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Speakeasy Introduces Broadband WiFi Sharing Plan
An anonymous reader writes "Today, speakeasy (the greatest ISP ever) sent out a letter from the CEO introducing their NetShare Wi-Fi plan. It lets you share your broadband with your neighbors, with Speakeasy handling the billing and splitting the fee 50/50. More ISPs should be like this!"
My neighbors pay 100%
I have been pwned because my
No, I actually mean it.
This is a great way to get the penetration without the risk of people fucking up the configuration of innumerable devices. No more battling with IOS or iptables. No more wrestling with the choice of sendmail, exim or qmail. Now, someone else does all the grunt work, you just sign up users - And you get money for it.
"God, root, what is difference?" - Pitr, userfriendly
Thats pretty cool. But what if someone breaks the Terms of Service. Would they cut the connection altogether?
I doubt any technology like this will get to ISPs in Iowa any time soon. :(
How do I mod up the CEO for +4 insightful?
I wonder how this appiles in states where using a router is (or will be) llegal. Its amusing to me that ISP's hand out routers themselves, or in this case encourage connection sharing. Kinda spits in the eye of certain lawmakers that think they know something about technology.
I'm all for the WiFi boom, but I wonder what new (read: idiotic) laws are going to start surfacing if people are broadcasting their internet connections around.
In Washington, Free == Illegal
I can't see any rates on their site because my line doesn't qualify. How much do they charge for regular ADSL and that(I want it, I want it, I WANT IT) 3.0/768? I don't know why I wouldn't qualify, I have 2 DSL accounts through Bellsouth lines and have qualified through Covad. Anyone in Georgia using Speakeasy?
According to the article, this applies if you get either a T1 or IDSL. IDSL maxes out at 144kbps up/down. Thats not much of a connection to share in the first place. Getting a T1 for a residential place is not all that likely even if you do cut it down to 50/50.. still a lot to pay. If youre a business user, you might not want to share the connection for security reasons.
But we also get 12Mbps broadband to make up for the rest of the telephone crap we have to put up with ($700 installation fee??)
I've had their service since DirectTVDSL crashed. They are VERY Linux friendly - their terms of service are REALLY reasonable, for the most part "do what you want as long as it's legal." Did anyone notice they are one of the three repositories for rpmfind??
I'm a happy customer!
Have you compiled your kernel today??
Sounds like Speakeasy's real benefit comes from the fact that the customers will be directing their questions to their local connection rather than calling up Speakeasy's support line. That benefit alone probably outweighs any losses they are going to incur.
All my neighbors are idiots, all their internet activity does is add spyware to their machines. I don't want to be part of that. Not to mention the neighbors taking all the bandwith trying to download porn or something...
I am the CheezWarrior AOL Sucks. It must be stopped I must stop it! [Insert Evil Maniacal laugh here] Mike the Ch
Where are they trying to make routers illegal and for what reasons?
As someone with a firm grounding in economics, I must admit that I just don't get it. ISPs and other groups have high fixed costs, and low variable costs
In English, that means that a lot of the infrastructure costs XXX million dollars, no matter how many customers they have and only a few things actually cost the company more as they add more customers. Because of this, I cannot understand why they would want to let people split service costs.
This article made me think of a joke I once heard... A man goes into a restaurant and sees a sign: "All you can eat 10 dollars, half of all you can eat: 5.50"
Doesn't it seem counter-intuitive for them to offer this service? I mean, increasing the number of people on residential circuits without increasing the number of paying customers is just going to degrade the service for everyone. People are still going to do it behind the backs of ISP's, but they are actually promoting it. Also, what determines which house gets the access point if the price is split 50-50 for everyone? Just a curiousity.
The site is down, or I would look to see if there are extra fees for getting service like this, or what other restrictions are put on. All-in-all, this seems good for the consumer, since you can get cheaper net access if you can get neighbors to chip in, without fearing the wrath of your ISP. Probably the RIAA should take a lesson from these people.
bananas like monkeys.
Oh, all that garbage about not be allowed to have any device that disguises where a communication originated from. Quite a few states are at least looking at it. I believe someone adopted it already, but I'm not sure. I want to say somewhere around Minnesota, but I can't recall.
In any case, routers fall directy under this proposal. They're also talking about hooking up 5 machines to one connection is ripping off ISP's or some such garbage. Yet ISPs seem to keep handing out routers and this new Speakeasy plan is even better.
I wish politicians would stay out of technology altogether.
Of course, if I charge 6 neighbours $40/month, then I should be getting $20/month back..... would they actually be sending me a cheque, or would they pocket the difference?
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
...that ISP's hand out routers themselves...
Who would get to configure the routers under a setup like that? The ISP, the original connection account holder, the "additional" person using the bandwidth? The one example that comes to mind is I'm an everquest fan, and EQ likes to have its choice of ports available - gamers are forced to leave lots of ports open if they play through routers. If I subscribe through my neighbor, a month later decide to play Everquest, and my neighbor (or isp) says no, we wont open those for you, then what? This question would really come into play in a contract situation... i.e. "I signed up for the net and now you wont let me set up this so I can use such and such"
I hope the other ISP's take notice before Speakeasy overruns them.
On second thought, please come to California and overrun my DSL provider soon.
Because: people are going to do it anyway, and NOT pay for it. This way they get to at least know what's going on, at least to some users. They can reach extra users with zero work on their part, other than billiing.
