It looks like Verizon is following T-Mobile and AT&T into the deep end of the hotspot pool. In July of this year, the carrier began to offer free Wi-Fi access on the Boingo network to Verizon home broadband customers. Today, that privilege is granted to its mobile broadband consumers as well. This means that if you have a qualifying Verizon DSL, FiOS or 3G plan, you’ve got a warm hotspot waiting for you at over 100,000 locations. And now for the catch.

The free access is only supported on Windows computers, just like it was back in July. Although I often travel with a netbook running Windows, I also take my MacBook computer with me on the road. But I’ll have to keep paying Boingo the $9.95 monthly fee to use Wi-Fi on my Mac, even though I’m both a Verizon FiOS and 3G customer. The funny bit about all of this — Verizon says that 3G customers must use the VZ Access Manager software to hop on the free Wi-Fi train.

That software is already supported on the Mac, although you don’t need it to connect to the EVDO network. And you can already use it to manage either your 3G or your Wi-Fi connection. You’d think that the already existing Verizon software for Mac would provide an on-ramp to the web over Wi-Fi, no?

 source:jkontherun