June 3, 2000 - June 10, 2000

News - June 10,2000

TFI Sue AltaVista

By:mark @ 6:49:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

http://www.altavista.co.uk , the search engine that recently announced their unmetered package is being sued by Excite's ISP backer, http://www.thefreeinternet.net (TFI). The Register is reporting the following HERE:

"Exact details of the claim are not yet known but it's understood to concern an alleged breach of contract.

In March, AltaVista announced it intended to offer unmetered Internet access to Net users in Britain.

Despite winning the personal backing of Prime Minister Tony Blair, AltaVista UK MD Andy Mitchell would not say which ISP or telco had been recruited to support the service.

The High Court claim suggests AltaVista had entered an agreement with The Free Internet Group but pulled out of the deal at the last minute."

Kinder reminds us of that battle very few will remember between 3dfx and Nvidia over what technology the Dreamcast would use. If that's anything to go by then AltaVista no doubt expected legal action. They'll take it on the head because their new course will save more money in the long run.

Telewest Temp DEAD

By:mark @ 6:43:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Several Telewest users have let us know that in their latest bundle thousands of subscribers have been cut off after a major cable was cut/damaged.

Sorry we can't bring you more details, their status page seems to have errors and load as fast as a turtle trying to run away from humans. Problems are being worked on but we have no concrete 'fix it' time schedules.

http://www.telewest.co.uk

Plus.NET not so GOLD

By:mark @ 8:15:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Well no 'activation e-mail' this morning, as was promised, however that might be a good thing after you hear this. Some of our readers asked us to take a closer look at http://www.plus.net 's Surftime packages and we found the following:

1) Plus.NET limits you to 250mb (standard surftime) and 500mb (+Biz package) of data transfers a DAY! We can't understand, as it's not even their bandwidth (technically). No ISP has offered such a low transfer since satellite connections!

If you're a gamer like so many reading this then you could easily top 250mb in a day without problem. Business users are also likely to use over 500mb, depending on what they do.

2) There is a 2hour cut off on all accounts (bar 0845), INCLUDING the +Biz one, which we were told there wasn't.

3) All packages go up to the Surftime limit of 64Kbps ISDN, even though the +Biz package says it supports 128ISDN, in the details for the account that is told NOT TO BE TRUE.

So there you have it, this easily makes Plus.NET the most EXPENSIVE and limited ISP known to exist. We now hear that other Surftime ISPs are imposing 2hour cuts =(. When will an ISP support 128Kbps ISDN without cuts and data transmission limits?

It shouldn't be so hard because aren't ISPs forgetting they have to compete with Cable Modems and ADSL that have no such limits (mostly)?

RedHotAnt Respond to Problems

By:mark @ 8:03:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Finally it would seem as though the troubled (engaged) ISP called http://www.redhotant.com has acknowledged there are problems with its service. Today's ISN newsletter outlines as much:

"We ARE AWARE there are some users out there experiencing the 'line is busy' or 'engaged' tone when dialling-up to our service mainly at peak periods, i.e. evenings and weekends. You will pleased to know that we are not just ignoring this vital part of your service and are constantly upgrading our network. More lines are due in very shortly but you can guarantee the upgrades won't stop there.

We are also aware that a minority of users are using the system in excess of twelve hours a day! C'mon. I would like to take this opportunity to ask those particular users to be fair and give your fellow users a chance to get online. We are going to keep to our promises to upgrade our service constantly but it would be very helpful if the minority mentioned above would assist us to provide a great service to ALL of our users.

On the positive side Internet Support have re-organised their department to deal with all customer queries promptly and reply to ALL of them. The most important point to note is that all tickets logged on the VSA are replied to daily, and emails are on a 48 hour turn around at present due to the backlog.

I am told there is still a problem trying to answer all technical support calls due to the 'line is busy' problem but they are doing their best in the circumstances; go easy on them.

In a nutshell it is becoming more effective to utilise the VSA or email to get a response from the technical support team so give it a go, you will be surprised."

No timetable for any upgrades has been given, all that's being said is, "we are aware there are problems". Failing to point out the problem occurs anytime but between 1am > 7am, so it's NOT just evenings and weekends, it's almost a 24/7 engage tone spree. We'd also like the point the following insult out:

"We are also aware that a minority of users are using the system in excess of twelve hours a day! C'mon. I would like to take this opportunity to ask those particular users to be fair and give your fellow users a chance to get online."

