One of the most under appreciated features of the iPhone is its ability to auto connect to WiFi hotspots as you go. With my current repeated travel overseas to a few locations, I appreciate the way that it picks up connections to free access points and those Hotels I have stayed in that use constant WPA/WEP keys that rarely change. So much, that I almost can get away with not using any roaming data as I ‘drive by’ pick up as I walk through the city.
Of course this works only when there is no registration or login mechansim, which points to the need for the setting of a standard mechanism for doing this which makes it ‘interaction’ free. We can only dream… although wasn’t this supposed to be what 3G data was for? Oh yes, but that was before data was made more expensive than Gold by Roaming costs!