In the end, it's silly of course.. ultimately, people will have neighborhood wireless networks set up, and be sharing resources with each other other than just their internet connection.
When they start busting people for owning routers, I'll believe it. Until then, I think people are extrapolating the reach of the law to scare people. Think of how many businesses use routers. No way they'd make it illegal to use NAT.
The way I interpret this is that Speakeasy is saying that this plan makes it easy for people who don't live in an area where ADSL/SDSL is avalible to share a connection and split the costs, much like the co-ops mentioned awhile back. They are NOT limiting the kind of connection you can use. I would look into setting up a 3-10 Mbit line and sharing that! The costs would still be very low, but imagine the speed when no one else on your network is online - great for getting iso's and other "files"
All they have to supply is the bandwidth (damn cheap, unless your neighbour is a spammer) and some light-duty billing support (also damn cheap) and email services (also cheap). In return, they get a nice new income stream.
Definite +4 insightfull!
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
supporting a neighborhood network can have alot of benefits if you plan it out. Consider kazaa on one single shared server that everone can remote desktop into to download, then everyone has instant access to what the others have downloaded. Now when someone finds a cool game everyone else can get interested in and you have an instant wlan party. Suddenly its more convinient to download tv shows then recording them.
The beuty of the internet is you can connect to japan as fast as your neighbor, the problem with the internet is you connect to your neighbor just as fast as japan. Wifi can change alot if you allow it.
Now THATS what I call a supernode!
What happens if you get busted for sharing music? Are you now legally responsible for your neighbors actions or are you free and clear because no one knows (not even you) who did the alleged file sharing. Logs? we dont need no stinking logs.
Am I responsible for the NetShare customer usage?
So what liability will you incur if your neighbor you just signed up :sends fraudulent spam
defaces a website
cracks a site and steals cc info
publishes libel and slander
distributes child porn
distributes the latest eminem track
etc
This might be taking on more than I'd want to deal with!
If your neighbors are sharing a connection with you it should be obvious to them whether you are paying your share of the bill each month. I'd say it could create more of a sense of accountability in regard to keeping the neighbors happy and the connection up. After all, nobody wants to be the guy who got everybody's connection turned off because he forgot to pay the bill for 60 days.
hopefully (assuming youre the one sharing the dsl) are running longs. if youre the one leeching, lets hope they're not. ;-)
I have been wondering that for a while...
I live in a group house, and there's 9 of us with wireless ethernet running throughout the entire place. If RIAA sues because they suspect one of us is downloading something illegal, how do they decide who gets the blame, if all 9 of us are dhcp'd behind NAT, with only one publically addressable IP? You can't fathomably put it all on the one sap who registered for the DSL connection can you?
well, i wonder if they'd be able to legally take ALL of the computers since they have proof someone is downloading music
Service providers are excluded from the DMCA. Hopefully, the neighborhood tech would fall under this category.
Come on, you can admit what the other files are. This is Slashdot, after all.
(\(\
(=_=) Bani!
(")")
haha, maybe if something like this comes out in my neighborhood maybe THEN would my stupid neighbors realize that sharing a connection is NOT NOT illegal...
come on.... you aren't open. admit it.
Revolutions are never about freedom or justice. They're about who's going to be top dog. -- Kilgore Trout
So, my bro-in-law is an economist. MIT PhD and snazz teaching appointment. Of course, at family visits, we get into looooong discussions of economic issues, geek-logic against economic orthodoxy.
Anyway, at some point during one of them, he says: "But all of economics is based on the assumption that people make rational decisions." To which I replied: "Wellllll, that's a pretty shaky assumption on which to build an entire science." I recall a brief period of speechlessness.
Speakeasy specifically allows routers and servers in their Terms of Service, its part of what you're paying them for, in their mind. I've had several friends on Speakeasy who finally convinced me to upgrade from the overcrowded cable in my area. They specifically tell you if you ask that they heartily approve of people doing these things. The stupid laws they are making up elsewhere wouldn't apply because of Speakeasy's TOS.
Check my Go-related blog for beginners: DGD
Costs that Speakeasy has to deal with are inflated over the bare cost of service and hardware.
As more ISPs do this, they put the admin tasks in the hands of capable users (hopefully better than the MCSE's they got conned into hiring). That simplies things a bit. That means that they no longer have to guarantee the speed of broadband. It allows the market to loosen up from the usually stagnant progress it's had. when you have two variables (performance and price) rather than this rigid 56k no more no less, DSL speed no more no less, customers can be satisfied and fewere are left out of the picture.
Don't we want to close the digital divide?
As Speakeasy (whoever it is up the chain) no longer has to buy as much hardware, the hardware sellers have to drop their prices, which is good for Speakeasy.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
I'll vouch for that. Conversation between me and lady tech at speakeasy:
tech:"how do you know your connection is down 30% of the time?"
me: "I use Big Brother to monitor it."
tech:"Oh cool, we use that here too. Is there a URL you can give me to look at it?"
me: "Hmm, no, it's on a server inside my network, and I don't have a hole punched in the firewall for it."
tech:"How about emailing me a screen shot?"
me: "Hmm, hang on- I don't remember which program it is that does screen shots in Linux."
tech(sounds of her standing up):"hey guys, anyone remember how to do a screenshot in X?"
I was speechless...
Please help metamoderate.