Since they have a three-hour cut off it doesn't seem possible unless somebody has found a way around it? As such we guess they mean INCLUDING THREE HOUR CUTs and that's just plain offensive. RHA clearly need a dose of professionalism before they understand how to communicate with people.

That aside and their service can be quite good, the problem is getting on-line takes anything from 5 - 200 (possibly more) re-connection attempts.

News - June 9,2000

AOL Beta Test ADSL

By:zeon @ 10:56:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

AOL are giving their customers in ADSL enabled areas the chance to take part in a beta test. The offer is currently open to people on the AOL beta test list but will be offered to all customers within a couple of weeks. The price will be £59.98/month.

Thanks to Jon for passing the info on to us.

Plus.Net \ Surftime Update

By:mark @ 7:52:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Look down below and you'll see this mornings Plus.Net update, well James sent another along:

"I have just got in touch with plus.net whom say that there have been some technical issues and these have been resolved. They also say that they should be 'live' sometime between 2-3 am tommorow morning, again dependent on BT but regardless f9 will be offering some service by the morning."

Not to much of a delay and one we can live with, although I hope they get things sorted soon because I'm about to get disconnected from RedHotAnt and you know what that means on a Friday evening =)

Connect FREE Launching Unmetered

By:Ross14 @ 5:53:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Yep, it seems our mates over @ Net4Nowt are getting all the news today.

They are saying that Connect FREE are to launch an unmetered off-peak service in August for a fixed monthly fee, whereas all calls to the Internet at peak times will be charged to your phone bill at 1p per minute.

They will also have a 24/7 option later in the year too.

The FREE Call service will be available to BT customers and credit card holders only. Although it will be available on PSTN, Highway, ISDN 2 and Featureline. Customers will also be able to combine both channels, for 128k access!

More info when it's available.

Source: Net4Nowt

Demon Going Unmetered?

By:Ross14 @ 5:45:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Demon Internet have announced that they shall be launching an unmetered service later this month.

Although no "technical" information or pricing info is available yet, we do know that it will be based on the BT Surftime Package.

Source: Net4Nowt

AltaVista Unmetered Prices INCREASE

By:mark @ 2:48:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

This is a very interesting piece of news from YAHOO about how AltaVista have decided to increase their UK unmetered package prices, why you ask? Here's why:

"The search engine operator won plaudits from Prime Minister Tony Blair when it promised in March to connect Britons to the Internet for 30 to 50 pounds in the first year and 10 to 20 pounds in subsequent years.

But on Friday the company said that following consumer research and a recent Oftel ruling on unmetered access it would now charge just under 60 pounds every year for the service, which it plans to launch on June 30.

A spokeswoman said research commissioned by the company showed people would rather pay more than put up with the marketing e-mails and automatic disconnection AltaVista had proposed."

Of course ISPreview would speculate that http://www.AltaVista.co.uk first have to prove exactly what the added cost is going to do. It's one thing to say, "No cut offs", it's another to actually bring such a service to light.

However AA were keen to point out that prices could drop just as much as they might climb, all depending on the systems take up. Apparently the new service is to be based on the FRIACO mould.

Breeding Like Rabbits

By:mark @ 2:39:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

According to THIS article over @ The Register, the growth of ISPs in Europe is somewhat akin to the mating habits of a common rabbit:

"There are now some 4,000 Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Europe, according to the latest number crunching from Cambridge-based researchers Analysys.

While the number of ISPs in Europe grew by a third last year, the number of subscribers jumped by 75 per cent to 34.5 million. Net users, as a whole, increased by 69 per cent to 64.3 million over the same period.

According to Analysys, 42 per cent of Swedes, and 39 per cent of Norwegians are online, but only 12 per cent of Italians and 3 per cent of Greeks subscribe to the Internet.

In the UK, the Internet penetration rate was 25 per cent, at the end of 1999.

Dr Philip Lakelin, of Analysys, said: "The Western European Internet market still shows significant potential for growth, since it continues to lag behind the 45 per cent penetration on rates in the USA.""

We think it's only fair to say that Internet growth in the UK has STORMED up since January 2000 thanks to all these new unmetered ISPs. We won't truly know by how much until this time next year, however we wouldn't be at all surprised if 40-50% was in it.

