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IOFFL mentioned in Examiner Money and Jobs.

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  • 12-09-2003 8:31am
    #1
    corkie
    Registered Users Posts: 7,481 ✭✭✭


    Irish Examiner has the following today:
    Eircom launches flat rate internet access at last
    By John Hearne
    The service you sign up to will cap the number of hours you can spend online every month, but the thresholds are high.

    He mentions Ireland Offline and has some quotes from David Long. (as Chairman)

    He also give's a good summary on the hours and price.
    As soon as it come's available on the Web, I will post full quotes.


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    #2
    Paddy20
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,797 ✭✭✭Paddy20


    corkie,

    Excellent news, well deserved and I look forward too reading it.

    P.:)


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    #3
    corkie
    Registered Users Posts: 7,481 ✭✭✭corkie


    here is some extracts from the articale:
    Eircom launches flat rate internet access at last
    by John Hearne in the Irish Examiner (Money & Jobs) 12/09/2003

    The service you sign up to will cap the number of hours you spend online every month, but the thresholds are high.

    Picture of Internet users in an internet cafe: Flat rate charges on home internet could put price pressure on premises like this.

    Flat rate internet has arrived... finally. With the launch of Eircom's flat rate product last week, there are now three to choose from in the market, but at least there's finaly a choice.

    ..........
    He explains FRIACO
    ..........

    Its introduction is nonetheless a major landmark in the evolution of internet access in this country. David Long is chairman of Ireland Offline, a lobby group which has been campaigning for FRIACO for well over a year now.

    He explains how significant it is. "It was most important to break the business model that the operators had been relying on . Without flat rate you are paying per minute of access that you had, so every minute your online the clock is ticking... Now that flat rate is in, there is no beneifit for the operators holding back the the rollout of other technologies, such as broadband, be it DSL or wirless or anything else, because they no longer have to protect this per minute revenue. While the per minute model was in, anything they did to disrupt that revenue was bad news. Why would they rush to get people onto a faster service where they could stay on unlimited amounts of time for less money, when they have this execellent revenue coming in for people who are dialling up and paying per minute for a slower product?".

    Last Janaury, however, Minister for Communications Dermot Ahern cut a swathe through commercial resistance to FRIACO by issuing a directive to the telcoms regulator to bring about conditions necessary for its introduction.

    Eircom introduced a wholesale price, facilitating the entry of other operators to the market. FRIACO is now provided by Esat BT and UTV as well as Eircom. Choosing the best is not as straight-forward as you might hope. "The problem is," says David Long, "it's the same difficulty you have with your mobile tariffs. There's confussion in the marketing, It's very difficult to compare and contrast."

    .................
    John Hearne explains each in turn, here are some of the quotes from that part of the articale:

    "On the Face of it, the best value is provided by UTV. ................."

    Una McGirr at Esat BT says that the company isn't policing that 180 agressively at the moment, and so long as no gets lazy and stays logged in all week, nor will they. However, "if they're serial abusers, we'll send them a bill."................. Minimum contract for IOL anytime is one year, though that may be reduced to two months.



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