Excite Could Go Dark On Friday

robvasquez writes: "According to this CNET article, excite @home could be pulling the plug on cable modem subscribers. What's your providers back up plan? Could milions of trolls and Nimda spreaders be taken off line?"

Comments

It may not be so bad.

[Roofus]

I got an email from AT&T yesterday:

Dear *************,

As you may be aware, Excite@Home, our service provider, recently filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. In order to continue providing you the quality and reliable high-speed cable Internet service that you expect, AT&T has submitted a proposal to purchase the Excite@Home network. If AT&T is able to purchase and manage the Excite@Home network, there will be no immediate change to your current service. If the network purchase is approved, we will notify you via your AT&T@Home email account as soon as possible.

As a precautionary measure, AT&T Broadband also has been building its own network and service in the event that AT&T is unable to purchase the Excite@Home network. If the proposal to purchase the Excite@Home network is not approved, your service may be temporarily interrupted and it will be necessary to move your service to a new AT&T Broadband network.

In any event, AT&T Broadband is deeply committed to providing you the best cable Internet service possible and communicating any upcoming changes. Be sure to frequently check the "Announcements and Updates" section of our Web site for the latest information about your service: http://help.broadband.att.com/

In the meantime, please check your AT&T Broadband email account(s) on a daily basis. Doing this will automatically save your email to your hard drive as well as ensure timely receipt of important future communications from AT&T Broadband. Also, if you use our Personal WebSpace feature, we recommend you backup your personal web page(s) by copying it to a diskette, CD, or to your computer hard drive.

If migrating your service to the AT&T Broadband network and service becomes necessary, we will call to notify you of the migration timing. A message will be left on your voicemail or recorder if no one is available at the time of the call. As a precaution, we are providing you the following instructions, which will enable you to connect your computer to the new AT&T Broadband network. Again, you will only need to follow these steps in the event you receive a call from AT&T Broadband instructing you to do so.

1. Restart your computer to begin the process.
2. Open your Internet browser. You should be automatically sent to an AT&T Broadband welcome page. This page includes instructions on how to download software used to change your computer settings for the new network. If the welcome page does not automatically appear when you open your browser, please go to http://newuser.attbi.com/ (This website will only be available if the service migration is necessary).
3. Follow the instructions on the Web site to run the Automated Configuration Utility (or you can choose to change your computer settings manually).
4. The software will automatically change your Outlook Express email client, your Internet Explorer settings, and configure your computer for the new AT&T Broadband network. Information on how to manually change your settings for other email clients and Internet browsers such as Netscape Communicator and Netscape Navigator can be found at http://help.broadband.att.com/
5. You can now surf the Internet and use email on the new AT&T Broadband Internet network and service.

If migrating your service to the new network is necessary, certain aspects of your service would change. Your current homepage would feature new content and your current email address domain name would change. Please note that your username would remain the same. For example, jsmith@home.com would change to jsmith@attbi.com. If service changes are necessary, a detailed description of all changes will be provided at http://help.broadband.att.com/ in the Announcements and Updates section.

Whether the Excite@Home network is purchased or your service is migrated to the new AT&T Broadband network, your Subscriber Agreement, which outlines the general Terms and Conditions of your service will change. You will be able to view the amended and restated Subscriber Agreement that will apply to the AT&T Broadband Internet service at http://help.broadband.att.com/ Your continued use of the service will constitute your acceptance of the amended and restated AT&T Broadband Internet Subscriber Agreement.

If you need assistance, visit us online at http://help.broadband.att.com/ to chat with a customer care specialist. Please remember, AT&T Broadband will call you if any action is required on your part.

While we realize these potential changes may cause some inconvenience, please be assured that we are doing everything possible to avoid any service disruptions. However, in the event the service is disrupted during a migration, you will receive a credit for those days of interrupted service.

We are working hard to provide you with the best high-speed cable Internet service possible. We appreciate your patience and your business.

Sincerely,

Susan K. Marshall
Senior Vice President
Advanced Broadband Services

@Home trying to keep subs until last packet....

