Regularity is good for columns too. By definition, columns are supposed to be stable, regular, constant. Like any good radial tire, columns are just supposed to be there doing their job.
This column, if indeed there are any people out there who actually follow this drivel, did not appear last time because there was too little space and too much advertising.
I never did like advertising. Not one bit. But unfortunately, it pays the bills. And sometimes, it calls the shots.
It shouldn't happen again.
Technophile happens every other Tuesday. From here on out, without fail.
Problem: Busy signal. Often.
Enter the eight 28.8k FAME modems: 15 minutes of connect time -- long enough to check your mail and some tertiary online communication or information retrieval.
Problem: Not enough time.
According to CS' Heidi Schmidt, the FAME modems are not all that famous. During a spot-check conducted once an hour by members of CS, only one of the eight modems were in use at any given time -- even during the peak hours between 5 p.m. and 12 a.m., when all 100 of the 14.4k 338-6666 modems are sending back irritating, fiber optic busy signals.
Enter the newly-imposed three hour time limit on the 6666 modems, instituted last weekend. Three hours maximum; abrupt cut-off without notification. And good luck trying to get back online.
"There are some people we know about who will stay connected for 24 hours or more," said Schmidt. The new time limit, she says, will eradicate the bandwidth mongers' greedy gluttony and provide access to more people, more often.
In defense of the time limit, CS' World Wide Web specialist Julianne Tolson pipes: "You should be able to get your work done in that amount of time." But, she concedes, "I still don't think I'll ever be able to get through."
Problem: Too many damn restrictions, not enough utility.
Aimnet is for serious users. It provides the basic PPP/SLIP accounts, with local dial-up numbers and an email account, for $20 per month plus a $25 one-time setup fee.
With that, you get 50 hours of online time. It costs $1 an hour for anything after that. And for those interested in WWW publishing, nothing in the basic package covers that. But for an extra $5 per month, Aimnet provides an outrageous 40MB (10 WWW, 20 FTP, 10 home) and unlimited online time.
Problem: Lots of space, but costly to the user.
While Aimnet is geared more for corporate users and those who need a whole lotta space, HookedNet targets the email and chat room junkie: A $25 monthly rate yields unlimited use, email account, PPP/SLIP access and local dial-up numbers.
Think of it as a cable TV bill where you control the content.
HookedNet also offers a limited account, which includes all the benefits of the above, for $15 a month. But for only 10 hours online use. It's $2 an hour after that.
Problem: No WWW publishing space.
But HookedNet also provides what they call a "corporate" account that allows WWW publishing for, minimum, $35 a month, plus a $200 startup fee, and an $8 monthly maintenance fee. For all that, all HookedNet will give is a measly 2MB of space -- the same as SF State provides free.
Problem: obvious.
Now we're getting a little closer. For $15 per month, Sirius offers unlimited 14.4k PPP/SLIP access, 1MB of email space, unlimited use, and local dial-up numbers. A 28.8k connection costs $5 more per month. And then there's that omnipresent setup fee: $25.
For another $4 a month, plus yet another $11 startup fee, Sirius provides 5MB of WWW space.
Not bad. But then Sirius adds the caveat: "We do have a 3 hour limit policy during peak hours, which only means that you should log off for a short while and log right back on if you need to."
Problem: Chilling similarity to SF State's system. And you have to pay for it.
CreativeNet provides essentially the same service as Sirius, with one important difference: No extra charge for web space, and no extra startup cost.
Problem: CreativeNet hasn't been in business for even a year. It's new, it's untested, untried, possibly untrue. It could fold, without notice.
Provides the same service SF State students already have, for pay. For $12.50 per month, SprintNet provides 75 hours prime time and $.50 an hour thereafter. Their biggest benefit is, of course, 90 percent guaranteed connectivity.
Problem: Too late. It won't start until next semester.
Next time: AFS vs. plain vanilla UNIX.
Until then, a warning: If you save personal email messages to your shell account, don't. It's not a good idea.
Technophile gleefully accepts hate mail: kbrown@sfsu.edu
[ Golden Gater Online October 24, 1995 ]
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