Little mentioned feature of the iPhone – It’s a great WiFi detector.

Honestly, had Apple mentioned the fact that the iPhone detects just about every visible WiFi network you walk by, that would have been just one more selling point for me. I’ve been mulling over getting a Canary Wireless Digital Hotspotter for quite a while now. Now, who needs it? My iPhone automatically tells me all about the nearby wireless networks and shows whether they’re encrypted or not. (It doesn’t tell you what kind of encryption until you try to connect, but that’s more detail than the Airport menu on OS X provides to you.)

Why you’ve got the unlimited data plan with your iPhone.

My Treo’s data plan usage for May:

This month’s data usage on my iPhone (since June 29th):

Admittedly, I’ve been using EDGE a lot this past week. Still, wow.

The iPhone: Young-European-working-in-America magnet

I’m on vacation this week with La in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and I’ve discovered that my iPhone is a magnet for young Europeans working overseas for the summer. They all wanted to know one thing: Did I think that buying it was a good idea? Sadly, I had to tell them that, for their particular situation (the not-staying-in-the-US situation), buying the iPhone in the US was not the best idea at this time due to AT&T locking the iPhone. They wouldn’t be able to swap the SIM card when they got home, so they’d be stuck. I advised them all to wait a little while, either for the iPhone to become available in Europe, or for AT&T (or a third party) to unlock the iPhone to use other SIMs.

They also generally wanted to know how well it worked, and there I was able to oblige with a demo.

Only time I’ve ever seen one of these….

Yup, it’s a Pringles vending machine. I’ve never seen another one, anywhere else in my travels throughout the United States and Europe.