I've had Speakeasy and while they were good, SureWest Broadband IS the greatest ISP ever!
t a. html
http://www.surewestbroadband.com/wf/products/da
I like Speakeasy. I was their customer for almost a year, but had to leave for SBC because they couldn't give me good service. That's not why I fault them.
The problems?
1. Hold times for customer service. 10-15 minutes was normal for me.
2. They sometimes didn't followup on open tickets. I'd call, get a ticket opened, and wait for days for them to call. Then, call back and ask about it, and hear "Gee, this ticket has been open a long time... sorry." No shit!
In general, they give good service, though it comes at a premium.
They won't make it illegal for businesses to use NAT, they will make it illegal for YOU to use NAT.
Sign up your neighbors, sniff their email, let the world know their business at the next block party.
I forgot to mention that the greatest ISP ever was DNAI (Berkeley, CA), who was bought by RCN who promptly sold off their DSL biz to some crap company that drove it into the ground. Well, RCN started to drive it into the ground before they sold it.
The original DNAI was far and above the best ISP I've ever had the pleasure to do business with. The people were first rate.
And get this: you called their # and a human answered before the 3rd ring.... and that human was competent and helpful.
I'm hoping that having an open access point will allow me the same defense. I can't say for sure it was my neighbors but I can say there's a reasonable doubt.
'course, that's only if I was stupid enough to go to trial.
closed minded is as closed minded does
I got this email about 6 hours ago and had a chance to check the site before it was /.ed. Very interesting idea, as it brings the whole idea of a bandwidth reseller down to the user/geek level. Combine this with a OpenBSD/FreeBSD/NetBSD/Linux VPN, Squid web proxy, icecast server, a locally-shared fileserver, Quake/Half-Life server and such, and you could sell a value-added DSL/WiFi package to your neighbors. Get enough to sign-up (or add enough extra features to raise the price) and you could quite likely cover the entire DSL line cost via subscription co-payments, getting your own share of the DSL just for providing support to your users.
Fully licensed blockchain psychiatrist
if speakeasy is doing the billing: in the mind of the customer speakeasy is the connection. thus, if the local wifi network guru doesn't have the best skills - speakeasy may begin to look like the problem.
(for business broadband on the east coast or dc earthwave.net.)
peace outside
I'm worried about this category
This is exactly wrong. Roughly half of the DMCA is about service providers. It provides them with a Safe Harbor protection for copyright violations committed by their customers. This only applies to ISPs who follow certain rules, starting with paying a (small) fee to register with the government.
They'd better give some kickass router with bandwidth monitoring and a good firewall, otherwise, why, on god's green earth, would I agree to admin for a bunch of strangers who can get my service shut off if they spam, or don't pay their bill, or whatever.
the FAQ is here . or some highlights below:
Q - As the Admin, it is your responsibility to provide support for:
* Customer support: for initial setup, signup and troubleshooting. Speakeasy will work with you to resolve issues related to circuit connectivity, and will forward any technical issue communicated by a NetShare Customer to you. You can then work with the Customer to resolve the issue in a diligent fashion.
* You are also responsible for the security and integrity of their shared network. Speakeasy may recommend, but is not responsible for enforcing specific network security measures.
AND
Q - I don't use WiFi but still want to share my connection (Ethernet, carrier pigeons, free-space optics, whatever). What's your policy?
A - Speakeasy believes that shared wireless networks are in keeping with our core values of disseminating knowledge, access to information and fostering community, provided this usage does not have an adverse impact on the services of other customers, does not involve any illegal activity and is not otherwise in violation of any aspect of our existing Terms Of Service. Please remember that the Speakeasy account-holder is responsible for all activity originating from their DSL line, even if it is the result of other users on a shared wireless connection.
closed minded is as closed minded does
10-15 minutes? Is that all? On Long Island, the average wait time for Verizon or Cablevision customer support is at least half an hour. If that's the worst of your worries, you lucked out big time.
They've been advertising this WiFi thing on their webpage for about a month now.
The rest of that letter is more interesting. Here are some excerpts:
In addition, we also plan to support IPv6 [editor's note: !!!], multiple connections for bonding or redundancy, individual customer firewall options, improvement of peer-to-peer applications such as video conferencing and application sharing, and, eventually, relatively advanced applications such as IP multi-cast through the last mile. Of course, we will always place an emphasis on assuring the fundamental network reliability and performance our members require.
[snip]
Many of you have tried our new and much improved Web-based Email service. You may have noticed this service also includes Calendaring, Reminders (via cell phone, email) and much more. I am excited to announce today that we will soon add a service option to allow true shared calendaring for Business-Class members.
[snip]
Although VoIP (Voice over IP) has been, in our opinion, a bit over-hyped for the past few years, we believe that the technology and service has advanced to the point that it is now a viable alternative phone service for many people. Accordingly, we are exploring a Voice over IP solution that will allow Speakeasy customers to use their broadband connection to make local and long distance calls. More details to come as we complete Beta trials and determine cost and features.
Interesting, eh?
...also said that they were planning on adding IPv6 support on their new backbone. Woohoo!
___
The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason. --Ben Franklin
>But what if someone breaks the Terms of Service
That's a tough one, worse is being everyone's "tech support guy."
Things you WILL hear:
The internet is slow!
The laptop doesn't work in the kitchen/bedroom/toilet/outside.
