November 15, 2000 - November 21, 2000

News - November 21,2000

Illness Strikes Once Again

By:mark.j @ 10:21:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Well it's slowly progressing into Winter and a time we associate with snow, rain, wind, cold and strange people that have long white beards and are dressed in red - yes the winter bank robbers. Either way winter is also associated with Flu, Colds, Hypothermia and a number of other cold and human-to-human illnesses.

Typically and as is always the case during the most work intensive weeks (perfct timing - not), a nice little Virus has struck me and found itself happily taking over my body - thanks little fella. His little friends are now happily attacking the old immune system and taking a break every lemsip to have a beer and then attack again.

As such my voice, strength and concentration are so diminished that working on ISPreview is out of the question until at least tomorrow - sorry. Usually colds (Mr Rhino Virus) last for longer, but hopefully this one won't take a long hold. If it does then it'll be Thursday before I'm back on my feet and so it's down to the other ISPreview staff to cover (Keep them in check readers =]).

Can't help but think that this is nature’s way of forcing me to take a break; well thanks for making me feel dead in the process, yeah thanks a lot nature! =). For those last people having a payment/billing ONLY problem with ISPr Freecall then send your mails to HERE and then CC to HERE, both will get you to somebody that can handle the problems further.

Redstone Boosts ADSL/SDSL Coverage

By:mark.j @ 10:06:AM - Comments (4) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Redstone Telecom is fast becoming one of the UK's prised Telco catches as they continue to be innovative with their use of technology. You may remember that not longer ago Redstone dropped the use of BT's ADSL for it's own and more cost effective SDSL technology.

Today it's claiming it can roll out services faster and cheaper than its bigger rivals for just that reason. Redstone specifically serve small and medium sized businesses; so don't expect any residential kit to be coming your way anytime soon.

The company is preparing to build roadside cabinets to house high-speed S/ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) equipment rather than fight for room inside the exchanges. This strategy would give it the broadest reach of any of the companies planning to offer the technology, and at a third of the cost of its rivals.

"We expect to be sitting outside more BT exchanges than anybody," they claim, forecasting shows Redstone could have 10,000 DSL customers by the end of 2003. That should put a competitive edge on things and give BT the wobbles.

The Big Break

By:mark.j @ 9:59:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

No it's not another snooker match on BBC2, but instead the reason why millions experienced poor Internet connections and or speeds the world over from early this morning. The article from Reuters goes to show just how much of an impact cutting a simple cable can have on global comm.’s:

Telephone companies from Singapore and Indonesia scrambled on Tuesday to repair a break in an undersea telecommunications cable that led to major Internet traffic jams for millions of users across the globe, including Britain.

Singapore Telecommunications said it had despatched a cable ship to repair the SEA- ME-WE 3 cable, which was cut between Singapore and Jakarta. The 23,600 miles cable links Australia, Asia and Europe and is one of the world's busiest Internet cables. The cause of the damage was unknown, but possibilities include a ship's anchor or earthquake.

"We still don't know what caused the cut and it's part of the international cable...through 33 countries," said a spokesman for Telstra, Australia's biggest Internet provider, which lost 65 percent of its international capacity on Monday.

"We have been told that it has impacted Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong, the U.K. and United States at least and possibly other countries as well," he added.

It's difficult to say how it might have affected the UK seeing as how most networks here rout on a different cable. That said and for a large population it was a very serious problem, one that's still not completely fixed.

xDSL Spreads By 1100%

By:mark.j @ 9:50:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

According to The Register, shipments of xDSL equipment are set to increase by 1100% over the next four years. That's from 1,000,000 now to 12,400,000 in 2004:

Germany is set to remain the largest xDSL market in Europe followed by Britain and France.

Growth will be generated by local loop unbundling (LLU) and competition among players.

However, according to IDC research analyst, Romolo Pusceddu: "Fully unbundling the local loop, however, will not happen in the near future. Unbundling access to the local loop will increase competition and could speed up the introduction of faster Internet access services, such as asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) and symmetric digital subscriber line (SDSL)," he said.

All sounds very interesting and exactly the same as we've heard before, the only problem is that even under LLU people have found broadband such as ADSL could well remain rather un-competitive due to prices set by BT under LLU for it.

