ISP down

[icarus]

Hi guys. My ISP (Earthlink) is down and has only been working sporadically over the weekend. Now I've had no internet access since Sunday am.

Any advice on a new ISP?

I've been annoyed with Earthlink ever since they outsourced their customer service to India. Other than my personal feelings about the loss of American jobs and corporate greed, the Indian customer service reps just aren't as good. I miss the days when I'd contact Earthlink and the guy on the other line actually cared and was knowledgeable, excitedly informing me that the problem I have is the nasty new McEvil virus -- then send me a link on just how I can fix it.

Now, I call Earthlink, and some confused fellow with a thick accent answers the phone. He flips through screens that are supposed to tell him what to do and comes up empty. He attempts some inept small talk that he obviously has been told to parrot. When he can't help me because he's either a) not that educated in technology or b) doesn't give a damn, he hands me a bottled, "I am so sorry for the inconvenience." Then sits silently on the phone waiting for me to accept my fate. When I try to ask him to get off his duff and perhaps try some original thought, creativity maybe? -- I get the same "I am so sorry for the inconvenience." And silence.

What idiot decided India was a great place for call centers? I lived there. They have some of the worst service in the world.

Anyway, back the subject at hand: currently I'm paying $21.95/mo. for unlimited dial-up.

I moved my website from the free Earthlink account to Slashcity a year ago. I've left my old website up so some people's story links will die (specifically dkwilliams's links at Inkstained Fingers and switchknife's links), but most people have already made the transition.

The move will take down the original Percy Fic-A-Thon site. But the Percyfest stories have all been moved to Percyness: The Percy Weasley Archive.

I've also migrated my email from Earthlink to Yahoo and Gmail over the last year-to-two years. So I'm packed up and ready to move.

Any recommendations?

Comments

[setissma.livejournal.com]

We have SBC Yahoo DSL - I have no idea if it's available in that area, but it's fantastic. We rarely have problems, they have knowledgeable customer support the few times we've needed to use it, it works through a phone line, and it's really not that expensive. I'm pretty sure they've got some introductory offers for something like 16.95 a month. It even comes with a browser that I personally love, customized sign ins for each user, a lot like XP, so everyone can have their own bookmarks and so on, and the speed is always a bonus. If it's available in your area, I'd reccomend checking it out.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Cool, I'm in Seattle so I bet it is available. DSL for less than my dial-up? It sounds like a dream. Do you know what the regular price for it is?

Icarus

[setissma.livejournal.com]

I'm 99% sure that after 6 months, it's 29.99, which is a bit more, but - not a ton more, and the service really is pretty great. We get ours in a bundle package, with cable and long distance and things, so it's 14.95 a month. I think there's a bunch of information here:

http://www.sbcreferral.com/Images/PDF/DSL.pdf

And if you call and they somehow need a referral number (can't imagine why they would), I could probably manage to dig one up.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Cool! Thank you. You know, a lot of my friends are using SBC Global come to think of it.

Icarus

[ursula]

The UW has free dialup, if you can wait till you have a student account.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

No way, really? I'm officially a student now (shhhh, I've been trying not to make a big fuss). I just have my orientation on Dec. 19th and need to give them papers that prove I'm not a measles-carrying marmot.

Free dial-up? From home?

Icarus

[ursula]

The phone numbers are right here:

http://www.washington.edu/computing/connect/dialins.html

I used it in the brief interval between moving to Seattle & getting DSL. It really is free, and I don't remember having any problems. You don't really need the UWICK CD the webpage talks about, assuming you know how to set up a modem connection, but I think you do need your MyUW ID and password.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Right on. I'll talk to WG about it when I get home. This'll be so great, and then maybe I'll migrate to SBC Global after I finish school.

Wow. Hey. This means I'll probably be able to log in to the internet when I get home, nevermind Earthlink's problems.

Icarus

[ursula]

Good luck!

[sharp-tongue.livejournal.com]

Congrats, Icarus! That's such great news. You deserve to have a fuss made over it. :)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Shhhh! *Icarus blushes profusely.*

I don't trust good fortune so let's wait until all the hurdles are overcome, I'm signed up for classes, they have proof that I've had my shots and don't carry worms or whatever it is and all that stuff. I'm still listening carefully for other shoes to drop so I'm not saying anything yet.

Icarus

[sharp-tongue.livejournal.com]

*covers mouth with both hands and makes big-eyes at you*

[dkwilliams.livejournal.com]

I had the same problem with Earthlink and I left for the same reason - well, also because they kept disconnecting me by accident and then wanting me to pay to reconnect.

I'm currently with BellSouth on their DSL Lite program for $24.95 a month. I've been pleased with the reliability and service so far. Hey, I know - it's MaBell and I feel somewhat like I've sold out, but they were my best option. They have a lot of sign-up deals, too.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm not even remotely surprised. Did you get the full "Indian" experience?

