Unplugged

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DECEMBER 1 2001:
The day @home went dark.

 

 

The page you are looking for will not be displayed due to posturing between lawyers and a judge that is not concerned with 860,000 or so customers.

 
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December 1 2001: No Internet
 I called AT&T Broadband's customer service line first thing after I noticed I could not surf. I asked the CSR if Excite had pulled the plug on them. The CSR said: "no." Either the CSR was lying or they don't inform the CSR's of the status of the company's network. Either way, that is shoddy business. Later,  Saturday morning, we received this message on our answering machine from AT&T.
 

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December 2 2001: No Internet
 

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December 3 2001: No Internet
 

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December 4 2001: No Internet
After work I came home to see a message awaiting on our answering machine. It was an automated phone-bot from AT&T saying that service is restored in my area. All I had to do was reboot my computer. So I did, and nothing. I called a "support" number and asked what else I should do. He said: "You should wait until tomorrow morning." - "Is that the best you can do?" I asked. He said that the message went out to all of California and that some areas may not be up yet. I harumphed, said "thank you" and hung up. I had a feeling he was a doofus-drone and didn't know what was really going on. The guy didn't even ask if I unplugged the modem and jiggled the wires blah-blah-blah...all the stuff in the script. So I called the same number again hoping to get someone with at least some English language skills. This time I was greeted with a touch-tone menu of choices, after going through four levels of menus and entering and confirming our telephone number the recording said: "Due to the high volume of calls we will not be able to help you at this time" and then... IT HUNG UP ON ME!! WHY-OH-WHY DID I GO THROUGH ALL THAT POOP JUST TO BE CUT OFF?
 

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December 5 2001: No Internet until 9:30PM When I happened to notice the lights on my cable modem were in the correct blinkie state. The new service is sluggish, they have throttled back the DL speed from 3000 to 1500 kbps and at www.dslreports.com I am only getting 930 kbps. Oh well, it's still better than DSL.
 

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December 6 2001: WE GOT INTERNET!
With the change from @home to attbi, comes some changes in service. Once again the old telco mentality at AT&T has kicked in. They say that our download speeds are "managed" for a better internet experience. I say they have managed to cut our speed to one fourth of what it was with @home. A comparison of Speed tests from dsl reports.

Date Speed Down/Up Provider Comments
2002-12-14 1745/225 attbi/comcast Well, that's interesting. I did NOT uncap my modem yet my download speed is well over the 1500 cap. Consistent results on several tests.
2002-05-26 1440/226 attbi well, a little increase
in service is nice.
2002-05-26 1390/122 attbi eh, I'll live with it.
2001-12-06 900/123 kbps attbi humbug! It's 1/4 the speed we had with @home
2001-12-06 950/124 kbps attbi humbug! It's 1/4 the speed we had with @home
2001-11-22 3336/123 kbps @home Smokin'!
2001-11-09 3644/123 kbps @home Smokin'!
2001-09-21 9/-39 kbps Covad DSL Notice the minus sign on the Up speed... It timed-out... failed
2001-09-21 23/-279 kbps Covad DSL Notice the minus sign on the Up speed... It timed-out... failed
2001-09-08 2398/128 kbps @home Rockin'!

 
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December 20 2001:
Oh crap! It looks like our email is going to change again. Comcast and ATT Broadband are going to merge. Also, on the speed test scene, I have been getting up to the 1500 dl cap on the speed tests. So at least they are screwing us a little less but not much less.
 

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December 21 2001: Crap++. According to an AT&T spokesperson, in addition to the dl speed cap, they are also planning on implementing a cap on the quantity of data downloaded. Looks like it's DSL or dial-up for us when they pull this crap. Seems as if AT&T wants to sell us a "service" as long as we don't use it.
 

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Late May 2002: I happened to read an article that ATTBI increased their upload cap from 128K to 256K. An increase in service? Unheard of! Anyway, I power cycled my modem. Lo and behold, my upload cap is now running around 226K! Funny they don't notify anyone of the service increase.
 

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December 2002: I rebooted our modem after an outage and whaddayaknow, speeds are higher than the 1500 cap. With the 'merger' of attbi/comcast, comes yet another email address change. We'll be sure to let ya know.


Other "Not at Home" Sites
bullet A Parody at lostbrain.com
  
bulletUser Forums at dslreports.com
bullet ATT Broadband
bullet @Home
bullet Comcast
 
bullet ATT Really Blewit - another ATT user's site.
 
bullet ATT Sucks Club at Yahoo.com
 
bullet Venting at geek.com
 
bullet TCI Sucks - My Old Cable Ranting Page
Personally, I have no sympathy for the Excite@Home's bondholders. They supported a management team that spent almost 800 million dollars on a company that generated NO REVENUE. (Blue Mountain Greetings) Then later sold it for less than 10 million. It doesn't take an MBA to see that squandering money like that will lead to bankruptcy. They should just take their lumps and suck it up like all the other dot.bombers of 2001.

On the other hand, It seems obvious to the most casual of observers that AT&T was up to some shenanigans. They placed their people in the management team. They had 75% of the voting power. They ran Excite into the ground so they could buy up the assets for dimes on the dollar. Is that legal? It may not be, but it sure looks like good old American capitalism in action to me.

I also have no respect for the Judge Carlson in the bankruptcy court. His determination that allowed the Excite network to 'pull the plug' was uneducated, unnecessary and incorrect. It was uneducated due to the lack of understanding the impact of his decision would have. The internet, is not a "non-essential service" anymore. It was unnecessary because there is already one (and only one) valid bid on the table for the network assets. And of course, it was incorrect because it was uneducated and unnecessary!

Somehow, the judge and the Excite lawyers think that turning off the network will increase it's value. This action, in their mind, will force AT&T to increase the bid for the assets. It seems to be a very risky move. Will people wait for this BS to settle or will they bail out and find a new service provider?

I am in the waiting mode for now. I can't go back to dial-up, Sprint Wireless is not accepting new orders and we are too far away from the CO for a decent DSL connection.

I hope that AT&T is really close to finishing their own network. Then they can tell the Excite lawyers and bondholders to go screw themselves. When no-one else bids on their assets, they can try to get pennies on the dollar rather than dimes.

 I am also perturbed that the Feds have not stepped in to stop the shutdown. A different bankruptcy judge forced a bankrupt DSL provider to stay on to allow users some time to transition to a new provider. The Feds have bailed out auto manufacturers, power companies and airlines... I guess the internet doesn't use enough petroleum products to catch the interest of our administration.

A Summary of the BS since the AT&T@Home Debacle Started.
bulletLoss of service for 5 days.
bulletUseless (and I mean really useless) tech support.
bulletNo status/incorrect status reports.
bulletSpeeds one third of what they were.
bulletSudden change of email addy without any forwarding.
bulletRumored "Enhancements"
bulletNo more usenet
bulletDownload limits
bulletTiered pricing
bulletNo more routers - BASTARDS


The dark side of broadband.
When I first signed up for AT&T@Home, I was thoroughly impressed with the service and I recommended it to many other people. To all of you, I sincerely apologize for my recommendation. I had no idea, it was going to turn to $hit so fast.
AT&T Comcast: Optimizing Your Broadband Experience (unless you download, or upload, or use USENET. Or Email. Or VPN. Or...that "Internet" thingie.)

Wednesday July 11, 2007 06:59:56 PM -0500