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How is what Tony did any different than driving around the block, waiting 'til someone leaves, and taking the spot to see if there's any time left on the meter?


The difference is you don't have to pretend to be someone else to use up money in a meter, a better example would be one of the UK type parking ticket machines which issues a ticket with part of your number plate on, so you can't give your space away. If this was the right thing to do the WiFi company would leave a connection open for anyone to use until the time is up, but they don't the connection is clearly only for the person who has paid.

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On a semi-side note, what happens if I were to pay the connection fee, and then use my laptop as a wireless router with NAT and DHCP, giving everyone in the terminal free access?


Then you would probably be in breach of the term and conditions, most SP's don't allow you to share your connection with people you don't know. To read more about this issue look up the Fon service, lots of interesting debate there!

Cheers

Cris.