Plus.Net & Surftime

By:mark @ 2:35:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We like so many others have been patiently waiting to hear from http://www.Plus.Net on what time they plan to launch their BTSurftime based packages (today). We contacted them earlier but as yet have received no reply; the good news is that one of our readers (James) was able to get through:

"I have just phoned Plus net re: BT Surftime. The operator assured me that Plus net are ready to go and poised to send out emails to all their surftime customers as soon as they get the go a head from BT. He said that this should be sometime this afternoon and that i should be using surftime before the end of the working day."

Certainly sounds like good news, however in the past BULK E-Mailings have had a tendency to screw up, we suggest that if you don't get a reply then wait till Monday morning and get in touch with them.

As an information piece we signed up for the +Biz package that uses BTSurftime Business and allows 128ISDN with no cut offs, expensive but the service benefits more than make up for it.

New Staff Update

By:mark @ 8:35:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Since there isn't much in the way of news I thought a post about staff would be good. Sorry for the delay but things never go quite according to plan @ ISPreview HQ =). With the whole 'cancer' problem and work delays/VD investigation, we haven't had time to sort through all the staff apps yet.

All Staff apps have now been sorted into a specific folder and are being looked through ASAP.

*Update*
On another subject, if a second window opens when you load ISPreview then please ignore it. We've complained about this and it should be removed from one of our sponsors rotations.

News - June 8,2000

CallNet0800 v FRIACO

By:mark @ 8:17:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Yep http://www.theregister.co.uk seems to be getting all the good news today thanks to their slinky (if a little incompatible) new design. This time around it's to do with CallNet0800's 60cents on the soon-to-be-introduced FRIACO unmetered package:

"He said he couldn't rule out the introduction of a new product based on a soon-to-be-released wholesale Net access product (FRIACO), but added that if this was the case, it would not be the kiss of death for CallNet 0800's existing telephony-based ISP.

Instead, any new product would exist hand-in-hand with CallNet's other services, he said."

You may remember CallNet0800 as having suspended registrations to the service in order to improve the network and get ready for an upgrade. Good to hear that even if they do adopt FRIACO, it shouldn't kill off that cheapo 0800 24/7 access some get.

Mind you with all these new FRIACO and BTSurftime systems floating about you can't help but wonder, will there be any originality?

Oftel on Unbundling the Local Loop - AGAIN!

By:mark @ 8:10:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Yep those cheeky chappies over at http://www.oftel.gov.uk have busy 'kicking butt' according to THIS article @ The Register:

"Oftel has banged the heads together of a number of telcos and hardware suppliers after they failed to agree to technical guidelines for unbundling the local loop.

The public and embarrassing ticking-off of some of the biggest names in the Net industry -- including BT, MCI Worldcom, Energis and NTL -- is further evidence that Oftel means business and will not tolerate foot-dragging over the introduction of broadband service in Britain.

Today's muscle-flexing announcement centres on the 'Access Network Frequency Plan' -- the guidelines necessary to ensure that any equipment installed by an operator does not cause interference with another operator's equipment.

It's a highly technical, yet very important, element of the overall plan to open up Britain's telephone network to competition, said a spokeswomn for Oftel. and broadband services.

According to Oftel, the industry group charged with producing proposals by the end of the month failed to come up with an agreement."

Good for Oftel, give those pesky critters a good kicking and then get us all more competition and cheaper net access. Oh and whilst your at it, go get one of those lovely beers over here STAT =) (Well its hot).

Madasafish Poised for Unmetered

By:mark @ 7:59:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

http://www.net4nowt.com have been the first to catch the proverbial smell of unmetered access on the horizon, this time from http://www.madasafish.net . You may remember we reported on them some months ago, well now it looks like they are finally ready to launch using the BTSurftime System (so the prices indicate):

"We are preparing to launch two brand new unmetered internet access packages from 10 July... do you want to go surfing?

Madasafish Freedom Lite
Only £9.99 per month (inc VAT)
for unmetered access during evening and weekends
Click here to pre-register

Madasafish Freedom 24/7
£24.99 per month (inc VAT)
for unmetered access all day every day
Click here to pre-register

Madasafish Freedom. It's really easy. We charge a simple (and cheap) flat rate monthly fee. You will benefit from unmetered (yes, free) internet calls either during evenings and weekends, or all day, every day - depending on which package you choose. It's that simple."

