The Downtown Mall has WiFi now, Rachana Dixit reminds us in the Daily Progress today, and people are digging it. As a part of the completed overhaul of the Mall, the city is spending $29k/year to blanket the area with free high-speed wireless. The same thing has been done in cities across the country in order to encourage tourists to linger and businesses to locate in the vicinity. I’ve used it just once so far, on my iPhone—you’ve got to click through a license agreement in your browser to get started, but from there it was just like at home, only faster.
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Sideblog
Police announced this afternoon that their investigation into what was initially believed to be a fatal fire on Rugby Avenue is now a homicide investigation. #
The Virginia Supreme Court has denied George Huguely’s appeal. His second-degree murder conviction will stand, WRIC reports. #
In a carefully worded story, and not citing specific sources, WTVR reports that forensic evidence belonging to Jesse Matthew Jr., the main suspect in the disappearance of Hannah Graham, matches forensic evidence collected during the investigation of Morgan Harrington’s 2009 murder. #
In the wake of Hannah Graham’s disappearance, and the evidence that came from private security footage, city officials are revisiting the question of installing security cameras on the downtown mall. #
Both Charlottesville Registrar Sheri Iachetta and former Electoral Board member Stephanie Commander have turned themselves in to the police on
foursix and four felony counts of embezzlement, respectively. #Ten years ago, the National Institutes of Health budget doubled and schools like the University of Virginia built massive new research facilities. A decade later, those buildings remain largely underutilized. NPR visits UVA in this story on the effect of federal binge and spurge spending in the sciences. #
In 2012, Council approved a new student housing complex on West Main—now some council members are questioning whether what they were shown matches what was built. #
The Architectural Review Board has approved a bike-themed mural on West Market, below the McGuffey Art Center, although at least one member expressed concerns that it might look like the bicyclists were riding away from Charlottesville’s downtown. #
City Police Chief Tim Longo is meeting with city leaders to work on protocols regarding the use of military surplus police weapons in Charlottesville. #
A 100-year-old Colonnades resident received military honors for her service in the WWII Women’s Army Corps #
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Apropos story from Ft. Lauderdale on June 9:
Dangers of using Wi-Fi often overlooked; hackers can easily intercept your files.
By Andrew Tran | South Florida Sun Sentinel
2:42 PM EDT, June 8, 2009
Locked out of his dorm at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Chuck Forbes was desperate for an open wireless Internet connection.
He knew it could be unsafe because his family’s home computer network had been compromised by using an unsecured signal. Still, he wasn’t worried.
“I just don’t have much stuff that’s interesting,” he said.
While an unsecured wireless Internet connection may be the only way for some people to get online, for others it can be an opportunity for illegal activity.
Read the rest…
Ms Christian, I appreciate your bringing up the matter of security, though I’m afraid that I did have to truncate your content. It’s not fair (or legal) to the Sun Sentinel to reproduce their whole story here, so I truncated it after the introduction and added a link to read the whole article on the paper’s website.
It didn’t seem to work for me last Friday. I had a strong signal on my Dell Axim, but no access. I was headed to the library also, and had no problems there.
My browser never got to the license agreement.