As of Thursday, half a million Bangkok-ians will have access to 15,000 access points throughout the Bangkok metropolitan area. The municipal administration are attempting to alleviate some of the strains caused by rising fuel prices by allowing people to conduct business and transactions over the internet. This pilot program will run 1 year and each access point will allow people to connect to a blazing 64kbps pipe.

Though slightly better than dial up, one has to wonder how much bandwidth anyone will actually get. Nonetheless, this is a step in the right direction and should give WiMax a run for its money since this service is being offer for free. Next time Bernice is in Bangkok, I'm sure she'll have a pleasant surprise :).

Anyone living in range of one of these hotspots? Please do let me know how it works out for you. The Bangkok administration has been handing out access cards at most shopping malls and public places.