MSN Buys 500,000 Qwest.Net Customers

SEWilco writes: "MSN is expecting to increase its users by 10% in a deal with Baby Bell Qwest. Although the MSFT press release does not specifically state it, according to Mercury News and Reuters/Yahoo a later conference call confirmed that Qwest.Net will be replaced by MSN service. MSN said it will 'strike deals with companies that own their own infrastructure rather than wholesalers' in a PC World article pointed at by a recent DSL discussion. You can't strike a much bigger deal than this, unless you get all of a Baby Bell's voice customers too." A few readers have written in unhappy that they're about to become MSN customers, too.

Comments

Re:Incoming!

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, one of those monolithic Linux ISP's, oh wait, there are none.

Time to switch...

[Anonymous Coward]

I was never very impressed with Qwest.net anyway, but now that it's going to be part of MSN, it's _really_ time to switch ISPs. The part of the press release that scares me is the line about how Qwest and Microsoft share a common vision .

Additional info. Not all Qwest DSL customers sold

[Anonymous Coward]

A little more info. Not all DSL customers were sold. It seems they only sold their personal customers not the business customers.

Here is an excerpt from an email I received from Qwest.

Qwest Internet Solutions Technical Support wrote:

Hello,

Thank you for contacting QWEST Internet Services Technical Support.

You are inquiring about MSN and Qwest partnership.

On April 26, 2001, Qwest and Microsoft announced an agreement, which will soon offer the benefits of MSN to Qwest's In-Region (14 state) customers.

Details of this arrangement are still being worked out.

All existing Qwest.net customers will receive e-mail notification about the agreement in approximately 30 to 60 days. Full implementation is not expected for 60-90 days.

Qwest.net Internet Access Analog, DSL Select and DSL Deluxe customers are included in the agreement.

Qwest.net OfficeWorks and OfficeWorks LAN, and DSL Professional customers are not included in the agreement.

Our relationship with MSN will enhance our ability to provide Internet access to our customers.

Thank you,

Qwest Internet Services Technical Support

Microsoft slammed Dellnet users to MSN, too.

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't the first time Microsoft has bought a competitor and "SLAMMED" users to their MSN service. Anybody who bought a DELL computer in the last year or so with DELLNET ISP option was switched to MSN without recourse this past January. Branding is so important to Microsoft that they wouldn't even let people preserve their "dellnet.com" email addresses. They forced all users to adopt MSN account names.
Everybody I know who was slammed by this switched to other service providers, as they hated their MSN service.

Not a Baby Bell

[howardjp]

Qwest is not a Baby Bell. Qwest bought U.S. West to become a Baby Bell.

Incoming!

[nebby]

Let the Microsoft bashing begin..

Sometimes I think it would be interesting if Slashdot would post a Microsoft (bashing) story with Microsoft's name omitted ("An Unknown Company" or something less suspicious) initially, let the posts roll in, then reveal the truth and see how quickly opinions change.

I'm guessing that if some large Linux based ISP picked up the entire userbase of another (NT based, perhaps?) ISP it would be declared a "Victory for Linux" etc., etc.

Re:Incoming!

[nebby]

sets out to monopolize the industry

Having a monopoly is not illegal. Abusing it is illegal, and is why MS got in trouble. It is the ultimate goal of any company to have a monopoly over the industry, though almost always an unreachable one. I'd be perfectly content with Windows on every desktop if MS didn't try to hinder the competition and leverage their OS monopoly to overtake other companies. The fact that Linux exists says that it is still not an impossibility for an alternative to exist, it just (right now) sucks nuts in comparison for the average user's desktop.

makes crappy software

I like Linux just as much as the next guy (and use it for running my site) but Windows 2000 is the best desktop platform I've yet seen. Office is the best office suite on the market as far as I'm conerned. DirectX, COM, and other technologies are well designed AFAIK (never coded using either however.) C# looks like it has potential. These are all opinions, YMMV. (And yes, I'm well aware of the security flaws MS has a reputation of having in their software, so don't lash out back at me.. I didn't say that they put out perfect software, just that the software they produce is not universally "crappy")

Activism becomes 'geeky' because of morons who call it a 'trend' that bratty young people use just to have something to rebel against

I'm 19 years old. A lot of activism is trendy, participated in by individuals who do not understand the complexity or both sides of the issues involved.. I see it every day where I live. A lot of activism is participated in not because it is trendy, but because it is well founded and offers a truthful perspective on a situation. The trick is differentiating between the two, and Microsoft bashing of extremely one-sided nature falls more into the former than the latter, IMHO. "A few readers have written in unhappy that they're about to become MSN customers, too." .. come on now, was that really necessary??

