Category Archives: Freedom

NEWPORT BEACH, CA--(Marketwire - Oct 22, 2012) - Fuel Freedom Foundation officially launched its campaign to end America's oil addiction with a major event held at the home of Eyal Aronoff in Newport Coast on October 20. The day's activities brought together leading experts and supporters who share a commitment to opening markets to competition from replacement fuels for gasoline.

Fuel Freedom Foundation was founded by Eyal Aronoff and Yossie Hollander, with the belief that the markets are the solution to ending America's oil addiction. If the markets are open to replacement fuels like ethanol, methanol and natural gas, this will break the monopoly on global oil, eliminate our dependence on foreign oil, and end America's addiction to oil.

The Oct. 20 event, attended by more than 500 guests featured remarks by Aronoff and Hollander, as well as Fuel Freedom Advisory Board Members R. James Woolsey, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; Peter Goldmark, former Rockefeller Foundation President; Gal Luft, Co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Securitas; and friend to Fuel Freedom Foundation John Hofmeister, the former CEO of Shell.

"The high cost of oil impacts our economy, our families, our national security, our environment and our health," said Aronoff. "We founded Fuel Freedom because it's time to introduce cheaper, cleaner, healthier, American-made fuels, like natural gas, ethanol and methanol into the transportation fuel market. With these fuels, we could have $2-a-gallon transportation fuel tomorrow. We are asking all Americans to stand with us to end our nation's addiction to oil."

"We have the support of the most influential business leaders, environmentalists, national security experts, intellectuals and thought leaders in America, all of whom believe the absence of competition in the fuel market is the biggest threat facing America today," said Hollander.

Stray Cats' Lee Rocker and Los Lobos performed at the event, and Sir Richard Branson offered his support for the launch of Fuel Freedom with a video appearance. Also featured were segments of an upcoming documentary by award-winning filmmakers Josh and Rebecca Tickell, and the winning videos from Fuel Freedom's first video competition, held in partnership with Chapman University's Dodge College of Film and Media Arts.

Earlier in the day, University of California, San Diego economist James Hamilton joined Woolsey, Goldmark, Hofmeister and Luft at a luncheon where they addressed topics central to the fight to end America's addiction to oil. Subjects included rising global oil prices over the next decade, which will cripple the U.S. economy, the threats to U.S. national security posed by oil, and the rapid development of replacements fuels as a realistic solution to oil independence.

About Fuel Freedom The Fuel Freedom Foundation is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to breaking the U.S. economy's oil addiction by powering our cars and trucks with cheaper, cleaner, healthier American replacement fuels. Consumers could easily convert their cars to run on replacement fuels for gasoline, but outdated regulations and entrenched commercial interests stand in the way. The Fuel Freedom campaign aims to remove barriers to competition so that natural gas, methanol, ethanol and electricity can compete on equal footing with gasoline at the pump and at the dealership. Achieving Fuel Freedom will lower fuel prices, create jobs, spur economic growth, reduce pollution, and improve national and global security. For more information, go to the Foundation's website at http://www.fuelfreedom.org; Facebook: FuelFreedomFoundation; and Twitter: @FuelFreedomNow.

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Fuel Freedom Foundation Launches Campaign to End America's Oil Addiction

ST. PAUL, Minn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Securian Freedom is a turnkey asset management program offered by Securian Financial Services, Inc. (SFS) that offers a disciplined approach to investing for the long term. It combines the investment expertise of the professionals in SFS Investment Resource Group (IRG) and the convenience of the Pershing platform. Securian Freedom is available for investments of $50,000 or more.

Advisors can offer a range of Securian Freedom model investment portfolios to their clients and help them choose the one that best suits their financial goals, risk tolerance and investment horizons. Client accounts are managed by the IRG on a discretionary basis in accordance with the model portfolios selected by clients, allowing advisors to focus on client investment objectives while building their businesses.

Advisors new to investment advisory business or those who wish to expand and diversify their practices will find Securian Freedom especially useful, said Richard A. Diehl, chief investment officer, Securian Financial Services, Inc. It gives clients professional asset management that includes ongoing monitoring and account adjustment, and its not as time-intensive for the advisor.

