> The article doesn't quite mention it but back then the other option to get internet on a laptop was a dedicated USB dongle modem or Wifi hub thing. Those wer

> The article doesn't quite mention it but back then the other option to get internet on a laptop was a dedicated USB dongle modem or Wifi hub thing. Those were the only other options from the carriers; lots of phones supported the bluetooth DUN profile and so forth, which carriers would disable. So the alternative was to buy an unlocked phone elsewhere and activate it. This was essentially impossible on Sprint and Verizon but AT&T and T-Mobile could pull it off -- and T-Mobile's frequencies overlapped those used my many European carriers, so the best bet was to buy a Nokia from the UK or such and activate it with a T-Mobile sim back in America. There was also JoikuSpot for some of the Nokia devices.