C.U.T Looks @ FRIACO2

By:mark.j @ 9:36:AM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

The C.U.T (Campaign for Unmetered Telecommunications) site seems to have been down forever, at least under ClaraNet, RHA, ConnectFREE and another ISP that I use. Thankfully it's up again today and takes a complex/confusing look at the light and darker sides of the new FRIACO revision (FRIACO2):

The Consultation, which finally mandates a sustainable version of FRIACO, Single Tandem FRIACO, is enormously complex and we provide a summary of its core findings.

We shall see about the '£10 A MONTH' charge, and will not be satisfied until services based on Single Tandem FRIACO are shown to work; it will take a few months for any such services to be offered as OFTEL has set the start date for Single Tandem FRIACO to be 1 February 2001.

Even more remarkable than the appearance, after several false starts, of a sustainable unmetered service is what is said about the context of OFTEL's decision. OFTEL appointed an independent panel of experts to study the BT network and how it interconnects with other telecommunications operators' networks, something which has almost certainly never been done before, and the panel's report is embedded within the Consultation.

This article is not for the faint of heart, if you don't understand much about the internal goings on of a Telco then this is just plain techno babble - or business babble. But then if you've seen the original and overly complex document you'll also know it's a kids version of that =).

It's a shame C.U.T didn't include their usual practical examples to help explain things a bit better.

Connect25 Price Increase

By:mark.j @ 9:19:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

According to Simon Connect25 have updated their website with a brand new design, but it's not all good news as they've increase the annual price from the unrealistic £25 to £49.

They also state the modem to user ratio is a cool 1:3 (very good for unmetered) and that you can use the freecall number from anywhere, but not more than once at the same time or you'll get cancelled.

ISDN is still not supported and the 1-hour cut off remains, so far complaints about Connect25 have been minimal at best. Just remember that Connect25 is not big and so hopefully they won't take on more customers than they can handle.

Overall Connect25 is starting to improve on the mistakes it made before launching and so far things look good. This is an ISP for those who barely use the net and have no higher usage. Based on what happens with other ISPs, Connect25 will likely have a lower tolerance for any kind of heavy usage.

News - November 20,2000

Leased Line Monitoring Via SMS

By:mark.j @ 4:47:PM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

You're a businessman and you have a crucial leased line for your network, all of which needs to be monitored because it costs you money. The problem is that without taking on more staff, such a task can often be rather boring - yet crucial.

However according to netimperative.com, iomart (people behind Madasafish) have a system that can notify you via SMS the minute something goes wrong:

UK-managed service provider iowatch has launched its flagship service linkscan, which monitors lease line internet connectivity and notifies customers of technical problems via SMS messages and email.

The company claims that linkscan can determine where the connection has broken down, so the customer can identify it as internal or external with the ISP, which would help the client determine if its ISP is delivering on its service level agreement.

In January, iowatch will be offering linkscan plus, which will offer alerting and reporting over the corporate firewall, email server, DNS server and webserver, as well as the lease line connection. Simultaneously, the company plans to make freely available to its subscribers an internet index which shows how ISPs are delivering against their SLAs by ranking their performance for their customers.

Amazing New Cable Modem Prices From NTL

By:mark.j @ 4:31:PM - Comments (17) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Cable Modems have been around a lot longer than the likes of ADSL, although in relative terms it's still a fairly new medium. Despite this NTL have yet again shaken up the broadband market by chopping the monthly charge in HALF - according to CableNews:

The new standard price for the 512k cable modem connection is £19.99 per month, and this service will now be available to over three million homes in ntl areas (although still excluding ex-CWC franchises for now). A new 'starter' cable modem service is available in original 'CableTel' areas in Surrey/Hampshire, Hertfordshire/Bedfordshire, South Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. This provides an always-on 64k link for only £9.99 per month.

There are now two options for cable modem hardware - users can buy a cable modem for £149 or pay rental of an additional £5 per month on top of the standard monthly fee.

£9.99 .inc VAT for an unmetered/always on 64Kbps connection! Can you believe it? This puts a very serious perspective on the problems with ADSL and even a standard Dial-up unmetered connection. Many of us are still paying 10 times as much and it doesn't seem to be getting any better, if only Cable was better spread around the country!

Of course there is just one problem when compared to Telewest, NTL have been getting dramatically more complaints over service quality, speed and support.

New Article @ ISP Review

By:mark.j @ 3:19:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We've just thrown up a new article called 'Cost of Unmetered Part.2', as you might have guessed it's the second part of our original article. Unlike the last one and those we've done before, this takes a look at how customers use freecall ISPs and the costs they incur.