[Arethan]

I'm hearing rumors that @Home is delibrately causing issues with customer account conversions at various cable offices. My fiance is a CSR, and she's been talking about how @Home's sytems are no longer removing modem records from the headends, and the regional General Manager is contantly on the phone bitching at them to fix it (and fast). Apparently every time they try to convert a customer, they issue the account close operation, and it returns successfully, but the customer's modem stays online. When they add the local record for the subscriber, their UBR is given the appropriate information and will accept the modems, but the customer has a 50/50 chance of the @Home UBR responding before theirs. Effectively keeping most customers on @Home's network.

You'd think that they were just having issues with their UBR, or maybe with their access to @Home's subscriber management system, but they are able to successfully add new customers to their own service just fine, and everything was going smoothly with conversions until just a week ago.

Could be @Home being a prick until the very last minute, could be a coincedence. I'm not apt to support one theory or the other, I'm just relaying what I hear.

Moderation: -1 Heresay! (lmao)

Re:@Home trying to keep subs until last packet....

[hyrdra]

I'm a network engineer for a cable provider in Columbus, Ohio. What we do is contract backbone service out to bandwidth companies in the area. When we switch networks what we do is issue a DHCP update to all of our nodes, and turn the DHCP server off before it has time to respond with a new IP address on the old network. We then send a TFTP configuration to the modem to turn the network control access object off, switch the HFC IP address, turn it back on, and by this time the DHCP server on the new network responds with the new IP address.

The process is completly transparent and the only hit is to programs which keep a constant port open (e.g. file sharing programs), will suddenly loose a connection for receiving (sinc they have a new IP). However, they usually time out and reconnect.

It also has the added advantage of flushing out priate modems on the network, since customers who use a modem with it's TFTP disabled or it's control locked to on don't receive the new info for the new network and are stuck on an old, dead network.

We have switched networks over four times with only a few support calls. It could have been a big deal, requiring customer talk-throughs but we do it transparently.

Re:what about us...

[camusflage]

It's not all "trolls and Nimda spreaders" who happen to be on @home, and could be screwed.

You're absolutely right! It's spammers too. They're in the top ten sources of spam on spam reported through SpamCop. This is even more impressive considering that they send anything from spamcop, whether it's an automated report or a manual email with an @spamcop.net address, to Dave Null, prompting many SpamCop users to send a manual report

While I feel bad about the legitimate customers, seeing a provider who is utterly unresponsive to spam complaints disappear down the drain after circling a while isn't exactly breaking my heart.

don't let the screen door ...

[chip rosenthal]

It will be a huge relief in my spam load when @Home goes dark. My most recent attempt to report a spammer with a business-class account was bounced:

Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 22:52:21 -0800
To: Chip Rosenthal <chip@unicom.com>
Subject: Fwd: Newsletter Provided by The Black World Today [Evaluation - see full header]
From: AUP Enforcement Team <abuse@home.net>
Reply-To: AUP Enforcement Team <abuse@home.net>

Dear Chip Rosenthal,

Your message, including your pasted-in email message body, firewall log,
or newsgroup header, exceeded the maximum message size allowed by our
mail service. Please reduce the size of your email message and exclude
any excessive message body or MIME/UNICODE text.

For firewall users, usually one line detailing a system probe attempt
from an @Home user is sufficient for us to take action on the event.
Multiple lines detailing more than one event from the same user are not
necessary.

Thank you,

The @Home Network Policy Management Team

The message they refused was a whopping 50K.

Oh, and of course they fail to return the original report so that you can revise and resubmit it. That's a favorite trick of spam-friendly ISPs.

Pity @Home flushed all that money on the Excite portal. Otherwise, maybe they could afford another disk shelf for their mail server.

Re:A good motivator

[camusflage]

The ensuing clamor might be enough to motivate the gubment to monopolize Internet provision and bring it to everyone for a reasonable fee.

This is wrong on so many levels it's difficult to even begin. First of all, the government is the last entity I think of when I consider responsive, efficient organizations. I don't know about you, but I like both of those qualities in my internet connection.

This is ignoring the fact that Carnivore would go by the wayside. Who needs Carnivore when you just own the whole thing?

We see what happens in other countries when the government runs the internet. Why, just this week, we've had 17k internet cafes shut down in China and Saudi Arabia looking to build an even bigger firewall.

You thought that the interstate highway system was yours because of gasoline taxes? In times of war the DOT has the authority to take over whatever roads the military needs to move troops/supplies. I don't know about you, but I don't relish the idea of getting kicked off the net for any reason, let alone some religious nutjob.