You've heard the announcements before, it was popular in the early '00's for city's around the world to announce they were going to have free wifi citywide. Then the years went by and companies pulled out of the projects, went out of business, or they turned it into a pay-only wifi option.

This week the city of Rotterdam announced that they're getting back into the free public wifi game. As of January 2010, next month, anyone on the street in the city center, will be able to access the citywide wifi system. They haven't mentioned any limitations on this system other than the fact that for those indoors, the signal will not work or will be weak at best.

I'm especially happy about this as in previous years I've heard from tourists who have their laptops or wifi-enabled mobile devices who are looking for a specific address in Rotterdam but could not find a convenient place with open wifi. Looks like the wait is almost over, next thing you know we will all be sitting around in public parks and street corners checking our email and updating facebook.