The 10th July launch date seems to be in time with BT's 9th July FIXIT that should occur tomorrow, meaning official BTS ISPs can finally go On-line a week after the proper launch =). We'll be reviewing two of the first BTSurftime package based ISPs before the end of this month, following that we'll also do an article on it.

New Stuff @ ISPreview

By:mark @ 3:09:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We've just thrown up another interesting article; this ones called 'Internet Safety & Security' and examines how secure you are while on the Internet. It has a test you can perform on your system to see how open to hacking it is and also talks about everything from Trojans to ports and firewalls:

"The biggest risk doesn't come from Trojan horses or wannabe-hackers, no; the biggest risk comes from yourself if you fail to protect your system(s). For the purpose of this exercise we'll focus on those using the 'MS Windows9x' operating system(s) (O/S), easily the most insecure piece of software ever devised. It houses some 65,555 ports and numerous methods for gaining access to them.

A port is best explained as a definition of data transfers, for example; systems such as FTP, WWW and IRC each have their own unique port for working in conjunction with your system. However many of us will never use more than 5% of the sixty five thousand that exist within a modern O/S because most ports aren't even bound to a particular system yet, this leaves the rest vulnerable."

http://ispreview.co.uk/articles/security/

Problems Update

By:mark @ 9:45:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

You may remember myself posting about how a family member was in hospital to remove a nasty bit of 'cancer', well I'm glad to say the operation was a success. Sadly we won't know whether it's a lasting solution for a while as cancer has a tendency to re-occur.

Well back to work for me anyway..

EzeSurf Update

By:mark @ 9:25:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Looks as though Richard (Eze Tech Geeza) is back from his time away and getting right into the swing of things again, http://www.planetinferno.co.uk has reported to us that he has made a service update about the technical support problems:

"New Phone lines that were installed in the call centre offices by a new telecom we are dealing with (for office communication only not net lines!). They are pointing at the wrong numbers and not distributing the calls correctly. The company involved spent all day trying to sort this out but have been inconclusive as to their answer.

In the meantime please be aware that the best number to contact us (and the only one pointing in the right direction) is 0870 444 4211, now it will still be difficult to get through.

Richard"

Things seem to be looking up, but that doesn't explain the poor response times on E-Mails. Hopefully if http://www.ezesurf.co.uk can get all the bugs ironed out then we might be able to award them with something =)

News - June 7,2000

BT Agree to FRIACO

By:mark @ 6:12:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

The newly redesigned http://www.theregister.co.uk is reporting on how BT has agreed to the new unmetered standard announced by Oftel & CUT recently (FRIACO). We already knew this but here's TR's 60cents:

"BT has confirmed it will comply with Oftel's directive and offer wholesale unmetered access to the Net "within a few weeks".

A spokesman for the telco said: "We have agreed to Oftel's directive and will introduce it (Flat Rate Internet Access Call Origination or FRIACO for short) in due course.

The BT spokesman explained a delay was unavoidable because it was "not something you can flick and switch on just like that".

He said the service would be introduced "as soon as is practical".

This statement of intent from BT is good news for consumers and service providers who have campaigned long and hard for unmetered Net access in Britain.

It's one thing being ordered by Oftel to comply -- it's another adhering to that ruling. Despite the obvious jubilation among pro-unmetered activists there is still a fear that BT will drag its feet over the implementation of FRIACO.

And there are also concerns that even if it does offer the wholesale Net access product "within a few weeks" that the service will simply not be up to scratch."

Good news all round, just one question; now that FRIACO has been given the 'all clear', what will happen to Surftime? Surftime still has its benefits, FRIACO isn't as cost effective as it might seem but we won't go into detail until full details are announced.

More at 'The Register'.

World Online Status Page Up!

By:zeon @ 4:49:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

World Online now have a proper status page that is apparently going to be updated daily.

You Can find it @ http://www.worldonline.co.uk/status/

Downgrading the Standards

By:mark @ 1:44:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

As a change from the usual hustle bustle and general turmoil presented by the ISP world, we've decided to give you a little treat. My sister sent along this little list of things some GCSE students from '99 put as the answers to questions they didn't know, we can't include it all so here are the best bits =):

"English

-Define the word "monotony."
-Monotony is being married to the same person all your life.