I can't play SOME_ONLINE_GAME, open up these ports.
My buddy is staying for a while, can you hook him up?
Can you get a stronger antenna for that thing?
Who the hell is messenger service and why does he keep asking me to buy crap?
Hey is it cool if I download porn? I won't tell anyone. *replace porn with unregistered software, movies, etc
Virus scanners are for chumps right?
Yeah, I'll pay you next week. I'm low on funds now. (or I can pay you in pot, beer, outside art, etc)
Can you really read my email from your apartment?
Is it cool if I resale my connection to the guy upstairs? You know, like Amway.
--
I'll take peace of mind over saving a few bucks on broadband anyday.
Speakeasy knows that x amount of people will not pay 50 bucks a month for broadband no matter what. They might pay ten or twenty dollars. That's where "kid with too much bandwidth" steps in. He gets customers because he's going to save/make money. He has an incentive to find these people e.g. bug his neighbors. Speakeasy will get 50% AND payment for the line no matter what.
Also, people are sharing anyway too. So Speakeasy legitimizes it and hopes greed will turn Bob the computer geek downstairs into Bob the money-making netadmin. Bob wakes up one day and realizes that even though he gives the two blondes upstairs free internet access they still won't go out with him. Might as well make a buck.
Plus, it fits in with their "do what you want with your pipe, we'll mostly leave you alone" corporate philosophy.
Even if it turns out they lose some money, they're breaking ground, getting press, and getting more techie cred. I'm sure they reserve the right to cancel the program anytime.
I just checked and looks like you can get it in Des Moines. So stop making Iowa look like it is worse than people think it is already! You could also do it all yourself minus Speakeasy if you can't get their access in your neck of the woods.
dave
So sell a friend some lint from your sofa for a nickle. Now you're a business. Seriously there isn't much that sepperates Joe Average from Acme Lint Inc. Some paperwork might be useful if you're really woried about not legally qualifying but it's not a lot. If you are selling under your own name and not an assumed business name then there really isn't much more to worry about until you actually start selling a product and making money.. even then you don't need to do much. Fill out the right paperwork for taxes and things such as that.
:)
These laws might harass a few people but will shortly just be another 'No elephants on Main St after 9am on Sunday' law. Yet another example of why I think non Constitutional laws should expire every five years unless renewed. Maybe in five years our country will be past this post-9/11 retard/fearful stage and back to our usual arrogant obnoxious short sighted behavior.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
A LOT of companies (mostly software) do NOT sell their software directly. They use resellers. This creates not only great relationships, but also adds a free sales force. I think SpeakEasy is applying that model here.
Speakeasy is widely rumored to be one of the more pro-active ISP's when it comes to monitoring their net, recording what people are doing, and sharing the data with the USGOVT and intelligence agencies. If people use this Speakeasy plan for WiFi, it gives Speakeasy a great vantage point to exactly what is going on with WiFi -- and who your friends and acquaintances are and what they do on the net. This is the same reason Speakeasy supports rpmfind, gaming, and other handy tools. Because it's a great tradeoff between the small additional cost of underutilized fiber bandwidth and the great value of who is doing what on the Internet. As usual, caveat emptor.
It was a great cafe
With everyone singing the praises of Speakeasy, I filled out the "is it available for you" form on the speakeasy site, and they said that I'm 14K feet from a CO, but that my only option was 120$/mo for 384K SDSL.
Is it just me, or does that seem awfully high for a not very fast broadband connection? Considering that my cable provider (while they suck) only charge 50$/month.
There is very little future in being right when your boss is wrong.
When they start busting people for owning routers, I'll believe it.
Dear Sir/Madam: Your router is owned.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
You went to SBC for better service? Thats got to be a joke. I've been forced to use SBC for the last 3 years where I live.
I've been told:
Losing 40% of the packets on my network for weeks at a time was perfectly acceptable.
If it takes close to but less than a minute to load a text based (200byte) web page then my connection is within standards.
If I want to even talk to them about a network issue that I have to replace every item on my LAN one by one just to make sure one certain item isn't causing them problem. Including printers and speakers and similar periphials (this was more than a few times and over times I started to believe them enough (and technology advanced) that I did eventually replace each item).
Ping times to the upstream hop at the DSLAM of 1 to 1.5 seconds (not miliseconds) is normal and the line is in great shape. In fact, several of them have told me that this is one of the best lines they've ever seen and they're jealous of my speeds.
And many other wacky stories. This is if I can even get through to support within the 20+ minute call queue. And frequently when I talk to them technician they put me on hold, close the trouble ticket and transfer me to a different DSL company. If that somehow doesn't happen I get passed back and forth between two departments that tell me that the other side is the responsibility of my problem and that they shouldn't have passed me here (and this repeats for weeks).
I've spent months (seriously!) on trying to get some of the simpliest issues resolved. Each time I get them to admit its got to be something on their end, the next technician tells me that the last one was wrong and it couldn't be problem with sbc. If I knew I would have had this much problem when I moved here, I would have not moved.
Fortunately every once in a while, they must accidentally fix the line and it stays healthy for a few weeks to a few months.
If you've come to SBC for better service, you'll be sadly disappointed.
-t
This is a great idea, a real win/win situation. Problem is that in Australia you need a carrier license to do this if you derive any financial benefit from providing carriage to a third party, even if it only cost recovery. I would love to have my neighbours finance an upgrade from 512/128 to 1.5Mb/256kbs.