Each of the five model portfolios combines 13 17 sub-asset classes to maximize risk-adjusted returns They range from an aggressive growth option whose objective is the highest possible long-term growth of capital, to an income option for investors whose primary objective is current income. The target market is individuals who:

Securian Freedom also gives clients access to institutional share class pricing, reducing the cost and maximizing returns. Additional services include performance reporting; consolidated statements; online access; and email delivery of statements, trade confirmations and other important documents. One transparent advisory fee covers all investment advisory and transaction expenses, though miscellaneous fees may be charged, depending on the size and structure of the account.

Securian Freedom is one of many value-adds available to advisors who work with Securian Financial Services, said Diehl.

Detailed information about the program, including costs, is contained in Securian's Freedom program brochure. A copy of the brochure is available upon request by contacting Securian's Service Center at 1-800-820-4205.

Since 1880, Securian Financial Group and its affiliates have provided financial security for individuals and businesses in the form of insurance, investments and retirement plans. Now one of the nations largest financial services providers, it is the holding company parent of a group of companies that offer a broad range of financial services.

Neither diversification nor asset allocation guarantees against loss. They are methods used to manage risk. Investments will fluctuate and when sold may be worth more or less than when originally invested.

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New Securian Investment Product Offers Team Approach to Portfolio Management

Nayland Blake's hot-colored new installation at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, "Free!Love!Tool!Box!," celebrates sexual and artistic liberation as it played out in San Francisco during two culture-changing periods: the early 1960s, when the artist was a toddler in Manhattan and knew nothing of places like the storied South of Market leather bar called the Tool Box, and the early '90s, when the pioneering queer performance artist, as Chronicle Art Critic Kenneth Baker recently called him, was at the hub of the action.

"It was this moment that was post-ACT UP, post the activism coming out of the AIDS epidemic," said Blake, a warm, gray-bearded bear of a man who was busy mulling what to put where in this improvised project, which he calls a big installation with discrete parts. "There was this kind of flowering of a new sort of drag scene, a new art scene, an explosion of activity among a lot of queer people in San Francisco.

"The show tries to evoke those two moments," adds Blake, who was lit up by the famous 1964 Life magazine photograph of the Tool Box that figured prominently in Life's revealing spread on homosexuality in America. Many of the patrons in the photo, which Blake came across a few years ago, appear in the striking 1962 black and white mural Chuck Arnett painted on the wall behind the bar. Blake, who moved to Brooklyn in '96 but has remained a presence in museums and galleries here, has re-created the mural on a gigantic digital print on silk, which fills an entire wall at Yerba Buena.

The artist is also mixing things from his box of materials - plastic bags, an old wood bench and other discarded objects he found on the street outside his house, clown shoes, tutus, latex face casts and other things he's used in performances and sculptures - with personal objects from people at ancillary events whom the artist asked to bring something expressing freedom.

He's placing them on shelves on a canary-yellow wall (he chose the color because it had a psychedelic feel that suggested the free-loving hedonism of '60s San Francisco). A reading in the gallery last week yielded a self-published chapbook, and a studded dog collar in a red velvet-covered case.

Blake has also built some new things in the galleries. There's a hanging sign glowing with red and yellow bulbs that says "Tool Box" on one side and "Free Love!" on the other.

The actual Tool Box stood at Fourth and Harrison streets, a block from where the long-delayed Yerba Buena project would eventually rise, a connection not lost on Blake. It closed in '71 and the building was torn down. But the mural, which had been painted on a wall adjoining another building, was exposed and visible to drivers coming off Highway 101 until it was demolished a few years later.

"It's a piece of art that allowed guys to identify with something they only thought about in their heads before," Blake said, "and it counteracted the image of these people as freaks and losers. They're not tortured souls." He speaks of the moment in the early '60s when artists and "people in these sexual minorities" embraced the idea that "freeing yourself sexually would lead a kind of transformation of society. This photograph served as a kind of siren call to all these guys who were into leather, around the world, that San Francisco was a place you could go."

Blake, who hopes this show offers a taste of liberation, has also built a tall metal pole with crossbars, draped at the moment with chains made of black construction paper of the kind we all used in grade school.

"I was thinking of maypoles. I wanted to come up with something that would be like scaffolding," the artist said. "I like that it suggests a ship's mast and also a Christmas tree."

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Nayland Blake: Freedom key to Tool Box

KYIV, Ukraine, October 17, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

"There is a complete freedom of self-expression and no censorship in Ukraine," stated the Head of the Delegation of the EU to Ukraine Jan Tombinski. At the same time, he said, there was an issue regarding the ability of citizens to express their views through the media.

