I had posted via email as to needing additional information from your escient. What router is it wired to? What is the gateway, subnet mask, etc... Is the escient on the same network as the pronto? If not, that may be the issue. Is there a firewall in place such that pronto is on separate network or escient is behind a firewall?
If so, then setup on different networks or behind a firewall, have you opened up port 251 (0xFB) for TCP communication such that the Pronto can communicate with the escient? Contacting escient through a web browser uses HTTP port 80 and one might think that this is OK (most firewalls allow ports 80 and 443 to pass) but not port 251. Port 251 via TCP/IP must be open such that the Pronto can connect to the escient via the external control protocol.
FYI, the script above that I posted, (not hieroglyphics) should give us additional information about whether the pronto can connect to port 251.
The more I think about this, all things reported here indicate that 1) you have a bad wifi xmitter in remote or 2) more likely, you have not poked hole through a firewall.
Let us know, please.
FYI, I recently saw this documented in the FP-1 manuals but no where else other than in the Vision and Fireball external control protocol specification.