The internet access at the hotel was infuriatingly slow while I was there, likely due to the massive throngs of nerds converging for WinHEC 2007. Even though I'm easily frustrated, I'm difficult to actually anger—but the slow wireless connection actually pissed me off since the WayPort people were charging $12/day for this access. I would think they could afford some nicer equipment at those rates.
The absolute worst part about this whole mess, however, was the suggestion on this flyer that if we encounter problems using their network access, we should disable our firewall. Overly aggressive firewalls that block that much access are fairly rare these days, and someone (likely your IT administrator) has to really go out of his way to configure your firewall like this. Odds are good that you'll either know about this or have your IT admin on speed-dial already if this is the case.
Telling people to disable their VPN and proxy software is perfectly reasonable, but telling them to disable their firewalls is absolutely the wrong advice to be giving out.

Leave a comment