Useful to Brooklynites? Only if your soul belongs to Midtown

If you’re one of the schlubs like me who has to take the train into Midtown for work, then you have probably seen these janky blue cardboard signs pasted onto various subway entrances advertising free wifi at the station. No, this isn’t some kind of crude underground (har har) art experiment. There really is free wifi at these stations, thanks to Governor Cuomo and something called HT CONE. Can’t keep track of where all the stations are? There’s a handy map now. (more…)

If this is your office, here’s some things to think about

It’s getting to be the time of year when freelancers and work-at-home types can finally stop feeling jealous of their office job friends because they have things like “stability” and “health insurance.” Who’s ever heard good news from a doctor anyway? The reason we can start lording things over those palookas is because it’s working outside season! Well, if you can even concentrate in the face of all the short shorts and sundresses and tattooed shirtless dudes. Whether you want to work at an eatery with a nice outdoor space or want to hang out in a park like we might be doing now, it’s important to actually get work done while you’re outside. Jen Doll at The Atlantic had a few tips for you sun-worshipping freelancers. (more…)

Check Rupert’s twitter feed, via free wifi all month.

For some not-quite-clear reason other than maybe that Rupert Murdoch is the last crazy tycoon standing in the newspaper game, the Wall Street Journal is providing free wifi in a ton of spots throughout the city through September. You have to sign up for a free WSJ account to access it. The wifi is available at dozens of spots around the borough; the Brooklyn ones are listed below. (more…)

Reason #89: Super Summer Man is here! Flickr photo by Quiet Storm!

We tell people all the time that NYC is a great place to live even when you’re broke, and never is that truer than in the summer, when the city splits open at the seams and releases everyone into the wide open. The almost nightly barrage of free movies, free concerts, cheap drinking spots and no-cost revelry makes you drunk on the idea that this is indeed the best city in the world, even if you don’t have a dime. And there’s seemingly more every year. Here, in honor of  today’s high temp, our top 88 reasons why summer belongs to brokesters: (more…)

Now you can shop for pants online while commuting! Via Improv Everywhere

If your commute involves traveling through the west side of Manhattan, you will finally be freed from being forced to read all those boring books and magazines on the train and just keep checking your Pinterest boards instead. Google Offers and Boingo — that network you always see pop up in airports — announced today they’re teaming up to offer free wifi in six stations starting today through Sept. 7. After that, they’ll start charging, but the goal is to add the service to 36 stations by the end of the year and to more than 270 stations. The list of the free ones you can use starting today is below. (more…)

Your boss won't mind. Because the world's probably ending anyway.

Happy spring! Or whatever this is! Our fear of what this surely ominous early onset of warmth means is only offset by our disappointment that our favorite outdoor bars won’t even be open for at least another month. So until then, the obvious solution is to grab your machine and take advantage of the city’s parks that are newly enabled with free wifi: Herbert Von King Park, McCarren, Brooklyn Bridge Park and Prospect Park (by the Picnic House) and Fort Greene Park. Even if you’re working in the city, you can play too. Picnic work meeting, anyone?

Why do this when you could be checking Facebook? Photo via Flickr's Pantone261.

This would normally be an item we’d tell you to hold on til the glory days of summer, but with our freakishly beautiful (and surely a harbinger of doom) spring-like winter, you can probably use it this weekend! Today, Fort Greene Park became the latest Brooklyn public spot to get free wifi. That brings the total jacked-in parks in the borough to five including Herbert Von King Park, McCarren, Brooklyn Bridge Park and Prospect Park (by the Picnic House). See the full list of wifi-enabled parks, which now includes Central Park Zoo — so you can instagram your orangutans? — across the whole city below. Wondering how good the signal is? Check out this test drive in McCarren Park from Meredith Olson. (more…)

John Hodgman finally answers burning Park Slope questions [FiPS]
Book price inflation index [The Awl]
Special Jesus birthday hours at The Flea [Brownstoner]
Celebs, they’re just like us! [Gothamist]
Relaunching a dating site? That takes Nerve [NYO]
Coming this winter: wifi-enabled sledding [L Magazine]
Biggie biggie biggie, controversy [The Local]
Cheap cigarettes, too good to last [Daily Intel]

Free wifi has been creeping its way across public parks ever since the city announced the initiative this summer: McCarren Park  became the first to go online in September. Today, AT&T flipped the service on in two more: Pier 1 at Brooklyn Bridge Park and the Picnic House at Prospect Park (along with Marcus Garvey Park in Manhattan in Harlem, where you can go for some non-BK marathon watching). Fort Greene and Herbert Von King parks are slated to get wifi next. How well does it work? Brokelyn’s Meredith Olson took her laptop to McCarren to put it through the paces. See her findings here!

Already looking forward to the summer.

McCarren just became the first of the five Brooklyn park set to receive free wifi, thanks to tech ninjas who installed the routers quietly over the weekend. While Brooklynites all sat around, none the wiser, stealing wireless from the downstairs neighbor as usual, I donned my sturdiest flannel, braved the cold wind and set out to test drive the new signal before others discovered it and starting hogging my bandwidth. Sure, they installed it just in time for the part of the year when the parks won’t exactly be crowded all day, and the service is only free for a bit before you have to pay [Updated below]. But does it work well enough to make it worth lugging your laptop and travel coffee mug down to the park?  (more…)