Wherein customers ask me for support for ILLEGAL products...

[MadMike]

Wow, I can't believe people actually have the balls to ask for support on a game they pirated. Some people.

As for unsecured wireless connections, it's scary how many of them are out there. I don't normally use the wireless myself, but one time I was fixing a computer for someone, which had only the wireless, no standard ethernet. Go figure. When I started it up, it detected several wireless connections, most of them open, including one that apparently belonged to my next-door neighbors, called "The (neighbors' last name) Family." I only saw it that one time, so they must have figured out how to secure it, or they changed it.

Another time when I picked up son up at his grandparents', he had his laptop with him, and just for shits and giggles he turned it on and watched to see how many wireless networks popped up on the way home. There were a few dozen on that half-mile drive home, from what he told me, and most of them had "Linksys" or some other default as their name.

Ours is unencrypted for now; the trick is
creating a WPA key that my mom will actually remember (of course it will be written down, but I know that if her laptop "forgets" it she may freak out).

I used a website to generate mine, and then I saved it on a thumb drive in case another computer needed it. Just google the phrase "WPA key generator" and you should find something useful.

[ditchdj]

Yeah I've noticed over the years the number of wi-fi connection out there have increased. There's an unsecured one that I can pick up on my laptop sitting in the living room. BTW I pay for my own internet and have my own WEP-encrypted signal that I use. And I always encrypt my signal. In fact by next year I plan on upgrading to an N-signal router and getting an external hard drive to connect to it so that I can stream my music and movie files to my computer and laptop at home. I don't want anyone else accessing it without my permission.