I spent four straight days inside the new Vancouver Convention and Exhibition Centre (VCEC), leaving only to caffeinate and head home for the night.

Sunday, I was at EPIC. Monday was Fjord’s Convergence 09. Tuesday and Wednesday were the inaugural GDC Canada and the International Partnering Forum.

The VCEC is a beautiful, breathtaking facility. I love the wood work, the vaulted spaces, and the massive windows that create such an atmosphere, even in the rain and fog. But it gets a massive fail for not providing free WiFi access.

Instead, wireless access – which is provided by Bell – costs $15 per day. Conference organizers can arrange to get passwords for their attendees, for a conference-sized fee.

I find this ridiculous and frustrating. We’re living in an era when free WiFi has become the norm for most public facilities. Even the airports are providing wireless Internet access for free.

The weekday events I attended were all part of Vancouver Digital Week. I’ve been at many press events and conferences for the video game and technology industries, and the common denominator? Free wireless.

I don’t know if the VCEC mandated the WiFi fee, or if it’s Bell deciding to make some money. Maybe the exorbitant charge is an oversight because nobody thought about the optics of wireless access in the facility.

But charging visitors and conference attendees for wireless isn’t going to generate much by way of revenues. It’s certainly not going to recover the cost of constructing the facility.

So the only solution is for whichever organization is responsible, whether VCEC or Bell, to drop the cash grab and make WiFi a free service for visitors.

[Cross posted at the Georgia Straight’s tech blog. ]