If you think there is no such thing as an activist who participates because it gives them something to do, a 'scene' to associate with, a snappy catchphrase to wear on their shirt, and a place for social interaction, I can assure you they are far from a rarity.

the few people who break from the majority are the ones called ignorant conformists

Anyone who takes a black and white view of the world and closes his or her mind to alternative opinions is an ignorant conformist. If they are conforming to a majority or minority stance is of no relevance.

Re:Incoming!

[King of the World]

You're saying we should judge someones actions without considering their past? This is supposed to be a better way of evaluating the situation?

I'm quite happy with taking into account someone's past to judge their current actions. Microsoft previous actions are the context. They do have to go straight for a while before I will give them the common respect I give someone I don't know anything about.

Microsoft have proven themselves to be bastards, time and time again. Ignoring their past isn't sane. I'm going to go sing in the rain with my dame.

Re:Incoming!

[Sarcasmooo!]

This sort of attitude annoys me to no end. God forbid people bash a company that sets out to monopolize the industry, makes crappy software, then pushes CPRM and UCITA. It reminds me of an old response I saw that said, "I know it's 'cool' these days to bash companies like Nike...." THEY MAKE THEIR PRODUCT IN SWEATSHOPS FOR GOD SAKES.

Only in a country this rife with ignorance and complacency could people be demeaned for doing the right thing just because so many other people do the right thing. Activism becomes 'geeky' because of morons who call it a 'trend' that bratty young people use just to have something to rebel against. Despite the fact that most people would rather sit on their ass than protect their own rights; despite the fact that AOL and Microsoft dominate the market with inferior products; the few people who break from the majority are the ones called ignorant conformists. What a pile of bullshit.

Re:Incoming!

[screwballicus]

The problem with many of these so called Microsoft-bashing stories isn't that Microsoft is a sainted and blessed purveyor of good and truth to the net community, it's that, while Microsoft may be bad (to its workers, to users, to competitors, etc.), these stories don't present anything new to the Microsoft-monopolisation picture. Sure, this story is an illustration of Microsoft's cannibalisation of its competitors, but you could run 100 stories a day that show Bill's a monopolist and we would be none the better informed, still writing exactly the same "the microsoft bohemoth has to be stopped" posts, we did a few minutes ago. We'd know Bill's a monopolist, like we knew before we read the story, and we'd have essentially gained nothing from this news. If we want to be any the richer for reading these stories, their editorial philosophy has to expand beyond Linux vs. Microsoft. I'm sure IBM, Apple, Nvidia or any of the other major players have used aggresive monopolistic tactics. But the fact that we can't make a romantic doomsday pronouncement about their hegemony causes us to ignore them, in our fetishistic pursuit of editorial drama.

This is, more or less, the problem with a lot of contemporary media. It's either dogmatic or oriented towards the entertainment of the viewer. Information alone doesn't sell.

Buying Customers

[mudpup]

Hey I guess if your service is not good enough to attract customers; buying customers is an option??

Somehow that does not sound right, how much did they pay and how long will X number of customers have to stay to pay back the investment?

I currently use...

[PenguinX]

I currently use Qwest.net, being the LEC I figured they would be around. I switched after Reflex Communications ended up exploding in chapter 7 flaming death. This will probably make me switch my domain, internet service, etc. to another DSL provider. I have problems with this, and will not give any money to "that company".

A disgruntled Qwest customer...

[cowboy junkie]

What bothers me about this is that there's no info from Qwest as to what's happening except for a press release and no info on what's going to change (pricing, policies, etc.) People on the qwest newsgroups have to sit there speculating as to what the wording of the press release means, since no one in the company will answer any customer questions.

Re:Expect more of this.

[km790816]

.Net will require TONS of bandwidth

Says who? Substantiate your clain, please. .NET is exposing data programadically as XML over the web. Every standard that .NET uses, from HTTP, XML, SOAP, UDDI, ect. is supported by several other companies and in most if not all cases at least one standards body.

IBM is spending $1 billion on Linux and even they are in bed with MS on their Internet service vision.

UTICA

[phunhippy]

Hope some of those customers aren't in Maryland, doesn't MSN use Passport? Guess they are SOL

:)

Quest Sucks

[GrEp]

Quest has already screwed us. We noticed that they were over-charging us for long distance, so we switched to ATT. Next month we get slapped with a $20 "disconnect" fee. Boycott Qwest, they deserve it

bash-2.04$

Bogus Deals...