Tombinski mentioned that the Ukrainian media were focused on influencing voters instead of educating them. It is only after the election that it would be possible to see to what extent access to the media or its absence influenced the results of the vote, he added. Many international and local activists, including the international NGO CANADEM, indicate that media freedom has been an important factor for Ukrainian voters while making an informed choice at the October 28 parliamentary elections.

While the media in Ukraine is widely criticized for placing paid publications and spreading biased information regarding both the opposition and the ruling party, Freedom House gave free Internet freedom status to Ukraine in the organization's September 2012 report. Ukraine received 27 points out of 100 (maximum points indicate the least free environment) - the best Internet freedom result among the researched CIS countries.

"Ukraine has relatively liberal legislation governing the Internet and access to information," reads the report. The document states that access to broadband Internet in Ukraine is fairly affordable, Internet penetration in Ukraine has been growing steadily, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, WordPress and LiveJournal are freely available. The authors note that the backbone connection of UA-IX to the international Internet is not centralized.

Notably, in September 2012, Ukraine hosted the 64th World Newspaper Congress and 19th World Editors Forum. Almost 1,000 representatives of the world-leading media from more than 90 countries attended the event in Ukraine, receiving first-hand experience in the state of the media environment in the Eastern European country. International media CEOs had a chance to meet Ukrainian government officials and reflect on the issues of freedom of press and speech in Ukraine.

The issue of media freedom is particularly important on the eve of the parliamentary elections in Ukraine, which will take place on October 28, 2012.

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EU Ambassador to Ukraine: There Is Freedom of Self-Expression in Ukraine

By Daniel Greenfield

In 1941, FDR proposed his famous Four Freedoms. Some seventy years later it may be time to add a fifth freedom to that list. Freedom from Islam. Freedom from Islam would have seemed like an unlikely candidate back in 1941 when the worry was over secular ideologies, but as the West and its ideologies have fallen into a soporific state of decline, the fascism that concerns us no longer wears a military uniform or any of the trappings of nationalism, but instead wraps itself in the turban of religion. Of those four freedoms, three are directly endangered by Islam. We have seen Freedom of Speech being burned in effigy across the Muslim world, and even in the urban centers of Western nations. The Muslim bomb plots aimed at synagogues and the specter of Americas first, albeit unofficial, blasphemy trial, warns us that our Freedom of Worship is also under threat. Coptic Christians, who for many centuries were forced to live in an atmosphere of terror, subject, like all Christians in the Muslim world, to blasphemy trials as tools of persecution, have found that their land of refuge here is not so different a place from their old homeland after all. As Coptic Christian churches are patrolled against the threat of Muslim violence and one of their own is on trial for offending Muslims, they cannot help but wonder what happened to the vaunted freedoms to worship and believe, to speak and be free, that first drew them to this country. And third, Freedom from Fear, not a right but the outcome of a well-managed system of government, has been under attack by decades of Muslim terrorism whose purpose is to terrorize the non-Muslim into surrendering to its demands. Instead of freeing us from Muslim terror, government authorities have universalized it, spreading it about as much as possible to avoid offending Muslims by drawing attention to the motives and religion of their terrorists. Finally, there is Freedom from Want, which like Freedom from Fear, was an example of positive rights being snuck into a national compact based on the negative rights of minimal government, and yet it is interesting to note how the liberal mega-state has failed to uphold even its own four freedoms. Domestic drilling is banned, while the oil wells of Saudi Arabia and the other backward monarchies, that fund terrorists with one hand while slipping bribes to our officials with the other, go on pumping day and night. Gas prices in America keep climbing and the terrorists draw out those record profits to expand their sphere of terror. Despite all this wealth, created by non-Muslims for Muslims, where Islam goes then poverty soon follows. Even with wealth, the Muslim world remains a place of great poverty where powerful families and organizations control access to the economy and women are kept out of the workplace. Muslim economic failure has been chronicled elsewhere and yet it is worth noting that Muslim immigration fills up not only the prisons of the West, but also its social service centers. When Islam has the freedom to undermine freedom of speech and freedom of religion then no freedom is safe. And when Muslim immigration is unleashed on the free world, then freedom from fear and even freedom from want also become distant memories. Why discuss the Four Freedoms at all? Perhaps because they remind us that the freedoms inscribed into the Bill of Rights are meant to protect us against the abuses of government authority. And yet there is a more primal form of freedom that must first be defended if those freedoms are to have any meaning at all. Before the American colonies were free of British rule, the Bill of Rights could have no function. The first freedom, before all freedoms from domestic government authority, is the freedom from rule by external oppressive forces. Only when a people are free of foreign dominance and alien rule and are able to lift their heads and make their own laws without fear of their oppressors, can there be true freedom. The first freedom in the days of the American Revolution was freedom from British rule. The first freedom in 1941 was freedom from Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. The first freedom during the Cold War was freedom from Communism. The first freedom in our own time is freedom from Islam. The freedoms of our Constitution express a relationship between us and our government. But when a third party invades this relationship and imposes its will on both parties then the relationship can only be rebuilt by banishing this external oppressive force. When that oppressive force is comprehensive enough, when like Nazism, Islamism or Communism it represents both a physical means of conquest as well as a political ideology with its own cult, then freedom comes to be defined in terms of being free of that external force. Islam is not a subject for civil liberties debates. Those only address the relationship between a people and their government. It is not a constitutional issue because Islam already has its own Constitution, its own government and its own set of laws. It is a wartime matter. There are two kinds of wars: wars of survival and wars of choice. The war of choice is optional; it may be fought or it may not be fought. There may be compelling moral, political or economic reasons why it should be fought, but if it is not fought then life for most people will still go on much as it has before. And then there are wars of survival. Those wars are no more optional than fighting off a shark circling you in the water is optional. A war of survival is a conflict where an external force is determined to conquer the United States and eliminate the rights, freedoms and identities of all Americans. And in a war of survival, freedom is defined by remaining unconquered. Freedom from Islam is the fundamental freedom of our time. It is the freedom in whose shelter America can still be America. It is the freedom on which all other freedoms depend.