Icarus

[dkwilliams.livejournal.com]

Ohhhh, yes. Here's a link to my rant about them - http://www.livejournal.com/users/dkwilliams/46406.html - when we went round and round over why I should pay for dial-up AND DSL, got disconnected, reconnected, charged and assured the charge would be removed. THEN told to pay the charges to get reconnected and they'd reimburse me SOMETIME. And I could tell the person was going down a checklist, hadn't a clue what the situation was, because they kept repeating "But you just need to pay all the charges and we will reconnect".

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Holy cow. This is so typical of my experience with them, just not listening, not comprehending, not caring, but much with the bullshit.

I did get an American this morning (thank god). He told me that Earthlink still has two U.S. call centers left.

I am so gone.

Icarus

[brightsun301.livejournal.com]

Y'know if you're ok with dial-up Nocharge is free. It's what we use when my mom doesn't want to pay for comcast cable.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Yes, I am fine with dial-up. I also feel a little foolish that I've been paying for it all this time. Is there a catch? Does Nocharge have reliability isses? Because, I'm feeling very, very lucky at the moment if free dial-up is available.

Icarus

[brightsun301.livejournal.com]

The only catch is if you dial the wrong number your phone company will charge you long distance. Easily avoided, just don't put a 1 in the dialing box.

It works for us, we usually connect at 49k, sometimes 48. Once in a while you can get up to 50.6k I think we got 52 once... hehe But I've surfed the net on 46k and it wasn't too bad. It's all a matter of preferences. For instance, my mom won't deal with anything lower then 49, which is why we're using cable again. :)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm using it now and it's exactly the same as Earthlink.

Icarus

[wickedelf.livejournal.com]

I moved my website from the free Earthlink account to Slashcity a year ago.

Ooh, I'm glad you mentioned that! I had just finished uploading stories into efiction and was about to go looking for new things to add, and remembered that you had mentioned there was more of Beg Me For It now. :P

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, in fact I've all the parts linked together in order (including the little drabbles I did throughout the series) starting at the bottom of Beg Me For It (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/begmeforit.html).

If you don't want the million and a half drabbles, then all the main parts of the series are here:

Beg Me For It (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/begmeforit.html)

Sex, Drugs and Death Eater Rock (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/sexdrugsdeatheaterrock.html)

Hey You (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/heyyou.html)

SNAFU (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/snafu.html)

Stand In The Ruins (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/standintheruins)

Celebrate Life (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/celebratelife.html)

Scarred (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/scarred.html)

Hope that's helpful.

Icarus

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Whoops. I left the .html off the address for Stand In The Ruins (http://www.icarus.slashcity.net/stories/standintheruins.html)

Icarus

[wickedelf.livejournal.com]

great! I grabbed them all! Will hopefully have time to read them tomorrow.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oh, right on!

Icarus

[cordelia_v]

Given the content of your post, I'm not sure when you'll get this, but I just wanted to pop in and let you know that I rec'ed BMFI on crack broom today. I'm the Ron/Draco rec'er this month, so of course this story had to be on the list.

I'm ashamed to admit that I simply recycled the rec I posted about a year ago, elsewhere, however. I have no time right now, and when I read it over, I realized that I really couldn't improve on what I'd said then.

Hope it brings you some new readers!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oh, thank you. I'm around right now, at school. Just finished my very last paper for the end of the quarter (surprisingly difficult because I agree with almost everything Fouts has to say on animal testing and ethics).

Whew. For better or for worse, this quarter's done.

Thank you, I'm looking forward to ushering new readers into the fold.

On the reader's block (or smashed-and-bloodied-ego resulting-in-writerly-fragility-and-panic which is closer to the truth) my creative writing teacher Rick had a word of advice to just... play... for a while. Only as a published poet he had a much more elegant phrasing which I wish I could find. So now I'm tinkering happily with an SG-1 comedy peice (when I'm stuck the humor seems to flow more easily than anything else, don't know why), and tacking on an Epilogue to that Lucius Gen story.

Ahh. The end of finals. I think I need a treat.

Icarus

[swtalmnd]

I have to say, after years of trying out different things, I ♥ my cable modem. I don't use their email at all, but it gives a screamingly fast connection most of the time, and 99% of problems with it can be fixed by resetting your modem. Still, if price is an issue, DSL is a decent enough alternative, though I've found it slower and less reliable over the years.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Price is everything here and if I can get free dial-up instead of paying $250 a year for internet service, I'll do it. I also won't get cable TV (I can't see paying $600 a year for television). There are so many other things I can do with the money. In fact, I've figured out how to buy staple groceries for 3 months for two people for only $400, I kid you not.

Icarus