Last week, when my kids were still in school, I took my car to the dealership to get it serviced. When I went into the waiting room, I found a table to sit at and got my laptop out. I clicked to connect to the wireless network and smiled at the thought of an uninterrupted hour of getting things done online.

But then an error popped up on my screen, saying I needed a password to log in. I tried clicking on the network again. It still didn’t work.

I got up and went to the front desk and asked if there was a password I should use.