Daniel Greenfield is a blogger, columnist and freelance photographer born in Israel, who maintains his own blog, Sultan Knish.

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Freedom from Islam

A group of rebel pastors is breaking the U.S. tax code which prohibits churches and other non-profits from engaging in electoral politics

John Adkisson / Reuters

Pastor Mark Harris of First Baptist Church gives his sermon during the fifth and largest "Pulpit Freedom Sunday" in Charlotte, N.C., Oct.7, 2012.

Cohen is the author of Nothing to Fear: FDR's Inner Circle and the Hundred Days That Created Modern America

On Sunday Oct. 7, about 1,500 pastors of various faiths engaged in an organized act of civil disobedience: they endorsed political candidates from the pulpit, and many will continue to do so until election day. That may not sound like a crime, but the pastors were violating the U.S. tax code, which prohibits churches and other non-profits from engaging in electoral politics.

(MORE: The Decline of the WASP President)

Pulpit Freedom Sunday, organized by a group called Alliance Defending Freedom, has been an annual event since 2008. The participants are trying to bait the IRS into coming after them so they can mount a legal challenge to the politics ban. So far, no luck, though they show no signs of quitting.

Many of the participants are from conservative evangelical churches, and one critic Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Church and State has argued that the Pulpit Freedom clergy want to elect Mitt Romney. It is hard to know how all of the actual endorsements broke down, but Lynns take may not be completely off.

(MORE: How Romneys Faith Could Help Him Win)

Indiana pastor Ron Johnson told his congregation that for people who believe in the Bible voting against President Barack Obama is a no-brainer. Jim Garlow told Skyline Church, a San Diego megachurch, that he himself planned to vote for Romney though he did not make a formal endorsement. (Some pastors avoided the presidential race altogether; Mark Harris of the First Baptist Church in Charlotte, N.C. only endorsed a Republican candidate for state Supreme Court.)

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Pulpit Freedom: Should Churches Endorse Political Candidates?

CLARKSTON, Mich., Oct. 16, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --Clarkston, Mich.-based Freedom One Financial Group, a 401(k) plan recordkeeping and administrative service provider, announced today that Freedom One Investment Advisors, Inc. will provide 401(k) plan advisory services for Port Huron, Mich.-based Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C. Freedom One Financial Group Vice President of Strategic Growth & Development Errol Hau made the announcement.

Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C., provides a full-spectrum of health care for women, offering knowledgeable and compassionate obstetrical care. Freedom One Financial Group will work with Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C., to handle the company's retirement assets for participants.

The addition of Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C. to Freedom One Financial Group's growing client roster expands upon the company's continued storied growth in Michigan. As a Michigan-based company, the firm prides itself on partnering with other local companies within the state.