Talk about kneejerk Posts!
If only there were some execs at the RIAA who thought like Speakeasy, they'd actually be making money rather than spending tons of it on litigation.
They shoue embrace change rather than attempting to suppress it. By doing this they're only prolonging their inevitable, slow, painful demise.
An even happier speakeasy customer.
I had to call them once on a security issue (some guys redhat boxen was being used to spend stolen cc#'s). Their frontline support guy said they'd "talk to him" about it. I don't think it would've been a landmark case but it would have been an interesting prosecution. The guy was running a default install 2 year old distro with the default apache distribution and page on port 80. Just asking for trouble, if he wasn't trouble himself.
Course I guess that makes them (speakeasy) even cooler to some. Maybe linux friendly (given it's power) should require some linux responsibility too like telling people to patch and update and use a little security here and there and not just create proxies for the mentally advantaged.
I love the wi-fi thing though. They are definitely one of the cooler ISP's. Course most ISP's don't care as long as you drink quietly anyway.
How are you going to decide which laws aren't constitutional without taking them to court? And if a law is found to not be constitutional, shouldn't it be revoked immediately?
My guess is that yes, they'd go for whoever has their name on the ISP's bill. That person is the official contact point, and if you're supplying network access to your roomates, you're responsable for making sure they uphold whatever laws or contracts go along with said access. When you signed up for the DSL connection, you agreed to their terms of service. Just because you're sharing that connection out doesn't mean you're exempt. I know it's a shitty way of looking at things, but the DSL company is gunna want somebody's ass, and saying "well, it could have been any one of us" isn't going to make is go away. Actually, the DSL company would probably start by kicking your ass for sharing it out, anyway. I know around here, at least, most of the TOS contracts forbid stuff like that unless you pay ANOTHER surcharge...
// Dumps core here
You may be overestimating the way extra users impact an ISP. Speakeasy itself charges $20 for dialup access. Some no-frills ISPs charge half that. Now, the cheapest possible NetShare account costs $20, of which Speakeasy keeps $10. For this, they're actually doing a lot less than they have to do for a dialup customer. In particular they don't have to provide a local Point of Presence. I don't know much this costs, but it must be a pretty big fraction of an ISP's budget.
Another economic consideration. When somebody decides to become a SpeakEasy admin, they're extending SpeakEasy's customer base and taking all the economic risk of said extension. If it turns out that you can't sell enough NetShare accounts to cover the cost of your T1 connection, you're the only one that's out of pocket. SpeakEasy isn't out a penny -- in fact, they've made a few bucks on that T1.
That's something to think about before you drop $700 on a T1 router. And you should also consider the customer support that your "customers" should expect you to provide.
Hey guy, you're in no position to sneer. 90% of the folks on the planet consume less than you do. A good many of them could make a living just by going through your garbage. Face it, you're closer to this overpriviliged guy than you are to most of the human race.
It's a scam. I explain why here. But the basic gist is that you only get 50% of what your "customers" pay speakeasy credited back to your account. They don't mention this until you're on the MySpeakeasy page where you can set it up (screenshot).
It makes far more sense to not tell them you're sharing, and just have your neighbors pay you directly. And until the NetShare plan was unveiled, that was an OK thing to do. Now... I may actually need to find a new ISP because of this, if they intend to enforce this nonsense.
__
Choose mnemonic identifiers. If you can't remember what mnemonic means, you've got a problem. - Larry Wall
Doesn't it seem counter-intuitive for them to offer this service? I mean, increasing the number of people on residential circuits without increasing the number of paying customers is just going to degrade the service for everyone. People are still going to do it behind the backs of ISP's, but they are actually promoting it. Also, what determines which house gets the access point if the price is split 50-50 for everyone? Just a curiousity.
You are kinda missing the point, as far as I can see anyhow. It would (mostly) be uninteresting to share a broadband connection in most urban areas, and if connection sharing via WiFi is present, it is mostly between two households, not more.
What they are aiming at are long-range WiFi links that lets people in rural areas where DSL isn't available connect. I am myself one of those people, now surfing over a 802.11b-link spanning 10km. This is possible thanks to the Norwegian broadband company NextGenTel, however most other ISPs in Norway does not allow this without charging a fee (and then there is the 1GB max download pr. month limit on the major ISP). The connection will be shared between approximately 25-50 people when we are done setting it up, and then spanning 20 km with the help of parabolic antennas, all without passing the Norwegian limit of a maximum effect of 20mW for unlicensed radiowaves.
And, while I remember; the house that gets the access point is the house that can have DSL installed.
Anyhow, having the possibility to let interested souls connect to the internet in places the company won't have the possibility to connect them in other ways actually _increases_ their customer mass.
So, if you were to introduce legislation to oppose Speakeasy, would you call that legislation prohibition?
----
Squirrel
Then who gets the hardwire connection? Also, who provides the tech support? The guy with the wireless access point (like making sure it always has power) or speakeasy? If it is speakeasy, then who makes the call? These are a couple of questions that pop into mind. I don't mind wifi sharing my network, but I don't what a call from my neighbor at 2 in the morning because he can't get to his porn.
I have had extremely short wait times and have found their customer service to be exceptional. A couple times I was 15+ days late with my payments and if I called them and said, "hey I can't pay you for another 10 days, but I will pay as soon as the check comes" they would immediately restore any services. I've found this type of attitude extremely comforting on those rough, lean months.
