According to the statement release today by NASA, "Astronauts aboard the International Space Station received a special software upgrade this week – personal access to the Internet and the World Wide Web via the ultimate wireless connection."
This personal Web access, called the Crew Support LAN, takes advantage of existing communication links to and from the station and gives astronauts the ability to browse and use the Web. The system will provide astronauts with direct private communications to enhance their quality of life during long-duration missions by helping to ease the isolation associated with life in a closed environment.
During periods when the station is actively communicating with the ground using high-speed Ku-band communications, the crew will have remote access to the Internet via a ground computer. The crew will view the desktop of the ground computer using an onboard laptop and interact remotely with their keyboard touchpad.
Ok, they don't have full access to internet all the time, but probably a few hours per day as the station orbits around the earth. Also, the access isn't directly through a dell/mac they brought with them, but rather through a computer on the ground which the astronaut will access using remote desktop. Still though, this is really cool. This gotta be the most interesting place to use twitter and marks the first step toward full internet access in space.
Now, here comes some fun facts from the statment:
Astronauts will be subject to the same computer use guidelines as government employees on Earth
This translates to as: no porn, no WoW, and the other 100,000 noes from the government computer use guidelines handbook.
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