"By adding Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C., to our roster of Michigan-based clients we are continuing to expand our footprint in the healthcare industry, which is a critical part of the state's economic landscape," said Hau. "We look forward to providing them our industry-leading participant education programs, which ensure employees stay on-track for meeting their retirement goals."

In a prepared statement, JoAnn Brooks, Office Manager of Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C., stated "We recently decided to upgrade our existing profit sharing plan to add a 401(k) plan. When comparing potential providers we felt that partnering with an organization that specialized in providing advisory and administrative services for qualified plans was important. Freedom One has relieved us of a significant administrative burden, has brought us into full compliance and will save me hundreds of man hours a year; all while significantly reducing our fiduciary liability by providing independent investment advisory services. The transition was quick, smooth and professional. We have reduced our annual costs while adding a 401(k) to our plan, a real win-win!"

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Blue Water Obstetrics & Gynecology, P.C., Retains Freedom One Financial Group as 401(k) Plan Advisor

NEW YORK (AP) Brian Friel is a master at beginning his plays at the end. Even though we know the outcome, his compassionate interpretation of events and their aftermaths often sheds light on social issues both specific and universal.

His angry and deeply moving 1973 political drama "The Freedom of the City" is about the murder of three unarmed Irish civilians by British troops after a civil rights march in Northern Ireland. Friel's ironically-titled work is based on real events that occurred in January 1972, when British soldiers killed 13 Irish citizens in similar circumstances, on what became known as Bloody Sunday.

Ciaran O'Reilly directs a talented ensemble cast of nine in the thoughtful, quite stirring production that opened Sunday night off-Broadway at the Irish Repertory Theatre. O'Reilly cleverly stages Friel's multiple narratives, making excellent use of his small stage and cast, deftly showcasing a wide array of events and locations.

The focus is on an intimate setting inside a staid town hall where the three main characters spend their final afternoon. These ordinary civilians, later wrongly deemed by the official investigation to be "terrorists," have stumbled into the town's Guild Hall to escape being tear-gassed by British paratroopers after a public rally.

Scenes of their colorful chat and innocent enjoyment of the luxuries they find in the mayor's comfortable office are juxtaposed with flashes of the ongoing violence and misinformation outside. Stark contrast is provided by untrue statements from British law enforcement personnel during the subsequent investigation into their deaths.

The impoverished, ill-fated locals include Lily Doherty, cleaning woman and mother of 11 children, (a radiant performance by Cara Seymour), and two young men: Adrian Skinner is a sarcastic petty criminal, (Joseph Sikora, edgy and raucous), and Michael, a hardworking, idealistic student, who is given an earnest, uneasy air by James Russell.

Seymour is wondrously expressive, wearing a sweet, reflective and often mumsy demeanor. Lily offers up wry commentary as she and Skinner sip some of the mayor's fine liquor and open up a little about themselves, even doing some singing and dancing. Sikora is alternately impulsive and cynical, while Skinner's bitter flippancy seems most attuned to their possible fate. Russell radiates the uneasiness of upright Michael, who doesn't enjoy his companions' casual humor.

John C. Vennema is smug and querulous as an "objective" British tribunal judge who reaches inaccurate, clearly prejudiced conclusions. Politely condescending lectures about "the culture of poverty" are provided by Christa Scott-Reed as an American sociologist. Ciaran Byrne is appropriately outraged as a Catholic priest as politicians, the Church and media all use the trio's fate to serve their own agendas. Clark Carmichael mournfully sings a couple of ballads conveying the folk-hero status bestowed upon them.

Set designer Charlie Corcoran has effectively created the gloomy town hall, while dramatic lighting enhances each vignette and explosions outside increase the tension. "All over the world, the gulf between the rich and the poor is widening," the sociologist solemnly notes, like it was something new. Many of Friel's observations about poverty and power in this compelling work from four decades ago remain unfortunately truer than ever today.

___

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Review: 'The Freedom of the City' is angry drama

PORT OF SEATTLE, Wash., Oct. 15, 2012 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- Last month, the Port of Seattle was one of 15 employers to receive the Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award in a ceremony in Washington, D.C., says John Creighton, Port of Seattle Commissioner. The port is the first public agency from Washington State to be provided with this award.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20121012/CG92529 )

The Freedom Award is designed to recognize employers who support employees who have served in the United States Military. Since 1996, only 160 employers have received the award, says John Creighton. Port of Seattle officials note that the Freedom Award is the highest of its kind given to employers by the Defense Department.

