rfmcdonald | [LINK] "The Best Cafes for Free WiFi in Toronto" (Reply)

blogTO's Tim has come up with awonderful feature: where are Toronto's best WiFi coffee shops? Tim is critical of how many don't support wireless Internet.

Free WiFi access in Toronto should be a lot more common than it is. But with the powers at City Hall uninterested in bridging the digital divide or otherwise undertaking initiatives to increase wireless internet penetration, it's up to individual business owners and non-profit groups like Wireless Toronto to make the internet accessible in more places outside the home.

In the downtown core, free WiFi is particularly spotty no thanks to the presence of Cogeco's $5 an hour OneZone and the lack of free WiFi at many of the major coffee chains. Even a number of popular independents (B Espresso and Manic Coffee to name two) decline to offer the service, instead choosing to focus on what a Manic staffer told me was "the enjoyment of loving coffee."

Then there are places like Zoots which could have been a haven for laptop-toting caffeine-seekers. Free WiFi is available but management limits the duration of their customers' stay by not permitting the use of their power outlets (the official explanation being that the building can't support the additional energy consumption from laptops).

As some commenters note, it's unfair to expect all coffee shops to specialize in WiFi since, after all, coffee is their raison d'etre.

The list, though, the list and the commenters' suggestions are wonderful!