Any Oz comments on AOL as an ISP?

[Binoculars]

I've been with ozemail for a couple of years; never had any problems at all. Always get through on first go, no disconnections, good speed.

But when they brought in unlimited access for $25 a month to compete with AOL, and didn't bother to extend the favour to regional areas, I abused them roundly but found I didn't have any choice but to stay with them.

Now I see AOL have a connection in my city (Mackay); unlimited for $25 sounds great, but I don't want to change to slow speeds, disconnections, engaged lines etc.

Any comments from AOL users at all, particularly regional users, would be appreciated.

[Feeton Terrafirma]

Sorry I can't provide current info on AOL, but when they were setting up in Oz I was a beta tester. There were several problems at release of the service.

1/ They did not support any email client except the half broken thing they supplied. This meant I could not retrieve email from another ISP whilst connected through AOL

2/ They did not offer a shell account so I could not telnet.

3/ Their supplied browser was horrible and slow, but you could use any other browser if you wanted

4/ Most important for me is not a tech issue, but the deal for beta testers was a month of free connection after the service went live. This was canned after one week. I think the AOL ethics suck big time.

It's up to you of course but I'd say give 'em a miss!

Feeton

------------------
Once I was VERY good, now I'm very good, once!

[This message has been edited by Feeton Terrafirma (edited 26 November 2000).]