In that spirit, I spent the last month or so with a beta version of the OmniSky modem, a trim packet of electronics that clips onto the back of a Palm V organizer. I’ve been on the road for half a year, wishing for just what the OmniSky promised: wireless access to the Web and e-mail via the provider I already pay for the privilege.
Early adopting has its dangers. When the installation went awry, a helpful tech-supporter had me purge the data from my Palm, to which I’ve outsourced roughly 14 percent of my brain. I had terrifying visions of my empty Palm erasing my desktop backup. Plus, the install mucked with the Palm’s ROM and made the interface worse. The software ate half the Palm’s memory, it took two attempts to get e-mail and the modem didn’t work with my provider anyway. Coverage is spotty in rural areas, too.
But hey, road warriors are fearless. According to OmniSky, the next version of the software fixes all my problems. By May 2, when the modem goes on sale, it’ll have easier installation, a smaller memory footprint and a new, browserlike interface. The company is hashing out security issues so it’ll be able to pull e-mail from holdouts AT&T, Hotmail and MSN (though AOL mail will still be off-limits). The conjoined unit still feels a little heavy. But never mind. Last week I checked my e-mail in a movie theater, and the woman in the next seat said, “That’s cool.” Bliss!