It also exposes the true limits behind freecall; the ones your ISP dare not state and then questions the pricing of broadband when compared to unmetered dial up ISPs. Why is dial-up so expensive by comparison etc.?

This is the last of our looks at the costs of unmetered ISPs, at least until there are some dramatic changes to the industry, here's an early quote:

"According to our own survey of around 600 people, the majority spend 2 - 3Hours online per day (around 31%), with the next biggest group spending 4 - 7Hours (25%) online. This is from a general survey, although is comprised of a majority that make use of freecall ISPs. The last group with any kind of lead surfs for 8 to 11Hours per day (20%) and the rest are a mixture of less or more than those hours we've just mentioned."

http://ispreview.co.uk/articles/costs2

Broadband Wireless On Track To Fail

By:mark.j @ 1:33:PM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

BFWA (broadband fixed wireless access), that was/is to provide a cheap and almost instant alternative to ADSL, Cable Modems and Satellite access seems to be coming to a rather poor end.

The seventh day of bidding has now begun and with clear signs that the sale will raise only a fraction of initial estimates. Not to mention there are no bidders for more than half the regional licences!

The total proceeds stood at £38.16 million pounds at the end of round 19, compared with pre-auction forecasts of a final tally of one billion pounds. Clear the government has dramatically overestimated how much money could be made in such an area.

Totals have barely budged since round 7 and are unlikely to rise dramatically because a 4th bidder from the initial pool of 10 withdrew today. The complex rules of the sale also indicate there will be buyers for no more than 19 of the 42 licences up for grabs.

Perhaps one of the reasons for this is that the BFWA technology might be cheaper, yet the majority will only cover 'city' based areas with very few extending outside of that. The problem is obvious; cities are not the areas having trouble with broadband.

It's all the places outside (many rural) and thus the technology would invariably end up being sold cheaper because nobody feels a need for it. While this might be good for the bidders (more for less than expected etc.), the government are in tears.

ETI Launches UK ISP/Telco

By:mark.j @ 1:20:PM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

According to netimperative.com, ETI (Excel Communications [North America]) have launched their own ISP/Telco service here in the UK. The article itself says very little, although a quick visit to their website does outline some information:

http://www.eti.uk.com

MyETI Internet Access Features

-Speedy access at 56 kilobits per second
-Unlimited e-mail addresses, (10 megabytes for each address)
-Easy-to-use search function.
-Personalised portal.
-Access to local and national content as well as ETI Corporate (and MyETI for Reps services if appropriate) ETI home page
-Access to local and national content, as well as the ETI corporate home page.
-15 megabytes free Web space
-Not a stand-alone offer, customers must be switched to ETI network (if customers cancel their switched service, this Internet service is automatically cancelled). It is not necessary for call plan subscribers to connect their PCs directly through a Smart Dialler.

Internet Usage Rates
per minute (pence) inclusive of VAT

Day Evening Weekend
3.0 1.5 1.0

To be honest in the current UK climate of unmetered and even lower cost Telco charges, ETI looks rather sour. It's a very limited package and one that on the face of it actually costs more than BT when you include even the simplest discounts.

Why anybody would choose to swap Telco for this we don't know, it's unlikely to draw attention at such rates.

Gamers Against BT

By:mark.j @ 11:00:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

As a favour to Kahless from our forum, please don't forget to take a look at GABT. For those unhappy with BT for not providing a good unmetered product to ISPs/Telco's that support multiplayer properly:

http://www.planetunreal.com/soundoff/gabt/bt.htm

Sunday Times Does Surftime

By:mark.j @ 10:39:AM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Being our usual day(s) off, we missed posting about how our friend David Hewson took a hook to BTSurftime. Yet what's really interesting is the bit about Dual Channel ISDN that he has also noticed:

http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2000/11/19/stidordor02003.html

"SurfTime should be particularly attractive to anyone using ISDN (or Home Highway in BT's termin- ology), the service that puts two digital lines down that single cable into your home. ISDN modems have the ability to dial into the net on both lines and combine the signals into one service. Bingo: a 128kb digital net connection, which is very handy indeed.

