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

ISP Service Agreements

Author:Jim Stegman
Posted:8/2/2000; 6:34:39 AM
Topic:ISP Service Agreements
Msg #:19376
Prev/Next:19375 / 19377

At the same time, the service agreements of home connectivity providers are as busted as the distribution system of the music companies. Users are prohibited from running servers in their homes.

As an ISP, I can comment on this & shed some light on our collective POV. (if I can be so bold to speak for the industry)

Over the years we have had a number of inquiries from people who want a dialup "static IP" for $19.95 per month. We always refuse, although there are ISPs who will do this. The reason is that we know the customer will be running a server, and will make pains to keep the connection up 24/7. This is a line that costs us about $40 per month, paid to Ma Bell. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out this is a losing proposition for us.

We've been spending all morning cleaning up the mess created by a dialup customer who thinks he knows how to run a mailserver over a dialup connection. We've got 1,100 messages, each about 250K in size in our mail queue. Each one, when processed, bounces back and gets a little bigger each time. (an error message is appended) As you can imagine this has brought our email server to its knees.

A delightful problem to have, especially compounded because all our other customers are calling in, complaining about crappy service, want an adjustment to their invoice, etc. etc.

At the moment I'm not inclined to alter my service agreement! If you still think I should, I've got a business to sell you!!! ;-)

There are responses to this message:

This page was archived on 6/13/2001; 4:55:57 PM.

© Copyright 1998-2001 UserLand Software, Inc.