Cheap Dial-Up ISPs Gain Ground

prostoalex writes "PC World takes a look at the proliferation of sub-$10-per-month Internet service providers and notices that the market for low-priced dial-up access is actually up in this weak economy. The low rates, with $4.75 per month quoted as the cheapest, are not abundant with features, and many of the dial-up providers don't give you an e-mail account or Web space, but it seems to be a plausible option for many. But reliability is a big issue, since 'about 20 of the startup ISPs [...] shutter within a year.'"

Comments

Travelers

[awerg]

I travel a lot and would love a cheap international dialup account. No frills, just a connection. With yahoo, hotmail, VPN, web access to corporate email I do not need webspace or an email account. Now, If I could find a way to bypass those annoying hotel sur-charges for phone calls.

Free UK ISPs

[madaxe42]

We've had free ISPs in the UK for years now, such as Freeserve etc., which are profitable because they receive a proportion of the call charge (local rate call, nation-wide), rather than it all going to the telco. Also, there are a few which had 0800 numbers (free numbers), and rely on advertising banners. While living in the states, I was somewhat bemused by the complete abscense of free ISPs, and still can't understand why they can't operate on the british model, surely it isn't *that* difficult to set up a deal with AT&T, or whoever they're connected to. Ah well, just my .02$.

Its not the "economy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Its the incubent telcos who are milking profits form old technology.! Look at countrys like Japan, South korea, Sweeden. 10, 20 even 100Mbit connections for less than DSL in the usa. Look at Australia, Greece and Ireland as examples of incubents at their worst.

Re:Cheap?

[WegianWarrior]

It is the same here in Norway. In fact, only idiots actually pays a montly fee, unless they a) have it thru their job (meaning the company picks up the bill) or b) has broadband and thus ain't using the telephonewire for access.

For the benefit of our US friends who may wonder how the ISP can survive giving away free service with a usefull numbver of perks (e-mail adresses by the handfull, webspace and so on), lemme point out two things that explains why. Firstly, we pay by the minute to use the phone, no matter if we call grandma or to connect to the net. Secondly, the major ISP in Norway are also telcos...

WiFi

[DigiShaman]

Hopefully, WiFi should make connecting to the internet from around the world a painless alternative to dial-up. Of course, I would expect small charges to access them. But I don't see why you couldn't have 1 hour access for a few bucks. That should be enough time to grab your e-mail and small documents over VPN to the local drive.

Re:This is news ?

[tyagiUK]

I've recently gone from ADSL (1.5Mb/s symmetric) back to 56k dial (on a pay-as-you-go account) due to a house move out in to the countryside. To be honest, apart from when there is more than one person using the link, it's perfectly adequate for Web (on relatively graphics-lite sites) and Shell access. The only downer is larger downloads which I can do at work and then just copy over at home on the Wireless/Wired LAN. I've also found that it stops me wasting nearly as much time on the 'Net doing "pointless browsing"!