To make this work, your Surf-Time ISP needs to support dual-channel access - which Intensive will if you pay two sets of access fees - and BT has to do its job in pushing both signals to the other end. The last part is the hardest. Dual ISDN is apparently unusable on SurfTime at the moment because of some incompatibility issues with BT's network hardware. When will it be fixed? "Soon", or so BT has told the ISPs - it wouldn't even discuss the issue with a mere customer like me.

Here you see the nasty side of a deal like SurfTime. You are paying two sets of people for what should really be a single product. When any part of it fails, each can blame the other and leave you out in the cold, though, to be fair to Intensive, it did offer to refund my second subscription fee when the problems with dual ISDN appeared."

So as you can now see BT has indeed cut 128Kbps across the board, however the reasons we heard for it last week contradicts David's above. We're currently waiting for two of our BTSurftime ISP contacts to tell us a little more about what BT are doing.

At present the 'Dual Channel Supported' statement on BT's own Surftime page still exists, so technically that's breaking/bending the law.

IGClick Parody

By:mark.j @ 10:17:AM - Comments (3) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Customers are not happy with IGClick, no not in the least, in fact it could be IGClick that saves Freeserve from becoming the worst ISP of the year against RedHotAnt. Although to be realistic it'd have to get a lot of REAL complaints to do that.

Either way as more customers find a lack of working services, no support (none at all!), fluctuating and or random cut-offs and increased prices then eventually somebody was bound to take action. Usually it's a customer-to-customer help site, although this time it's just a parody on IGClick:

http://www.igcrap.com

WELCOME TO IGCrap.

We hope that you find a product to suit our needs.

We have an ongoing Bu**sh*t rollout to suit both us and us

Sadly the page is quite poor and they could have made it better, but then an artist might say, "ahhh but that's the point". Either way, those having problems with the service are probably quite used to watching paint dry by now and this might make a brief change.

FreeChariot Press Release

By:mark.j @ 9:55:AM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

The ISP/Telco FreeChariot have sent out yet another press release this morning. Only today it outlines one or two new Telco based packages on top of their current stock. Please note that all their prices are +VAT and not .inc VAT as many often forget:

Freechariot Press release MON 20/11/00

As some believe, the story of how life began is about as complicating as trying to explain the off side rule to a drunken orang-utan, whilst orbiting the central processing unit of an alien space craft which is in the final planning stages of the destruction of planet Earth.

Luckily, the objective of this release is not to try to explain such a daunting story. Instead, it is to quite simply inform you of the intentions of a young telecommunications and ISP by the name of Freechariot, which has been set up to challenge large money grabbing organisations which are too large to understand the needs of each individual customer.

Now seems about the right time to ask the question. What is the individuality of Freechariot? (Before you read the next sentence, I suggest that you take a seat and some deep breaths). Freechariot provide FREE voice call services and FREE Internet access 24/7. For those of you who have not suffered any form of ‘light headed-ness’, I’ll continue.

Product one – Free local voice calls at all times with just a one off subscription of £15.00. The line rental being £12.99 + VAT a month.

Product two – Free unmetered 24/7 Internet calls at all times, with free local calls on Sundays, plus 15% on savings on BT rates. With line rental of £12.99 + VAT. With a one off subscription of £15.00.

Product three - An independent 0800 unmetered Internet deal, for £15.00 +VAT monthly as usual 24/7. Alternately you can save by making an annual subscription of £150 +VAT. With this subscription you also receive 10,000 shares, and a free domain name if you desire.

***********************END**********************

Adenyke Alakiu
Free unmetered voice and Internet calls
Tel: +44 (0) 870 *** ****
E-mail: support@freechariot.com
URL: http://www.freechariot.co.uk

Being ISPreview we tried to find a drunken orang-utan and test their theory, sadly we could only find Elton John and even then he was stuck in a large pile of flowers. Freechariot are currently the second provider in the UK to offer free local calls on a 24/7 basis.

However it has not been made clear exactly what limits are imposed on such usage, as there must be some. BT allows you to have the first hour free and then after that it's local rates again, or you can re-dial (bit like an un-enforced cut off). We'll find out more details from FC later today, ISPs/Telco's are never very good at advertising the catches.

News - November 19,2000

ISPreview Site Update

By:mark.j @ 1:00:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Due to a bug in our survey (poll) script (will have to be upgraded/fixed), the last poll about 'Average hours spent online per day' has been closed. The good news is you can see the results here:

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/cgi-bin/Poll_It_v2.0.cgi?load=lastpoll

We've put up a new one while we attempt to fix the problem in the coming days, it asks, "What's important to you in a freecall ISP?".