"Receiving an award like this from the Department of Defense is a distinct honor," says John Creighton, Port of Seattle Commissioner. "Those who serve in the military should be respected and honored for the sacrifices they make in serving the country. We are committed at the Port to do all we can to support both active duty service members and veterans. I consider this award a great recognition of the sacrifices these employees make each day."

The award was provided, in part, as a recognition of the work the Port has done to help military personnel transition into civilian employment. The Port's Veterans Fellowship Program, begun in 2007, provides veteran employees with a significant amount of training and mentorship, as well as training in resume writing, interview skills and workplace etiquette. The program also provides veterans with 6-month work assignments that allow them to practice their skills in real time. According to John Creighton, Seattle has seen 26 veterans participate in this program. He hopes to see increasing participation levels in the coming years.

John Creighton has been a member of the Seattle Port Commission since 2006, and has been an active and avid supporter of the Veterans Fellowship Program during that time.

"Supporting the men and women who have given us so much for our country is just the right thing to do," he says. "The transition from active duty to civilian life can be challenging, and anything we can do to make the process run a bit more smoothly seems like a good investment."

Media Contact: Michael Linmore Linmore PR, 800-256-9168, info@linmorepr.com

News distributed by PR Newswire iReach: https://ireach.prnewswire.com

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John Creighton, Seattle Port Commissioner, Announces Employer Support Freedom Award

By Alex Colon

The Freedom Spot Photon from FreedomPop is a 4G hotspot thatgets you online for free. There's no catch. A free plan from FreedomPop is good for 500MB of data per month, with plenty of easy opportunities to earn more. Larger, inexpensive data plans are also available, and the Photon taps into Clearwire's 4G WiMAX network with aplomb.

And at some point next year, when it switches from Clearwire to Sprint's 4G LTE network, you'll need to replace your hotspot. But as it stands, the Freedom Spot Photon is an inexpensive, innovative way to get online, and well worthy of our Editors' Choice award.

Pricing and PlansHere's how it works. There are three different plans: Free, Casual, and Premiere. With the free plan, you get 500MB of data every month. After that, extra data costs $0.02 per 1MB (which works out to $20 per 1GB). Thing is, if you play your cards right, you may earn enough extra free data that you never go over.

FreedomPop has a number of ways for you to earn additional data. For starters, you get an additional 10MB of data for every friend you refer, up to 500MB per month. You can also share or request data from friends. But really, that can only get you so far. To that end, FreedomPop has a number of offers and surveys you can participate in to earn extra data. Signing up for the Chili's email list, for instance, scored me 22MB of free data and only took a few seconds to do. I even got a coupon for free chips and queso.

Offers range anywhere from 4MB of data to a whopping 2.94GB. Some of them require you to actually pay for merchandise or services, though most of them are free. All of them want your email address, however. Though paid plans are also available, this is how FreedomPop makes its money. Every offer you sign up for puts a couple of cents in FreedomPop's pockets and a few megabytes of data in your till. That's fine by me.

If you don't want to jump through hoops for your data, you may be interested in one of the paid plans. $17.99 per month gets you 2GB of data. After that, each additional 1MB costs just $0.01 (which works out to $10 per 1GB). $28.99 per month is good for 4GB of data, $34.99 for 5GB, and $59.99 for 10GB, all with the same $0.01 charge for each additional megabyte you go over. So while it may not be free, those are some pretty great prices when compared with carriers like AT&T or Verizon Wireless. They may offer faster 4G LTE, but plans start at $50 per month, and only get you 4 or 5GB of data.

Keep in mind that FreedomPop currently uses Clearwire's 4G WiMAX network, which only covers about a third of the U.S. population. Be sure to check out Clear's 4Gcoverage mapto see if service is available where you live and where you plan to travel. You'll also figure that out when you try to sign up with FreedomPopyou won't be able to join the beta if you don't live within Clear's coverage area.

You can easily chew through 500MB of data on a rainy afternoon spent watching Netflix. If you're looking to stream music or video, you're better off with an unlimited data plan from a carrier like Clear, which offers unlimited 4G data for $49.99 per month on the same network.And now that Virgin Mobile has access to that very same WiMAX network, it too is worth checking out for inexpensive, contract-free mobile broadband. You can get 2GB of 3G data for $35 per month, or 5GB for $55, all with unlimited 4G WiMAX data. Performance should be equal across the board.

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FreedomPop Freedom Spot Photon