[Pollux]

Alright, here's a Qwest.net customer for you.

We've been with them for a year and a half for dial-up. They've been GREAT in being a reliable dial-up ISP (49 out of 50 calls go through, have averaged a 45.6 kbps connection, never a busy signal), and payment's cheap ($15 flat).

We finally decided to go broadband...640k ADSL line, and service has been just fine (aside from no support for Linux with their internal modem). As for support, they suck (not even their managers know what G.Lite is, and it took the head manager to diagnose a problem that a line technician could have fixed in two minutes, or so he said). But the line's just been fine.

But I'm sorry, I'm not going to be dragged around like some schmuk who's forced to go where they drag us. It is completely bogus that they feel that because they have a regional monopoly, they can do crap like this. I'm not a cable fan, and quite frankly, I don't want to have to dish out $220 for a bloody cable modem, but I don't want to be a corporate pawn either (besides, I'm sure the cable company here would love to offer a "anti-Microsoft" deal for about 1,000 DSL customers who don't want to be pulled around in such a way...the regional guys will actually go out of their way to do stuff like that).

Phone companies are not allowed to "buy out customers" and inform them that they have to conform to the new bell. ISPs shouldn't follow suit.

Switch Carriers?

[Pollux]

I don't know what city you live in, but apparenlty you think that, like where you probably live, the places Qwest services have broadband "options."

Sorry, but Qwest services the upper-midwest. Do you know what broadband options are up here? Qwest. That's it. If you wanted broadband (and it was a pretty good deal too), you had to go with Qwest. North Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado...there aren't any other options for most of this region.

MSN and Qwest are taking advantage of a regional monopoly. Don't get me wrong, this isn't hate mail towards Microsoft...I think that it's absolutely bogus that AOL and Time Warner are trying to do the same crap.

Here's the problem: Big Businesses KNOW that broadband IS the future. The internet is the future, and the faster the internet, the larger business potential. Just like the telco back in the 1930's, businesses ARE TRYING TO MAKE A MONOPOLY out of broadband. That's what wrong. That's what I want stopped.

Damn, does this affect Qwest DSL too?

[MajorBlunder]

I was so shocked when I read this, that I spewed Mountain Dew all over my monitor. I've been a reasonably content Qwest DSL customer for over a year now. The service has been pretty reliable, and I've had only a few minor complaints. The possibility that MSN (or any company for that matter) could buy my internet subscription without my consent is both chilling and infuriating. I'm also a former MSN internet help desk employee, and I couldn't get out of the job fast enough. I got fed up with the "Support Boundaries" that prevented me from going out of my to help a customer. It was the only job I've had that actually made me feel dirty. Slashdot's Bill-of-Borg icon is all to close to the truth sometimes.

Re:Deals like this are so odd

[Acrucis]

No, they're not. I work for a medium sized ISP, and we frequently buy smaller ISPs that can't make it on their own. We already have the infrastructure so assimilating them won't cost us as much as staying in business separately would cost them. But the deal is just like a company buying any other company. If you buy something from one company and another company buys them, you call the new company for warranty issues. It's definitely less odd than banks selling peoples' mortgages to each other.

What will this do to "bundled" DSL service?

[Glowing Fish]

Qwest (the phone company) is currently one of the worlds largest DSL providers. Qwest (in a move that is of questionable legality) use their government regulated monopoly on phone services to push their non-regulated ISP business.

One of the big reasons that customers choose Qwest as an ISP for DSL is that they are told, either explicitly, or implicitly, by sales people, that this combinations of services is neccesary (which of course it is not).

With Qwest.net soon being part of MSN, it will lose one of its big selling points for DSL.

Also, DSL customers who were Qwest ISP customers will have to go back to making twice as many phone calls to get their DSL installed...both to Qwest to get the hardware installed, and to MSN to get the ISP side. In other words, Qwest is losing one of its big selling point (actually maybe the only one) - the ease of use from "bundled" services.

Interesting

[decaf_dude]

How can a company buy customers? It's a strange world we're living in...

Qwest's customers who do not wish to be MSN's customers should demand full refund of the equipment and/or remainder of lease contract, or a no-cost (to the user) transfer to another provider.

MSN should learn how to obtain and maintain a clientelle of their own and not resort to buying them off the market, like some comodity.

-----

Re:Hand in everything

[grammar nazi]

I really hope that I am avoiding the usual MS bashing

You are not avoiding it; You are adding to it.

Your second comment about the majority of conformist sheep blindly using MS. You are correct, my friend. You are correct.