And as for availabity, It's been my best ISP experience as well. I think I've been down for a couple hours 2 times in the last year.
You're right though, it all does come at a premium. They're certainly not cheap by any stretch.
dkap.info
>However, I pay $100/mo for my dsl (split with housemates, we all value having a 1.5/768 connection)
Ouch. FYI You can get 1.5/386 from Earthlink DSL for $49.
That's why I haven't switched to SpeakEasy. I know these guys are Linux friendly and people swear by their support. If they had a "no support" option that matched Earthlink's prices I would switch.
386 is more than most people these days and is plenty if you're not running servers that generate constant traffic (like game servers)
I could also get a 1.5/256 line for $39, from a local ISP who isn't earthlink, and if I didn't want the upstream thats what I'd probably do. If you know a way to get 768k upstream (or, ideally, more) on a non-business (aka residential) DSL line for less money, please do let me know.
Other reasons I wouldn't use earthlink:
Last I heard, their DSL still required PPPOE or some other nonsense
They don't want you to run an open WAP
Their tech support is retarded (I've dealt with them on behalf of a client, and I think I actually taught them some things about earthlink's hosting services.)
IIRC, they're owned by some religious organization I want nothing to do with. But I can't remember what the story on that was, and a quick googling didn't turn it up. Maybe just a rumor.
They tell people it's Their Internet (as in, "It's Your Internet"). What a bunch of crap.
__
Choose mnemonic identifiers. If you can't remember what mnemonic means, you've got a problem. - Larry Wall
I can just imagine that I'm playing an 'important' CS match, and my neigbor starts up kazaa... Then some idiot starts DLing porn and britany spears mp3s from him, consequently my ping skyrockets to 400ms.
the page referred to in the original article
http://www.speakeasy.net/netshare/
has a link labled "learn more"
it takes you here
http://www.speakeasy.net/netshare/learnmore/
and it's SPELLED OUT there
"..including crediting the Admin's account each month for 50% of the basic Customer fees."
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Actually, Gifu is the nicest place in Japan I've ever been (I lived in Japan for 8 years and saw quite a few places in that time). If you haven't been to Gujo-Hachiman, go up there in summer some time, you'll love it. The nicest way to go is from Nagoya to Mino-Oota via Gifu City, and from Mino-Oota take the Nagaragawa Tetsudo to Gujo-Hachiman. That's a long trip, longer if you're coming from Tokyo or Osaka, but worth the time. The Nagaragawa gorge is breathtaking. I was nearly speechless the first time I saw it, in 1992.
/28 was my compensation), it would have been a whole lot more expensive than DSL.
WRT bandwidth, ISDN is available practically everywhere in Japan and has been for years. If you can only get 64K, it's like that's all your ISP supports - something that isn't NTT's fault. I used a 128K leased line with a Yamaha ISDN router for years. Not DSL, but I found it sufficient. Granted, if it wasn't a perk of sorts from my job (I was on call 7-24, the leased line and a
i'd just like to add my personal experience with speakeasy as an ISP in 2001, i started paying them $200 a month for 1.5 MB SDSL with 80% of that rate guaranteed. for a year it worked but then dropped below the guaranteed minimum occasioanlly, and then often, and then constantly. despite many calls and emails to their support department my open tickets were always closed with comments like "customer doesn't know what he's talking about." Finally i closed my acct with them and started with cyberonic, who provides 768K upstream for $40/month, and haven't gone under 90% of that yet in the past 6 months.
I went to their site, filled out the form to see if their dsl was available in my area, and damn i got 6 emails from them in one week wanting me to call them to setup dsl, i was just checking, i finally had to email them back and tell them to stop harassing me.
I also told them I would not sign up with them just for the simple fact they badgered me so much to sign up. Besides their prices sucked hard compared to 2 other companies I looked at, and the speed was lower.
We have seen that living things are too improbable and too beautifully "designed" to have come into existence by chance.
So sell a friend some lint from your sofa for a nickle. Now you're a business. Seriously there isn't much that sepperates Joe Average from Acme Lint Inc.
Okay, Einstein. Now you're a business. Congratulations! You get to pay $50 more a month for DSL service.
Oh, I forgot -- you're an idiot. Sorry.
Cyberonic gets generally good reviews at broadband reports - 1.5/768 month to month for $50.
What's a sig?
Since these laws are being proposed in order to prevent people from sharing their internet connection without tell their ISP, I would imagine it would be fine to do so in this case since you're telling (and paying) your ISP.
-Now I mentioned this was an old house, built before the Civil War. Apparently hospitality to strangers was a lot different back then.
Esion, do you know WHY it was perfectly safe, common and acceptable to have a guestroom complete with accomodations and leave the front door open for anybody passing by to use before the Civil War, and not after?
Same reason it used to be perfectly safe, common, and acceptable to leave an unsecured Wireless AP on your network but now it isn't.
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
I was once a Speakeasy customer, and I think highly of them. But the greatest ISP is my current one, New York's bway.net. They explicitly let you share your Wi-Fi connection, although they don't seem to let you charge for it.