-What does the word "benign" mean?
-Benign is what you will be after you be eight.

-What is the correct use of a semi-colon?
-Only to be used as a last resort, a semi-colon is a partial removal of the intestines.

Technology

-What is a turbine?
-Something an Arab wears on his head.

History

-What is Britain's highest award for valour in war?
-Nelson's column.

Geography

-Name the four seasons.
-Salt, pepper, mustard and vinegar.

-Name a greenhouse gas. What could be done to decrease global warming?
-Cows make large amounts of methane when they fart. This could be reduced by fitting them with catalytic converters.

-What happens to a boy when he reaches puberty?
-He says goodbye to his boyhood and looks forward to his adultery.

-How can you delay milk turning sour?
-Keep it in the cow.

Biology

-What is the most common form of birth control?
-Most people prevent contraception by wearing a condominium.

-What is a terminal illness?
-When you are sick at the airport."

It's good to know that the modern youth generation are doing their bit to keep lowly examiners happy and all at the cost of their exam grades, how nice =).

BT & The ADSL Weekend Cuts

By:mark @ 9:11:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Those who are busy trialling ADSL through BT or linked with BT are likely to already know about the weekend cuts. The Register has reported on how ADSLuk upgraded their software and this caused some 200 triallists to loose connection:

"Two hundred ADSL users were left without Net access over the weekend after a software upgrade went wrong.

According to ADSLuk, the problems started at 5am on Saturday morning and continued into Sunday.

It claims the problem was compounded after Alcatel failed to inform BT of the problem.

A memo to customers from BT said: "Our Suppliers did undertake an Adaptation Layer upgrade on Saturday, and unfortunately this hit technical difficulties and caused disruption to some Customers on Saturday.

"All systems were rolled-back on Saturday evening to the status that existed on Friday night," it said."

Alls well that ends well and you can read the rest @ The Register, at least some people have ADSL =)

CallNet0800 Get Ready for an UPGRADE

By:mark @ 8:59:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

http://www.net4nowt.com have been the first ones this morning to report on the latest CallNet0800 Saga. It would seem the ISP has finally acknowledged there is a problem and has suspended new accounts for a pending service upgrade:

"Despite committing to a rollout schedule that was agreed in January, the availability of inbound connection circuits is now in general industry constraint. Whilst this would be of concern for any ISP, With CallNet's rapid account acquisition rate, the effect of such connection limitation becomes acute very quickly and it is this effect that you have noticed in terms of your service availability.

We are addressing this problem on two fronts:

1. The only long-term solution is to increase our connection capacity. We are working hard with our suppliers to affect a solution. Realistically, at this point, this will take weeks rather than days, so we are forced to take some additional measures to improve the general service level...

2. In the short term we have stopped activating any new customers and we have removed certain 'capacity intensive' news group features. Both of these actions will help the general ISP performance.

To ensure the best possible performance for the service you should also modify your dial-up connection settings to change the 'old' 0800 number to the newer, and recommended, 0808 105 0000 number. The new number will provide you with the best access method and provides a more direct call-routing path and yes, it is still completely free. This will result in better connection and better throughput. In short, we would strongly advise you to change to this number if you have not already done so.

NB The 0800 access number will be fully decommissioned over the next 2/3 weeks."

The above e-mail was sent out to all customers in the last 24hours, hopefully this would mean the service finally gets better and we can review them. Up until now we have avoided reviewing ISPs that have fluctuating services, how can you be accurate with such things?

Well the future looks a little brighter today so let's hope it stays like that for the rest of the year and hopefully forever.

News - June 6,2000

World Online Dial-Up Problems

By:zeon @ 6:57:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

This has just been posted on The Scream!:

"I am VERY concerned that some users are unable to access the WOL internet service due to engaged tones or network busy tones.

We have been criticised before for not having enough ports to handle the number of subscribers but this is NOT the case. We constantly have spare and unused capacity at our Remote Access Servers (RAS). Sadly it is the BT Network that is not allowing you access to it! This is a known and acknowledged problem.

Let me explain why. If a local BT switch or exchange runs out of capacity in routing calls to a non-geographic number (ie: 0845) then they Call Gap the service. This means that they only allow 1 in n calls through and reject the others before they hit the switch. The rejected call can come back as an engaged tone, or as a network busy message. By the law of averages, if gapping is set to 4, then one attempt in 4 will get through, but a better hit rate can possibly be got from not using the auto repeat dialer, but process the reconnection manually, and hence at a random time interval.