ISPreview Weekly Update

By:mark.j @ 10:13:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Its been a fairly slow week as far as new stuff goes, mainly because we've been in lots of 'behind closed doors' discussion about how ISPreview will change in the future. At present the automated ISP listings are only a few days away from completion and following that the article/review comments system.

Right now attention is focused on the new broadband section we have planned, it's quite ambitious and so should take awhile to complete (End December/Early January). During all of the above areas we'll also be looking at a re-design of ISPreview.

People seem to like the way data on the main page is presented at present, although they'd like a more sleek/cool look. As such we're looking at different ways ISPreview could be done to accommodate this, it could well mean a logo change on top.

Oh and one last thing on the subject of changes and as has been mentioned in the 'Website' part of our forums for awhile, yes that Flash banner will soon be gone - was only temporary.

Right now our biggest hindrance is finance, we have enough set aside for the upgrades mentioned above, although in the future ISPr may become increasingly difficult to maintain. Obviously I myself have to survive and at some point I'll have to take a more important job (ISPr is Part-Time at present).

So it really all depends on how ISPr grows from now until February, rest assured that whatever happens news updates and reviews will always be commonplace =). At present work has begun on a new look ISPr, although nobody - not even the staff, will see anything of it for at least a few weeks.

No NTL & Telewest Merger

By:mark.j @ 9:47:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We missed this one on Friday, but rumours of a potential Merger between the UKs two biggest Cable Co's Telewest and NTL have now been dismissed according to The Register:

Telewest, the cable company, has dismissed talks of joining forces with NTL, its bigger rival, after investors said they preferred its debt structure to NTL's.

Adam Singer, chief executive, said the company did not need to go through "the agony of a merger," a reference to a Competition Commission investigation should the two, the UK's only cable companies of any size, ever did decide to merge.

But neither of Telewest's two major shareholders, Microsoft and Liberty, had expressed enthusiasm for the idea, he told the Times.

It's not so surprising considering that any merger would be considered a seriously anti-competitive move. There are other Cable Co's in the UK, although small, yet having a super cable co could well break the others up.

News - November 18,2000

Germany Joins Unmetered Race

By:mark.j @ 9:40:AM - Comments (9) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

The Register has come up with an interesting item that shows how Germany is just about to enter into the unmetered race. Their own watchdog RegTP is forcing Deutsche Telecom into offering proper unmetered access by the 1st February 2001.

So why are we posting this being a UK site? Well just take a look at the similarities:

Germans have been able to surf for a flat-fee since June, but the country's ISPs are hindered by having to pay for network access by the minute.

The Regulation for Telecommunication and Post (RegTP) told Deutsche Telecom to offer the service by 1 February; but the telecoms provider is non too pleased by the ruling, and is threatening legal action.

In a whingeing spree similar to Britain's BT, it claims its existing narrowband telephone network will not be able to cope with the extra traffic created by flat-fee access.

It looks like the Germans could have an even less fair Telco than BT, is such a thing possible?

News - November 17,2000

Vote For Your Favourite ISP

By:rich.p @ 8:19:PM - Comments (5) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Voting has opened for the ISPA Internet Industry Awards 2001. You can get to there website at http://www.ispaawards.org.uk and cast your vote. There are currently three categories available for consumers to vote on these are: Best Consumer ISP, Best Consumer Customer Service and Best Online Consumer Product/Service. The winners of the awards are announced 7th February 2001.

IGClick & The 30Min Cut-Off

By:mark.j @ 4:10:PM - Comments (32) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Including the three reports we've just seen on the forum and the two in the mail box just now, it looks like at least five people seem to be getting cut off by IGClick every 30 minutes to the second. Has anybody else been getting this?

Wireless Broadband Auctions Stop

By:mark.j @ 3:55:PM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

So far the auction of the new wireless broadband services haven't exactly gone to plan, it's already been stopped twice and today happened for a third time according to netimperative.com :

The UK’s broadband fixed wireless auction has been suspended for the second day in a row and compounded by the withdrawal of former bidder Winstar today - the auction appears to be taking a turn for the worse.

Today’s recess day was called by an unknown active bidder, as was yesterday’s. A spokesperson for the DTI’s Radiocommunications Agency said: “We had two rounds of bidding this morning before the recess was called.”

