There is a really compelling new direction our wireless world is taking. From a technology perspective it is compelling, that is, not necessarily from an ease of use perspective.

Many of our mobility devices are now designed for hybrid networking. These devices work on more than one network. For example I am testing out the Blackberry Bold, a new Blackberry that actually looks almost exactly like the older Blackberry. The difference is the Bold has WiFi built in. So you can log onto your home or office network and use the Wifi connection. 

Very cool, very useful, you save money by using your local network instead of the mobility network. The catch is it only works for data and web applications, not voice. To be honest, it is a great feature, as data then ends up being a mostly free service. But it is also confusing, because most customers simply don’t listen or read the details of a service, so they have unrealistic expectations. I think a lot of customers will expect their phone to work over the Wifi network as well, no matter how often they are told otherwise, such is the nature of today’s tech consumer.

Voice over IP provider Vonage experienced those expectations first hand last year, they had a very creative phone available. It was a WiFi phone, using your Internet connection and WiFi network it was a very sleek implementation of the Vonage Service. They had to pull it from the market as customer after customer bought it and then complained because it didn’t work away from their home on the cellular network, even though it was made very clear in all materials that it was for home use!

Regardless of the fact many people will be confused, I love these hybrid devices. Another one I am playing with right now is the Sirius Stiletto, which is a satellite radio. They have done a great job with this device, when in the car, at the cottage any place where you can see the sky, it works pulling the signal from the satellites. When you are at home, in the office or any other indoor location, you cna jump on any WiFi network and still get your music. If you think about it this is a perfect solution, if you are paying for a music subscription, you want to be able to use it everywhere, not just outdoors. Now to be fair, you could install satellite receivers at home, or the office, but the WiFi solution is much slicker, and far more flexible. It makes me a convert to the whole satellite radio concept, something I was not when you needed to use the satellite service alone for reception.

Yet another hybrid device is the Apple iPhone. For some reason Apple users don’t seem to have the same comprehension issues as other technology users, you can fill in the reason for that yourself, but the iPone is perhaps the poster child for multiple network access. Partially I suppose, because if the fact the iPhone is also a iPod and iTunes is such an essential component of the iPod. So accessing iTunes over a WiFi network makes a huge difference in the usability of the iPhone. Add that to the significant cost Rogers is charging for iPhone data use, and you have iPhone users living on WiFi networks wherever possible!

In today’s wireless world, connecting to the fastest, cheapest, most reliable network for your device is not necessarily a hands-off process, understanding the options you have for connecting is an important step towards getting the most out of your technology investment.