Call Gapping is a method by which BT switches protect themselves from overload, and fluctuates dynamically with time, but this does not help you, our customer, and I want to try and fix this.

In order to try and move some of the gapping problems, I have opened a mail address to log your problems. The address is DialUp@localtel.co.uk and it forwards to me personally. I ask you to send me your phone number, PostCode, town name, dialing time and the number of retries only. It will not be responded to personally, only the data will be logged. This address will be open for 7 days, and I shall be using the result to see if we can unblock some of the problem switches. I will post my findings back here after the 7 days of data acquisition.

I find it unacceptable that customers cannot get onto the service when we have invested heavily in the kit required to do so, and will do everything I can to resolve this problem.

IT Dept
World Online Telecom"

The post can be found HERE

We have had a few complaints on this and it appears that the problems have remerged when BT started to fiddle about with the capacity on the exchanges for the introduction of Surftime. Hopefully this can be sorted between BT and Colt.

Buzzline !DEAD!

By:mark @ 6:18:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Thanks to one of our readers (Catrina) for forwarding us a rather shocking announcement by the ISP known as 'Buzzline'. In a media sensation the ISP has shut its doors over some bad publicity they received:

"As you will be aware we were hoping to make bulk connections to our system to clear our backlog during the course of today (6/6/2000) and tomorrow (7/6/2000). These delays were originally caused by our company being overwhelmed by the huge response we received in the
early weeks of launching the Buzzline service, these delays were compounded by persistent technical difficulties which took some time to eradicate.

As a result of these delays our company has attracted adverse publicity which in turn has sponsored wild speculation and allegations in news/chat rooms. I regret to inform you that one of our principal associate companies has today withdrawn its support for Buzzline, they have cited the bad publicity the service has received as their reason for this. These developments mean that we will not be able to offer you connection to our service until we are able to make alternative arrangements.

We do not feel that a further wait is acceptable to our customers, most of whom have already been more than patient. We have therefore decided to terminate the Buzzline service with immediate effect. Some customers have had their card debited with £40. If your card has been debited you will, of course, receive a full refund. This will show on your statement as APCC Bridgend - Refund. We will process this as soon as possible.

We have made our local Trading Standards Office aware of the situation and they have confirmed that this is the best course of action that we can follow.

This has not been an easy decision to make, and we hate to let our customers down, but we do not see that we have an alternative.

Although a very vocal minority have caused us difficulties we would like to express our gratitude to the majority of our customers who waited patiently and even sent encouraging messages!

We are very sorry that we could not provide you with this service but we hope you will appreciate the reasons behind our decision.

Once again, please accept our apologies and thank you for your support.

Adrian Pollock
Director
Medias Limited t/a Buzzline"

This news does not as yet exist on the Buzzline page and until it does we'd like you to consider this an 'unofficial notice'. We haven't heard a peep about Buzzline since it launched and so can't speculate upon the full details behind their pending closure.

New Paid To Surf Systems Launch

By:mark @ 3:13:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Just a bit of general news, if you don't want to know about 'Getting Paid To Surf The Web' programs then please ignore this post. Well anyway, two campaigns that we mentioned towards the beginning of 2000 have finally gone live!

The first is GetPounds, a system that pays you anything from £0.50 to £1 an hour. Note this is based on an individual status and is physically limited to £1 per hour (25hour surf limit) even with referrals, at least until the system breaks away into profit.

The next is an older one called Cashfiesta, which has payout rates that fluctuate like AA, initially seems good. Note this one allows you to earn money while doing other things as well.

Expect a payout closer and ever so slightly over that of AllAdvantage, GP is likely to give you more if it works, especially since there's no need for copious numbers of referrers. All the links above have our 'refs' implanted, so if you join then remember us anyway =)

RedHotAnt Complaints Increase

By:mark @ 9:30:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Looks like RedHotAnt could be a contender for 'most complained about ISP' when we update the complaints page later today. From our own experience and the large amount of E-Mails we are getting, the service is once again on the fall.