She added that each bidder has the option to call one recess day in the duration of the auction, and that it did not signal any problems for the auction.

Telewest Upgrade Blueyonder

By:mark.j @ 3:31:PM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

CableNews have just posted yet another article and this time it's about upgrades to Blueyonder (Telewests unmetered/broadband ISP wing). Most of the many upgrades listed are to be completed by the end of December, although some will go on into 2001. Here are two of the more interesting ones:

Upgrade of Bandwidth – Woking

* During peak levels of usage, we have identified issues with our NEWS service, blueyonder homepage and primary Domain Name Server (DNS). To resolve these issues, we plan to significantly increasing the bandwidth out of our Woking POP (at least a STM1 – 155 Meg). However, this upgrade will take some time to implement and we are aiming for a completion in late-December. In the meantime, so that we can improve our service, we will be taking actions over the next three weeks to alleviate network congestion. These short-term solutions will improve our NEWS service by upgrading the hardware and bringing back on line our Knowsley NEWS server. This upgrade should also improve DNS response times and blueyonder home page access.

Dial up Capacity

* Capacity issues have begun to resurface within some of our POPs. We are rolling out approximately 1500 extra ports to all POP’s over the next few weeks to provide high levels of modem availability when customers attempt to connect to the Internet.

* We are aiming to bring on the new CVX dial platform in Northwest by the beginning of December. This will provide us with a scalable dial-up solution going forward and also provide extra modem capacity to provide reliable connectivity to our customers.

RIP Scares Unions

By:mark.j @ 12:52:PM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

RIP has never exactly been the best three letters used to describe the un-regulated and un-fair new privacy act. Conjuring up images of death, headstones and Halloween will never help to put peoples minds at rest, especially when their worries are justified:

Unions called Friday for employers to promise not to spy on their emails to members, and to allow staff to send some private emails from work.

The Trades Union Congress said it wanted employers to draw up sensible guidelines with unions on how staff can use emails, following the introduction of the RIP Act last month which gives bosses wide powers to read employees' communications.

The TUC said users should be warned in advance that emails may be electronically scanned for obscene, indecent, racist or illegal remarks. They should be allowed occasional and reasonable personal use of email, as long as this did not interfere with work.

ZDNet go on to show some examples of how RIP can be used unfairly against staff and thus the abuse of such an act has already begun. But is any of this really a surprise for a set of laws that have no true regulation behind them?

Freeserve Shares Jump By 10%

By:mark.j @ 12:47:PM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Here we go again, more rumours (spread by freeserve themselves we reckon) that Freeserve are to be bid upon has sent their share price up a clear 10% in early trade. As usual Italy's Tiscali is supposed to be the key player, although now France's Wanadoo is also mentioned as being in the running (or walking).

As usual Freeserve have stated that there have been no changes since the last time such rumours occurred and the time before that and the time before that.. Tiscali denied it was bidding for the company.

"That hopefully draws the line on that," claims Freeserve.

Freeserve NOT Going Bust

By:mark.j @ 10:08:AM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

After the recent problems with Freeserve kicking customers it came as little surprise The Register thought they might be going bust. However Freeserve have now responding and claim that in fact the situation is quite the opposite, a stance that brings up more problems than had they gone bust =):

However, Paul has put the record straight. Last quarter, Freeserve had cash of £50 million plus another £30 million tucked away. Plus £10 million from the sale of Streets Online to Kingfisher. Plus their bank overdraft etc etc. So it's got around £100 million to play around with.

Losses last quarter were running at £14.6 million, so just taking these two figures we're looking at seven years happy commerce. But, hang on, says Paul, analysts reckon Freeserve we be in profit within two years. Fantastic.

Which begs the question why is Freeserve kicking off hundreds of paying customers, why is it threatening "non-abusive" users with bailiffs if they don't pay that £10 they owe, why hasn't it coughed up that £3 rebate, why are some people confused that they are paying more for a service than they thought?

An interesting point, but if you really want to look at things practically then how about improving service first? If they have so much spare cash then why not use it to take direct action and install more modems and bandwidth? We suppose that at the end of the day somebody’s pocket has to be filled, or what would be the point.

Vispa Delays Unmetered Launch - Again

By:mark.j @ 9:59:AM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

It's no wonder ISPs such as Vispa and ClaraNet, to name a few of many, have decided to hold off offering a full-unmetered package. With the FRIACO packages and LLU process changing so much it's becoming hard to know when to strike.