Here's the relevant section of their TOS:
Speakeasy has always allowed you to share your connection with whomever you wish... If you are sharing to people you trust will keep up with their share of the payment, then there is most likely not a reason to use this program
Actually, it is a requirement to use NetShare if your line is residential and you are collecting fees. So, yes, you can share with whomever you wish, but you'd better be using NetShare if they are paying you! From the NetShare FAQ:
Use of NetShare is mandatory if broadband circuit is residential and you intend to collect fees from third parties accessing your network.
Buying a second expensive home keeps homebuilders employed. It keeps third world factories busy churning out electrical outlets and network cabling. It keeps people fed.
Buying stuff keeps the world from starving.
If you want to see the effects of knee-jerk "you shouldn't have that" liberalism, just take a look at what the ~1990 "Luxury Tax" did to the American boat-building industry. Taxes and communist attitudes _NEVER_ increase quality of life.
Being responsible is buying stuff so someone else can make a living.
--
"I have also mastered pomposity, even if I do say so myself." -Kryten
>
> Dear Sir/Madam: Your router is owned.
When owning routers is against the law, only outlaws will 0wn-HEY! Waitaminnit!
slander is spoken. libel is printed. unless of course they post mp3s containing slanderous material. ;)
An anonymous reader writes "Today, speakeasy (the greatest ISP ever) sent out a letter from the CEO introducing their NetShare Wi-Fi plan. It lets you share your broadband with your neighbors, with Speakeasy handling the billing and splitting the fee 50/50. More ISPs should be like this!" :P
Err... you sure this wasn't written by the CEO of Speakeasy?
--
I had a terrible experience with speakeasy. I had an IDSL modem go bad and they refused to give the information needed to reconfigure the replacement. Then they expected me to continue paying for monthly service I couldn't get. I will never deal with Speakeasy or COVAD again. COVAD circuits, which speakeasy uses, are consistently rated the lowest quality in comparisons.
Sorry that had to have been Primenet.
*cries*
"We're gonna need a bigger boat"
I always appreciated Speakeasy's broadband tests (choose the location nearest you) Boston Chicago Denver Dallas LA NYC San Francisco Seattle
I am a very unhappy Speakeasy customer. When DirecTV DSL closed its doors Speakeasy made an offer that included webspace, a domain name and email. After installation they informed us that to use the advertised services would cost twenty to thirty, depending on the rep, additional dollars per month. They will not let me out of the contract, despite not delivering the service promised. As well, they have never sent a promised rebate check for our hardware. I could not recommend Speakeasy to anyone and would be very suspicious that they would deliver all of the promised fees to administrators in this program.
"...What is good for General Motors is good for America." -Charles Wilson, Secretary of Defense and fmr President of GM
Umm... My friend was literally 1 block away from the GTE CO, and got an Earthlink DSL ($39/mo, later became $49/mo).
He NEVER got over 400Kbits in and 128 or 256 (don't remember which) out.
If you're getting more, good for you, but I don't think that is their general policy.
Nothing to see here; Move along.
He's referring to laws that dont ammend the constitution. Things like the USA/patriot act; it's a group of laws that exist outside the US Constitution.
Earthlink was founded by a Scientologist. The rumors concern pro-Scientology bias in search queries and subtle evangelism.
A) If the customer shares his link with a neighbor WIHTOUT their help, 3) goes up and they don't get any extra money.
B) If the neighbor buys a line they get a new revenue stream, but all of the per-user costs are doubled. 1) is the bulk of their ongoing costs, while 2)is the bulk of their their one-time costs. 3) is miniscule, and the performance impact is mostly on the original customer (who expectes it).
The one about the performance impact being tiny and mostly on the original customer should have been attached to A).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Just to boil it down to the way I see it. If I buy a T-1 line for 400$/mo, and I offer it to 20 people in my neighborhood for 20$/mo, I still pay 200$/mo for the service. I mean, sure, I could limit it to just the first 10 people, or drop the price to 10$/mo to cover 20 people, but I'm not going to pay through the nose for half a T-1 when I'm not realistically going to get to use half the bandwidth. More than that, I'm sure as hell not going to offer it at a cost/person rate that's going to make /them/ a profit while continuing to cost me the same amount of money.
If they REALLY want to see this succeed, they should make it a profit sharing venture. Here's how I'd do it.
I'd also have an incentive program. If your share is popular, and used by lots of people, they consider bringing you on as a paid employee/partnership business or something. Or maybe they give you a discounted rate on the line. (more important for adding customers than anything else)
"No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
--James Madison
On the other hand, without this clause, anybody could use his T1 connection to Speakeasy to start his own ISP, without compensating Speakeasy for the extra strain on their network. No ISP can afford to tolerate that.
Well, if you were speaking Russian (or most of the major Slavic languages), "Not not" rather then negating itself, instead means something along the lines of "Very much not".
and (sorry, couldn't resist) In Soviet Russia, Not-not negates YOU!
-Trav
I should really get around to creating a sig.... Nah - too lazy =)
While no ISP is perfect, I have to hand it to Speakeasy. How many other ISPs cringe at this AUP? I think Speakeasy is taking the high road here and saying, "Share all you want." Unlike the prototypical behemoth ISPs in the form of Verizon, et al., "No connection sharing allowed" Granted, we all do it regardless, but Speakeasy is smart enough to know that there's nothing they can do to stop it, so why not offer to get that person who's sharing your line to pay for part of it? This may make sense to most of us, but in the corporate world, that's fairly progressive thinking.
I just hope SE can stay independent for a long time to come.