This time it's not speed or server problems, it's the simple fact that most of its subscribers can't get on. For example, we picked out a random complaint from a guy called 'Mick':

"Difficulties connecting. Usually have to redial 10-25(+) times before connection. It wouldn't have been so bad if RHA had said that I'd have to dial 20 times before connection, then I could have taken or left it. It's this not knowing even after dialling all that many times whether or not I'm still going to get a connection!"

Being ISDN users ourselves, we only have to re-dial around 10-20 times (can't believe we said - ONLY) and that's with one - two second intervals. Now imagine how bad it must be for those with modems that take some amount of time just to dial the number.

Our efforts to contact http://www.redhotant.com have completely failed and this weeks 'Internet Support Newsletter' didn't mention anything about RHA at all. Their site has no service update to explain the problems either, looks like it's time to send 'Trading Standards' in =).

NTL Investigated

By:mark @ 9:17:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

The Register has reported that the 'Advertising Standards Authority' have been investigating NTL over their supposedly 'miss leading' TV ad campaign:

"The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is investigating NTL amid allegations that it has misled consumers over its free Net access offer.

The ASA confirmed it has received a whopping 13 complaints so far about the poor availability of the service and is looking into the matter with great urgency.

But even if NTL is found to have broken every single law in its voluntary code of conduct it appears nothing will be done.

A sympathetic spokesman for the ASA said: "NTL been a victim of its own success.

"It's more a problem of supply rather than a misleading ad," he said.

It's estimated some 600,000 people have registered for its service."

We couldn't help but laugh when we read this, compared to somebody like BTInternet, NTL is relatively tame and we receive very few complaints about them.

True they have problems, why not look into the problems with BTInternet instead, or perhaps take to the Internet and stop those freecall ISPs advertising for a service that's really bad.

News - June 5,2000

Care4free 1p per minute

By:Daniel @ 8:20:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Care4free, the charity ISP, has lauched a 1p per minute tariff. Here are the details about the new tariff.

"Care4free (www.care4free.net), the first and only UK ISP dedicated to supporting charities and the fundraising community, today announces that amidst the explosion of 'free' internet services and monthly charges replacing metered calls, they are launching an innovative 'no-frills' pricing policy providing a visible comparison to the numerous alternative services:

* No registration fee
* No monthly charge
* No change in telephony provider (included in your normal BT bill)
* No prefix dialling
* Simply a flat rate of 1p per minute at all times when online

Kelvin Trott, Managing Director of Care4free, said: "We studied closely the various new telephony deals announced by ISPs earlier this year and found them extremely confusing - consumers really need to read the small print before committing themselves. We felt that a simple and easy-to-understand offering was desperately needed, and Care4free now provides this."

Care4Free has over 245 charities on board, all of which will be able to enjoy the benefits of this service. The site provides a premium quality internet service with extensive UK-centric content and, more importantly, they provide a platform for the charity and fundraising sectors on the internet.

Seventy five per cent of all profits generated through Care4free go to
charity. The charities also receive their own web pages enabling the secure collection of online donations, improved communications with supporters, extended brand awareness and potentially increased membership.

The '1p per minute' service by Care4free begins on 1st July 2000 and users can pre-register immediately"

Its nice to know you are helping a charity out when you surf the internet. But its only 1p per minute and the people want unmetered.

Not around

By:mark @ 7:44:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Please excuse the fact I haven't been around much today and likely for the next couple of days, a memeber of my family is having a lump of 'Cancer' removed and my time is better spent with them.

AltaVista Unmetered Details

By:Ross14 @ 5:25:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

AltaVista have finally announced the details of their unmetered ISP. We have included as much as we can:

Launching on the 30th June, users shall need to pay an initial sign-up fee of £59 - this was more than anticipated. This fee includes VAT.

There will be no monthly fees (although the £59 can be split up into 12 monthly payments), no minimum spend on voice calls and no need to change telephone service. However, there will be an annual renewal charge, which has yet to be decided.

AltaVista admitted that the pricing is more expensive than it first anticipated, but said the increase was needed because it had decided not to bombard users with adverts and marketing email to generate revenue.

AltaVista said the pricing, including the £59, could go down once BT announces how much it will charge for its wholesale unmetered service - called Friaco (flat rate internet access call origination) -that regulator Oftel last week ruled it must offer.

Andy Mitchell, managing director of AltaVista UK, said: "As the first company to recognise the need for free internet access in the UK, AltaVista's leading the industry in explaining the implications of this change. We will also be the first to bring the real benefits of Friaco to our customers."

