And they plan on making it just as simple as plugging in a phone. First, this scheme will require an Ethernet port on each notebook. Except for the lucky few packing Xircom's RealPort, I'll bet those 8-pin indentations are few and far between. And even if Joe has a PC Card with Ethernet built in, I'll bet dollars to donuts the PC dongle will disappear before Dallas.
Modern man is simply unable to keep track of more than one dongle at a time.
That trait has been hard-wired into us since our monkey days. But let's say, for argument sake, that we can overcome 10 pounds of baggage and 10 billion years of evolution. Anyone who has ever attempted to print from their notebook to a business-center printer knows that hotel staffs have the technical acumen of a raccoon. They can't even figure out how to configure a humidifier or an iron, let alone an expensive piece of modern computing. Let's face it, high-speed networking is difficult and our desktop operating systems don't make it any easier.