IT IS SM's greatest feature as it launched its free access wifi zone anywhere inside the mall.

SM regional manager for Mindanao Debby A. Go led the switch-on of its wifi access on October 30, together with Joanne A. Abrogar, operations manager, Cyberzone, SM Supermalls; Jennifer D. Silan, head, sales and marketing of Philcom; Russel D. Alaba, group brand manager, Vismin, SM; Jay J. Mandulara, brand manager; and Bert Barriga, vice president, Davao ICT Council.

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Go said the SM mall in Cagayan de Oro City is also a wifi zone, saying that they wanted to also provide people in Mindanao free access to Internet.

Abrogar said SM Davao is the 24th mall that they had installed the connection and five more malls will be equipped with wifi access before the end of 2009.

She said by the first quarter of 2010, all the 36 malls around the country will have Internet access, one of the value-added services within SM malls with Philcom as their wifi provider.

Meanwhile, Silan said with six megabyte per second, the wifi access at SM can allow 1,500 users simultaneously even as she said that one can get connected anytime in the mall.

Both Abrogar and Silan said they carefully studied the access, including the ban of restricted sites while people access the connection within SM.

Abrogar, however, said that as part of their corporate social responsibility, (CSR) they pay particular attention of banning strictly restricted sites.

She said they had set up a monitoring system even as she encouraged the public to report to SM management any suspicious sites being used.

She said this is a free access and they encouraged the cooperation of everyone inorder to maintain continuous connectivity.

The Davao ICT Council welcomed this new development even as Barriga reminded the public that what SM had offered to Dabawenyos should be put to good use.

Barriga noted that the move of SM to align with ICT sector is a milestone and with that in itself is a manifestation that SM is the key to push for community development.

He said with a bandwidth that runs faster, this is already an advantage and we need to capitalize on this by using it to good use.

He said this is also an opportune time as Davao is now a global player considering that many business process outsourcing companies are eyeing the city as expansion area.

Part of the launch activity is a photo blogging seminar workshop by Davao's first female web designer and freelance journalist Jojie Alcantara.

Alcantara said visuals are important in any website but she said that with everybody now into blogging it is also important that bloggers know some journalism ethics.

"Other than sharing with the participants techniques on photo blogging it is best for them to know that there are ethics to follow because ethics in the formal media also applies in the Internet," she said.

She said this is part of my advocacy to let people understand and learn some media ethics. (Prix D. Banzon)