Things like the USA/patriot act; it's a group of laws that exist outside the US Constitution.
That's kinda a waste. Why should congress have to vote to affirm that murder is still illegal every 5 years, etc...
What we need is not some gimmick, but a demand from the people that the federal government go back to the notion that has been discarded over the last 50 years, that any right not specifically mentioned in the constitution is still reserved to the people or the states, not automatically assumed to not exist.
When people wanted to ban alcohol, it required a constitutional amendment. When people wanted to ban cocaine, marijuana, heroin, and hundreds of other drugs, the governments just slowly banned them without the amendment process. What a difference 40 years makes!
The only recent constitutional amendment was a BS one to make it look like congress cared about the people's concerns about being able to give themselves pay raises whenever they like. In reality it has little effect since most of congress are long term incumbents.
The current supreme court, while sometimes making good decisions, doesn't seem to be willing to take any strong stands against the federal government. Most of the stuff they have struck down lately have been state laws, with the odd blatently unconstitutional federal law thrown in.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Why? Because the majority of laws are stupid and to be honest are somewhat based on fad. I'm pretty sure it'd take all of 5 minutes every 5 years to decide that basics like murder are still bad.. and if not could be ammended to the constitution. If there is enough about an issue to make it need discussed every five years then there is good reason not to make it permanent. The extra work would force lawmakers to consentrate first on the important things and only then nit pick over new stuff.
:)
Just having all things, not otherwise outlawed, to be legal is a good start but with generation after generation of lawmarker trying to make their mark the legal system is slowly spammed to death.
Ammending the constitution for things like banning liquor is pretty stupid but it takes more work to pass an ammendment than a normal law.. so if they have enough support then I guess it's fine.
The Supreme Court getting some balls would also be a good idea but much harder to enact as a basis of law. It's easier to tweak the system than change human nature.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Usually you'll also get benefits for the extra $50. Make your choice as to which will serve you better. Stop whining. :)
Signed, an idiot.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Several other Worldcom/MCI resellers offer the same +/- $10.
digizip.com, britsys.net, etc.
>Last I heard, their DSL still required PPPOE or some other nonsense
;-) but I'm happy with the router. I get measured 1.5/.384 as evidenced by BitTorrent, and the occasional website that can serve those speeds.
Yes, they do. 2 years back it was *hell* trying to get PPPoE running running under Linux: the documentation was incomplete, and it wasn't even clear you had to choose EITHER the kernel module, OR the userland clinent... never both.
I got a cheap hardware router that does PPPoE instead. PPPoE is probably plug-and-play these days on Linux (unless you use Debian
I shouldn't complain about 384 because many "broadband" users have worse, and lots of cable users are capped at 128 up.
Anyways, if you want consumer-level accounts with better speed, you can look into routers that bind or pair 2 connections (like the old "shotgun" 56k modems). We use dual-cablemodems at work for a secondary connection, and it's a pretty good solution. Of course, that ain't $39 but it's faster and cheaper than a $100+ DSL "business" line.
I was also a DirectSwitch type, and S/E was really helpful when I had startup probs. with them. Not their fault!
I'm in Verizon land (near Boston), where there was, iirc, a class-action lawsuit some time ago (2 yrs?) because ADSL was heavily promoted and they had much more response than they could handle. IIrc, people were waiting months...
Anyhow, I wasn't in a hurry to tangle with Verizon if things didn't work out.
Verizon discovered (how? Possible that I told them) I had been a DirecTV DSL customer. (D/TV DSL was, imho, a class act; their bridge was made in USA!) V. DSL Salesman put on the pressure, and his closing inflection was, subtly, in effect, "you'll be sorry!"
Covad handled the details, although I suspect that the actual hardware cutover was handled by Verizon techs.
Repeated attempts by my ZyXEL bridge to sync with the DSLAM were always unsuccessful, although S/E Tech Support logs showed every attempt.
Can't prove it, and the accusation may be unfair, but I suspect that Verizon intentionally sabotaged the cutover. Covad said their job was done, but I e-mailed Speakeasy Billing to please wait until I was able to use DSL. They did.
In the meantime, one fellow in S/E Tech Support, who calls himself Murray (a name too difficult for many Americans to pronounce or spell; no kidding) apparently told Verizon something they needed to hear, and service has been great ever since.
Murray's real name is Scott, and there were, iirc, five Scott's in the Tech Support crew!
Murray really had a personal interest in getting me going; splendid fellow.
Some details omitted...
Enby
But more and more people every day are figuring it out, and more and more products are coming out every day making it easier and easier to do. As the population curve moves along, and more people grow up, even more people are less afriad to do stuff like this.
PPPoE is probably plug-and-play these days on Linux (unless you use Debian ;-) but I'm happy with the router. I get measured 1.5/.384 as evidenced by BitTorrent, and the occasional website that can serve those speeds.
/usr/share/doc/pppoe . The stock debian install has everything you need for pppoe, including quality docs. I wish the haters would stop hatin' on Debian, already.
For the record, I went from not knowing what PPPoE was to having a Debian box up and running with it in a period of under 5 minutes. Granted, I'm familiar enough with debian that I knew to look in
also, seeing how pppoe requires a login/pass, it really couldn't be truly plug-n-play in the apple-hardware-since-1984 sense. Granted, windowsXP's so called PnP today still isn't that good, but hey...