Dam* you AT&T!

[Bob Putnam]

Gentlemen (and the rest of you),

My presence here will be a bit limited until I get my cable internet back. It's not the speed so much as the fact that I share this connection with the fax. Hopefully, things will be straightened out in a couple of days.

[Jeff Frigo]

Bob:


I can't believe such a large company can allow one of their partners to go bankrupt without some type of contingincy plan. They knew this was coming and decided to do nothing about it. I am so pissed, but what can I do? Untill towns allow two different cable companies to compete with one another in the same town, we are screwed.




Jeff

[renaissance man]

Bob,

Get a cable modem if possible. Much more reliable than AT&T or any DSL for that matter.

Also, go to faxwave.com It's a free service for receiving faxes. You can have forms emailed to your clients and have the signed faxes sent right back to your computer.

Regards,

[Jeff Frigo]

Dave:


Hello? We both have cable modems. Excite (AT&T's partner) went bankrupt this weekend and pulled the plug on about 1,000,000 customers that use cable modems. I guess they are not as reliable as we thought.



Jeff

[Jamo]

I'm sure you guys appreciate the fact that the founder was from Fresno. You're welcome.

[Tom T.]

Jamo,

He should've stuck with the sheep, eh?

TT

[Jamo]

"EXITE" was the command he gave the sheep when...you know. Kinda catchy, huh?

[Bob Putnam]

I hope they get their "stuff" together pretty soon. I was very happy with AT&T/@home. It was functional more than 99.5% of the time - and I typically log on at weird times. Meanwhile this connection is costing me $2/hour. And I'm cheap. ;>)

[bran3b]

I received a mail from AT&T about this. AT&T tried to buy Excite outright, which was turned down. Then AT&T, as well as the other Cable modem providers that use Excite, offered to pay some ammount to continue service for a short time so that a new network could be completed. Excite accepted the offer from two other providers worth over $300 Million for several months of service, however they refused AT&T's offer. As of yesterday AT&T is expecting to have Colorado back in service (on a new network) Wednsday (I am not sure about other places, but I think that Oregon and Washington will be working before that).

Bran

[Zderf]

AT&T is the only cable provider that Excite cut off last Saturday night at 12:00am. Other providers like Cox continued to receive service as negotiations with them held hope of reasonable settlement. AT&T made a ridiculous offer to purchase Excite's network which told them that any reasonable settlement with AT&T would not be possible. A such, myself and about a million other AT&T@home folks were unhooked. I don't blame Excite, they were losing millions whilst AT&T and other cable providers were scooping in millions of profit. Simply business 101.

As for AT&T in the Northwest, we were back on line with AT&T's network within 24 hours. I received 2 pre-recorded phone calls providing updates over that time. Quite customer oriented I might add. As well, one receives 2 days of credit for every day one is without service.

I've have T1, had DSL, and had a dedicated 56k fone modem. Cable is still the best option by far in my experience.

I'm still pleased. (Sorry about that!)

Zderf

[Bob Parmenter]

Hi Fred,
I'm with you. They had my service back up by Sunday evening. The biggest pain has been getting the new email address out where necessary. The frequently used corespondents have been easy to get to, but for us seniors it's hard to remember those less frequent ones!

One of the best things about senility is you meet new friends all the time!

[Bish Wheeler]

Hey Bob,

Been so long since you have been around, thought you may have been abducted by aliens. Happy Holidays!

Bish

[Bob Parmenter]

Hey Brother Bish,

Happy Holidays to you as well.

You're not far off, we've had quite a time the last few months. Lee and I are looking forward to a little more relaxation this coming year as we sold the business last month. I'm working off my consulting period now and should be done with the corporate close out stuff by years end.
This winter it's get hard after the hot rods time. Since the Cobra is now my only completed car here it will be my primary ride when decent weather returns. Hopefully the '32 3 window will be done before next summer is.
Thanks for the good thoughts,
Bob

[SSSnake]

Bob,

I know what you're sayin, as i am also without internet. It is hard to imagine how a major corporation such as excite could go bankrupt. Probably wanted too much money. Such as some manufacurers want for cobra replicas.
They called my house and said the network should be back up tonight. They better be right

Glenn davis jr

[Bob Putnam]

Whew! I finally got it back - after 12 days on the slow track. The cable modem was no longer compatible with the service. PITA.

Just to make things interesting, when the service guy called the home office to complete the connection address, he was put on hold for 1/2 hour - "the computer is running very slowly". I was totally calm - I'm sure my dentist will appreciate the loss of enamel from my tooth grinding.

Then I had to reconfigure all the computers I run through a modem-sharing program. PITA2

But now I'm happy.

[Jamo]

and his trust busting ways. Bring back the monopolies--one freeking communications company (telephones, cells, on-line connections), one power company, etc.