a side note. As a fortunate user of a 768 DSL line at home, I just want to mention that the 40meg downloads that are common today, irritate you just as much as the 5 meg downloads of years ago. All a matter of perspective. But I do agree, having a 40meg d/l as an only option sucks. I wonder if there is a greater percentage of Mac users on broadband than the computing population at large?
Hi Jenny;
Good "Mac Basics" column idea. In the meantime, I actually use an FTP client more often for uploads than downloads -- stuff like articles and pictures, although if FTP download is available, I'm inclined to go that route. Why?
Resumable downloads for one thing. A big deal on my famous rural dialup hookup.
However FTP is technically better than HTTP for downloading files because while HTTP is designed to fetch Web pages -- optimized for numerous repeated fetches of small items. FTP is designed expressly for transferring files, offering faster overall throughput and better error checking. Users who fail repeatedly to download a large file via HTTP using a browser, may find that they will succeed on their first try using a dedicated FTP client.
I wouldn't doubt that Mac people are disproportionately inclined to opt for broadband. I know I would if it were available here.
Charles Odyssey - great tip from MacOS X Hints From Jonathan Tyzack Hi Charles, I realise that this isn't so much of a benefit for you owing to your keyboard problem, but this is a great tip from MacOS X Hints: http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030214120921107 Basically, while dragging any item, you can perform keyboard commands at the same time! So, say you are dragging text from your browser, instead of dropping it to the desktop, bringing e.g. TextEdit to the fore, then dragging it into an open TextEdit document after shuffling windows about etc, you can simply drag the text, command-tab to e.g. TextEdit (even open a new page if you need to by pressing command-N) and *then* drop your text. Works for images too.
Cheers,
P.S. Is this a (classic) Mac feature that I haven't known about for years, or is it new to OS X?
Hi Jonathan;
It's new to me (but then lots of things are. ;-)
Charles From Alex Summersby Hi, Charles! Just a quick note: I was interested to read your comments about the new OS X native Vicom FTP Client 4.0. I too have been using the excellent "Classic" version, Vicomsoft FTP Client 3.1.3, for some time. I road-tested a whole range of alternatives a year or two back, and settled on Vicomsoft because its features, speed, stability and design suited me best. One correction to your comments: the Classic Client does indeed offer a two-window view, not just a single window: you simply select "Mac and Host View" from the View pop-down at the top left of the client window. (The simple drag-and-drop functionality this gives you was one of the things I liked best about the software.) Following your (ever-interesting) comments, I look forward to trying the OS X version... when I'm finally forced to make the move to X.
Warm regards,
Hi Alex; 
Well, fancy that. As I said to Jonathan above.... ;-) Thanks for the tip. Charles • From John Dennis Just to let you know that these reside in PreferencePanes in the Library folder. Some are system wide and you have to click on computer and then what ever you have called your hard drive and find it this way. Some are located in the same folder, but in the users library folder. I am not sure where the ones are that Apple uses for the system, but I would be wary to delete those any ways.
The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here: Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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