Customers will not need to change their phone operator and the service has no time limit. Although Mitchell said a cut-off after two hours of activity may be introduced to maintain service quality. He also added that calls to support lines will be charged at National Rates.

So what do you think? We honestly think that AltaVista have thought this out well. They haven't "rushed" in like most other unmetered ISP's out there so the outlook is promising. But we don't think that AltaVista were the, and we quote "first company to recognise the need for free internet access in the U.K." I think AOL may have a say in that one, =)

Post your comments.

Source: Vnunet.com

New Stuff @ ISPreview

By:mark @ 9:24:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We've just thrown up yet another article that follows on from our 'Initial Unmetered Report', this one looks at the serious lack of customer support provided by modern 'FreeCall' ISPs in the UK:

"Nobody's perfect, but when some 90% of freecall ISPs neglect one of the most important aspects of the system, somebody has to take stock and get the word out. Sadly ISPs have been doing just that, in an effort to boost profits and reach ever closer to the 'break away' point, ISPs have been neglecting customer support."

It's called 'Unmetered Support' and you can read it here:
http://www.ispreview.co.uk/articles/support/

News - June 4,2000

ISPreview Weekly Update

By:mark @ 10:19:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

It certainly hasn't been a week without its surprises, what with the BTSurftime problems and the strange goings on at VisualDepth. Still that aside and we're back on track to announce a few new things for the coming weeks.

First up is the mailing list, we've changed systems and the new one is a lot more 'user manageable' that the old. As a plus it also supports HTML, although we will only make minor use of that feature so as not to alienate people with TEXT only E-Mail. You will need to re-add yourselves as the old list was removed (bottom left nav).

Then we have the ranking system, lovely as it may be the current system is limited to '20' and doesn't rank by rating and instead by votes. We've just purchase the commercial version which thankfully does everything the other couldn't, as such our 'Top20' will now become '50'. The new system is being worked on and should go live soon.

Next is the chat system, the current one is ok but only allows us limited chat controls and could be faster. As such we are investing quite a bit of money in a commercial web based chat that will allow us to do a whole lot more than most people thought possible. However the most complicated things aren't implemented yet, but our new system will be extremely good and should go on-line at the end of June.

Lastly we come to ISPreview itself, the font styles and sizes throughout the site are being streamlined. Everything will be normal writing size once finished, so you should all be able to read it no matter what res. So far our testing hasn't gone well, there simply isn't enough room in the tables so this may mean yet more small changes. Yet we WILL do it, hopefully by the end of July as I'll be working abroad for the first two weeks in July.

That just about covers it, hopefully we'll have some of those systems on-line for you next week =)

Leave VisualDepth Alone

By:mark @ 9:46:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Somewhat acting on the behalf of VD, we ask that you don't phone, E-Mail or post comments about them until this investigation is concluded. There are no doubt several issues that have been brought to light, however please leave it up to us and our various backers to look into things.

Please remember that there have been NO formal allegations brought against VD as of yet, only questions. One thing we are clear on and have been from pretty much the start is that EzeSurf are not 'knowingly' or 'officially' involved (evidence points towards this).

We are contacting people involved with BTNet, Planet Online (VD don't use them, EzeSurf does) among others in order to get the truth. We will publish our findings hopefully within the month, however 'official' lines of investigation do take time.

We could also do with the help of two VisualDepth subscribers to aid in this investigation (contact me directly). Your details will be protected and nobody outside of the key ISPreview staff will discuss the issue.

That just about covers things, please consider the VD matter closed until we have collected the details that VD wouldn't allow us to have and published the report. Once again for those hard of hearing, VD offer good support and services, we merely 'QUESTION' their honesty.

News - June 3,2000

Oftel 99->00 COMPLAINTS Report

By:mark @ 7:02:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Thanks to http://www.barrysworld.com for letting us know that Oftel (Telephone watchdog) have published a complaints report from 31st Oct99 > 31st March 2000:

"From a brief look I noticed that, surprise surprise, LocalTel featured highly in the list of most complained about companies."

You can read the rest HERE and sorry for no 'specific' quotes but we're on RedHotAnt just like Barrysworld, so for some reason it's impossible to access the site. On a side note, there are several hundred sites in the UK that RHA users can't see, but almost all others can.