Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Re: The British Freeserve is doing quite well.

Author:William Crim
Posted:8/7/1999; 5:09:41 PM
Topic:Is it time to short AOL?
Msg #:9259 (In response to 9253)
Prev/Next:9258 / 9260

Polls in Britain have shown that at least 1/3 of all home Internet users in Britain use a Freeserve account as their main Internet provider. 1/3 use a Paid service, like AOL, MSN, etc as their exclusive provider. The other 1/3 Have a Paid service account, but also use freeserve for more time consuming things like Web browsing ans downloading files. The only use their paid accounts for email and services(less time on-line at AOL = less cost). Since Freeserve started, AOL's and MSN's growth dropped. Many customers left, especially those who are moderatly experienced with the Internet. Freeserve's mediocre technical support was offset by the greater computer/Internet savvy of the users, and the lack of cost.

Both AOL and MSN already have free service in Britain(with extra non-Internet related features for pay) to compete with Freeserve. This is because the telephone cost in Britian is so high, people can't afford to pay the telephone AND the Internet bill. Freeserve was started by the store Dixon's in Britain. They fund it on the hope it will increase thier sales in technology and to draw Internet commerce.

On a side note, ADSL is comming to Britain and the people are very excited. British Telecom was not planning on rolling it out for several more years, but Cable access was moving in and they had to advance their plans by several years. Ahhhhh competition. :-)

There are responses to this message:

This page was archived on 6/13/2001; 4:51:47 PM.

© Copyright 1998-2001 UserLand Software, Inc.