ON 7 JUNE, 2004, Apple proudly unveiled AirPort Express. It was a 802.11g mobile base station that could be plugged into the wall, providing Internet connections wherever the user went. It’s hard to imagine now, but in 2004 “portable” internet might require all sorts of cables and power supplies — it wasn’t as simple as opening up the hotspot provided by your iPhone. In March 2008, things improved further as Apple updated AirPort Express, introducing the 802.11n wireless standard which it said delivered up to five–times better performance than its predecessor. A second generation of the 802.11n arrived in June 2012.