However, if ISPs wait too long they could easily start to loose their share in the market. Either way, thanks to Christian for spotting that VispaConnect have delayed their unmetered launch to January 2001 from November 2000:

In order to give us more time to talk to our suppliers, we have decided to delay the launch of this product until January 2001

Telewest Going UP

By:mark.j @ 9:51:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Following on from the NTL article, we also noticed CableNews had mention of Telewests Quarter3-2000 results. Results were so good that they sent the share price up by a cool 7.1% in early trading:

The company's earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) hit the top end of analyst expectations at £180m - a rise of 9%. Turnover rose 41.2% to £814m. Pre-tax losses rose to £475.3m compared with Q3 1999.

The churn rate remained unchanged at 14.5% (excluding the Cable London franchise), with penetration falling slightly to 34.9% of households - however, Telewest added 161,000 new customers to its cable service, bringing the total to 1.6m. Adam Singer, Telewest CEO, reiterated the "revised target" of 500,000 digital customers by the end of Q1 2001, saying:

"Telewest is back on track to reap the benefits of the digital age. Our current trading demonstrates that we are once again making rapid progress in all areas of our business."

At present Telewest and NTL seem to be the dominant (at least in the public eye) two cable operators - super suppliers. Although in the long run it'll be interesting to see how Cable Co's react to the new found competition in the Telco market.

Cable Modem Price Confusion

By:mark.j @ 9:45:AM - Comments (0) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

If anything you'd have thought Telewest various price trials and standard offers would be most confusing. However according to CableNews its NTL's turn to add a little confusion into our lives:

At the centre of the controversy is ntl's Nottingham franchise, which appears to be telling intrigued customers that the price for 512Kbps access is being reduced to £19.99 per month; this from thread "price drop" in ntl.discussion.cablemodems:

---
Its Official as from Friday this week cable modems will be £19.99 per month in the Nottingham area......Direct from NTL themselves
--- posted by Wizzzzzoo, 14/11/00

Then began the discussions, claims and counterclaims:

---
Hi wizzzzzooo,

I have contacted the relevant managers in Nottingham who have confirm that this is just a rumour. There will be no further price changes until the recent trial has been completed.

Please accept our apologies for the incorrect information that was passed to you.
--- posted by Ted, ntl: Technical Support, 15/11/00

It goes on like this for awhile with each contradicting the other, sounds very much like some BTSupport staff have joined NTLs ranks =). There is a £20 per month charge for the first two months under NTL and so unless NTL say anything else, all the rest are just rumours. Not to mention £20 per month is quite low, especially for NTL who are still having service problems.

News - November 16,2000

Readers Top 50 Update

By:mark.j @ 4:34:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

We know of three ISPs in the unmetered list that have been suffering from a serious case of fake voting by the ISPs staff or others. In order to help prevent this we've imposed a lengthier waiting period before you can vote again and also changed the ranking so it's based on total score (combination of votes and rating).

We will also be removing IGClick from the list due to the false votes being abundant with them and replace it with Connect25.

Genie Goes Unmetered WAPPING

By:mark.j @ 4:27:PM - Comments (8) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

BT's mobile arm, BTCellNet has said that its WAP ISP 'Genie' is to offer unlimited mobile Internet access for £20 per month. That's more expensive than Breathe.NET's offer - all according to Reuters:

"We're directly responding to the needs of the mobile generation who rely on the Internet to manage their busy lives," said Genie Managing Director Kent Thexton in a statement.

"Genie is able to offer the most competitive and compelling tariffs on the market because we are cutting out the middleman and passing on cost savings directly to our customers," he said.

Under the deal, customers buying online through Genie would be able to choose tariffs which offer unmetered WAP and/or text messaging as part of the monthly subscription. A pre-pay option would be available shortly.

Pre-Pay WAP access, that's sure to get all those 10year old yuppies jumping for joy =). Soon the under 12's will have full drivers licenses and allowed to run their own businesses.

Not loosing sight of the news item and this is a good move for BT, albeit a bit late and in typical BT fashion; way too expensive for a pile poo like WAP. Take that £20 and use it on a real unmetered ISP! – Oh wait, thanks to BT those don’t exist either.

