Blackout gets mention in Athlone local Paper

MS

Thanks to Adam (Nice One Mate :P ) our local Westmeath Independant gave the Blackout in Athlone a mention. I dont have a link to it so i hope ye dont mind if i try type it here as best i can and please excuese and miss spellings etc.

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Ireland Offline Blackout Reaches Athlone
- by Gareth Naughton. Westmeath Independant

Last Friday, the people of Athlone were being encouraged to join in a nationwide blackout of telecommunications services organised by Ireland Offline, a protest group fighting for improved internet services in Ireland.

The protest in Athlone happened at the last minute and was something of a surprise. By all accounts it was very successful and I wouldn't be surprised if they handed out more flyers in Athlone than we did at the top of Grafton Street in Dublin "jokes Mr. Adam Beecher, spokesperson for Ireland Offline.

It is not known which disgruntled internet user from the area organised the the protest in Athlone because like many of the other activists throughout the country they worked with the organisation through it's discussion forum on boards.ie. As part of the nationwide protest people were asked not to connect to the Internet, stay off the phone as much as possible and temporarily replace their personal and buisness homepage with a special Blackout support page available from the groups website.

We have a very buisy forum and our users have been discussing ways of protesting and the Blackout emerged from it. The success of the day cannot really be measured because the telecom companies are not going to say whether they lost buisness or not. However, the main success was the media coverage because we want to educate people about this and draw their attention to the problem, says Mr. Beecher.

Ireland Offline was established in May 2001 following Esat's decision to block 2000 users of their no limits flat rate service for abusing it. It was a bit annoying because there were no limits on the service so it was a bit rich throwing people off it for using it too much. says Mr. Beecher.

The orgaisation, which is largely run through the interent, are campaigning for establishment of a flat rate internet access service, whereby people pay a monthly fee rather than a per second of use as they do now. In addition they want the introduction of broadband services to Ireland, thus, facilitating an improved service for the internet users.

It would be a huge benefit to e-buisness and for research purposes and it could be installed very easily but the companies do not want to introduce it bacause they say they will have to drop the retail price and sell it below cost price. Fair enough if it is more expensive to provide here than in the UK but we want to pay a fair price for a fair product , said Mr. Beecher.

People were aslo encouraged to write to their local public representatives to support the Cummunications Regulators Bill 200 which must be signed withen the next six weeks if it is to survive in its current format. The bill establishes a regulatory board with final say on telecommunications matters although there will be room for negotation.

The poor quality of rural phone lines, in terms of Internet connection, is also an issue that the organisation feels strongly about. Outside the major urban centres people are having awful problems dealing with lines of poor quality - some users are using 28ks and lower which is incredibly slow. It may be too expensive to deal with it directly and replace the lines but at least with a flat rate service those users wont be paying for the time spent waiting for slow connections , believes Mr. Beecher.

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Again i apologise if i misspelled anything or the post is too long.
But once again Adam Thank YOU! 'Nice One Mate '

LOL! i cant type n e more me fingers are going NUMB!


MS

disConnected

Well, isn't that exactly what we wanted?

Considering how many people in the local are read the Westmeath Independent this is a huge success.

Hmmm... thinking hard about the next action we should take. Assuming that quite a few people have seen now how successful we can be we should be able to get more of our members active for our next action. What about another leafletting blitz just before Christmas (when everybody is out buying christmas presents) or shortly after Christmas, when most people are still on holidays?

dahamsta

No problem MS: "I'm a PRO, that's my job."

BTW, I wasn't kidding when I said I was surprised. I knew ye were hitting the streets, but by all accounts ye did very well. Well done.

Maybe with the success of this initiative, people will be more inclined to get involved on the ground in future.

adam

MS

Thanks mate i have not smiled like this in a long time but i had a LOT of help. I wont mention names, but i really think the John Denver look alike had a lot to do with it too hehehe. Damn if he could sing as well we would have been there all night LOL! But again many thanks to everyone that helped. I cant mention names becaouse some people were threatoned NOT to take part but they showed up n e way. So to the guy that baought the first Pint...thanks mate! And hmmmmmmmm all i can say is the other guy is he is a NUTTER! LOL! (just kidding ) But if anyone meets him DONT! buy him drink becaouse he falls asleep after 14 pints..ooooops that should mean he goes home after 13 pints LOL! And dont mention Pringles Cans ok

Once again.... i know u might say your a Pro and its your job .... but from all of us here Thanks .... your much appreciated mate.


MS