The same people just recently became able to comprehend how to use a computer. They have yet to form opinions about whether MS is a good choice or not. Most of them don't even know that MS is a choice or what exactly an operating system is.

My faith in humanity is decreasing everyday.

You should have faith. People will learn. Enough of them will eventually jump off the MS ship to either turn Linux into a viable desktop OS or to force MS to compete and MS will turn Windows into a viable desktop OS. Neither of which has yet happened.

Where do you want to go today?

[FrostedChaos]

Never mind, you're coming with us.

Quest price plan may not be compatible

[Zeinfeld]

If all this means is that MSN will run the Quest modem pools and the price plan is unaffected then it means no more than MSN and Quest pool their POPs. Under the Quest long distance plan you got free ISP if you spent over $50 a month in long distance, catch is that with Quest charging 5 cents a minute or less that is pretty hard.

I don't think takeover by MSN is anywhere near as scary as being taken over by AOL. MSN gives clean IP dialtone, AOL locks you into their own private prison and bombards you with pop up ads. There may be an MSN for morons to compete with AOL these days, but at least you get the choice.

What I am worried about is if my AT&T cable modem goes AOL. I can't get DSL at the moment in my neighbourhood - otherwise I would have hooked that up and got a static IP address. I guess that if I get AOL'ed I will simply have to pay for a T1 and see if I can rent my basement space out to folk who want to co-loc.

There goes the neighborhood

[deran9ed]

I wonder how this will affect Qwest overall. For those that don't know the story about Qwest, if I'm not mistaken, the company was working with a railraod company, and laying fiber alongside the tracks of the railroad, when the internet was in its infancy stage.

Anyways one thing I know is Qwest owns a hell of a lot of dark fiber, and I know MS would love to get their hands on some of it for their MS.NET world. I wonder if Qwest unloaded because they were losing money, or could this be the staging for a future rival to AOL-TW. Qwest is pumping out about 15+ billion $ so I can't see them needing money that bad now. ;\

3 days till launch

As a Qwest.net customer

[Sycraft-fu]

I'm not all that concerned for a couple of reasons:

1) I think MS is going to more or less leave the service unchanged, they'd be foolish not to. Remember, home users aren't the only ones on Qwest DSL, there's plenty of bussiness class lines too. I'm guessing that when you subscribe to qwest.net residential service it will now come with a warm and fuzzy MSN welcome CD that will setup and configure it all for you and install all the silly MS features like MSN mesanger if you like, but nothing will change other than that. As is, they send you a CD with a customized version of netscape and so on, but you don't have to install it, I never did. The hardware is just a plain Cisco 678 DSL router,it doesn't care what's on your system.

2) If the MSN service sucks, we can just switch over. Qwest.net is not mandidated with a Qwest DSL line (that would break regulations), you are free to choose other ISPs and there are around 15 others in Tucson where I live. I'm with qwest.net because I feel they do the best job but The River or Dakotacom would be more than happy to take my bussiness if Qwest/MSN start doing a bad job.

3) Supposing the whole thing really goes to hell, we can always just switch off to another kind of broadband. Cox (or whomever your local cable provider is ) offers cable modems, Sprint offers wireless, and so on. Supposing the overall service gets real bad, it's real easy to jump ship.

Basically, I think this move is more centred around the technophobe/AOL type person. Qwest DSL never was very friendly, and MSN will help that image. However, I seriously doubt they'll do anything silly to harm power users/bussinesses.

OH and for those of you that think Microsoft will spy on it's customers, get real. IF you're really worried go get a copy of Tiny Personal Firewall and it'll verify it.

Just a game

[Lothar 0]

Hey kids! Now's your chance to create your very own Anti-Microsoft Slashdot Post [tm]! With this handy schematic paragraph, you too can post just like the Big Boys! It's easy, just fill in the blanks with one of our many choices... I can't believe that ______________ (Bill, Borgmeister, The Jerk from Redmond) is still pulling this ______________ (favorite variation of excrement). Soon the Net will be _____________ (corporatized, overrun, mutilated, assimilated) into a bastardized version dumbed down to where only _____________(script kiddies, grandmas, MBA's, droolers, h4X0rz, cluebies) will be enthralled. As soon as ______________ (Red Hat, Debian, Caldera, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Be) can gain more market share, we'll be able to push back _______________ (closed source, proprietary software, mediocre OS's) to extinction in favor of a model that encourages _______________ (innovation, competition, self-determination, mass empowerment, utopia).

No disagreement here, but things do get to be a tad predictable on /. at times, with me sharing some of the guilt.