IGClick Change Service Details - AGAIN

By:mark.j @ 9:51:AM - Comments (1) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

Thanks to one of our readers (Mike) for informing us that once again IGClick has changed important FAQ information on their site:

IG Click, the newcomer to the UK ISP market is fast becoming a joke among its customers, with poor service, booting users off, trading standards investigation and the latest underhand change to the contract:

They have amended their website as follows, to remove the wording related to the fact it is (was) an unlimited service:

http://www.igclick.net/ResidentialFiles/faq.htm

What is IG CLICK Direct Access to the Internet?

At 7th November:

It is a package from I.G. Systems Ltd which for just £30.00 inc. VAT a year, gives customers unlimited access to the internet without having to pay any Internet call charges while using the service.

Now:

It is a package from I.G. Systems Ltd which for just £30.00 inc. VAT a year, gives customers access to the internet without having to pay any Internet call charges while using the service.

While in a strange way it's good to see an ISP being honest that they can't offer an 'unlimited' service (nobody could), at the same time it's a another stab in the back for customers. Although FAQ's can't be considered as legally binding as T&C's, they are none the less just as suggestive.

Get Online In The Toilet

By:mark.j @ 9:45:AM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

In what must be the most entertaining article we've read in along while, soon toilets the UK over could well be equipped with an Internet terminal in each urinal according to UK.Internet :

It had to happen sooner or later. Internet-enabled toilets could soon be cropping up in bars and clubs around the UK, transforming bog-standard trips to the loo into multimedia experiences.

Dubbed the Viewrinal, a splash proof screen will be set on top of the urinal, bombarding the captive audiences with adverts, promotions, information or music videos complete with stereo sound.

The female version, the Viewloo, will feature the same media rich screens, but in the 'queuing area' of the room, where users are likely to spend much more time.

Now no offence, but why on earth would anybody login to the Internet from a loo unless they were very poor or homeless? Wouldn't it make more sense to imbed the screens into the tables of the establishment, in fact wouldn't it make more sense to do anything but put them in the loo?

We don't know about you, but after a few pints on a Friday evening the last thing you're going to do is surf the net! =). Some might even mistake them for a new type of loo and cause the effect known as yellow sludge; hehe, but we’ll leave that to your imagination.

Freeserve Apologises - Kind Of

By:mark.j @ 9:32:AM - Comments (2) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

When is an apology not an apology? Tick... Tock... Tick... Tock - when you apologise for something that still stands of course! That's exactly the problem Freeserve have just made in an E-Mail to The Register :

Freeserve had sent us a copy of its statement regarding the appalling mass mail of customers demanding money or the boys will come round. In it, it claims it didn't know the email was being sent out and apologises for any distress. However it then goes on to say that the email still stands and all those receiving it will have to contact Energis and tell it their bank details. What a cock-up.

"Freeserve was unaware that the email was being issued and on behalf of its service partner apologises for any distress caused. The request for payment by Energis remains valid. Freeserve politely requests that those members with outstanding amounts please re-confirm their bank details with Energis by telephone on 0845 0700066 or email at time-enquiries@freeserve.com."

It's a bit like starting a war and then saying sorry for it before charging the beaches and taking yet another country. That recent and rather dire film, Mars Attacks, comes to mind for some strange reason. There’s also one last thing that a reader from The Register told the site in the article:

You know those 700 naughty people that were kicked off last month for "abusing" the service. Well, four of them have contacted the Reg to tell us that, er, they haven't been kicked off at all and are still enjoying the service, this time free of charge.

Now please take note, BTSurftime does not abide by the same legal rules as an 0800 No. That means that if Freeserve have supposedly kicked you and then you can still login to the 08xx number, there's a good chance you could be paying standard BT rates.

Don't take a risk on getting something for nothing with BT, they're not easy people to deal with and will find someway of making you pay.

News - November 15,2000

C&W Top First-Half Profit Expectations

By:mark.j @ 4:59:PM - Comments (7) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE]

According to the general information and news/media source, Reuters, C&W (Cable & Wireless) have topped expectations of what their first-half (2000) profits would look like:

Cable & Wireless has posted stronger-than-expected first-half profits as it pushes ahead with its transformation into a global Internet services group.

C&W said profit before tax and exceptional items was 537 million pounds, beating analyst forecasts of around 487 million. Pre-tax profits rose 33 percent to 4.59 billion pounds.

Then now perhaps the NTL owned group can put some of that extra cash into giving their ISP customers proper NTL unmetered access!