Why no AOL in Ireland?

The Gopher

Keep in mind im a newbie so nno attacking for stupidity but how come AOL,which must be the worlds biggest flat rate network,ever set up in Ireland?Itd seem a logical choice considering we have a high internet user percentage.Does eircom employ some blocking tactic to not let them off the ground?Knowing this government AOL probably applied for a licence in the 19th century but their form is lying under a huge boxful of red tape.
So anyway,whats the story?Why no AOL?

timod

Newbie with 365 posts, and here a year? slow starter eh? hehehe

Anyway... if you recall, about 3 years ago, we had iol, esat, ocean, eircom, dna, ntl, chorus, elivefree and probably more offering dial up....

Now we have Esat and Eircom, with most of the others gone, and the remaining hadling a fraction of the market...

i.e. no comptetition. Eircom have a stranglehold on the market, so even if you're dialling up to Esat, you're still paying Eircom etc..

There is no incentive for AOL, or any other company for that matter to invest in Ireland... at least not in the current regulatory environment, where the OLO's and ISP's are afraid or too comfortable to complain, and the regulator can't enforce anything useful, and the incumbent has no vision.

SkepticOne

Another point is that we (Ireland) compete for investment with other much larger countries. It is no harder negotiating with say DT in Germany or BT in Britain than it is with Eircom in Ireland. Therefore, a company like AOL will first go to these much larger countries because the market (and therefore potential profits) is much larger. Why bother with Ireland.

This is why we have been arguing for a more pro-active regulatory environment. Such an environment is necessary to attract and keep investment from abroad.

This may require more powers to be granted to the regulator, but it might also mean the regulator making more use of existing powers.

strat

market
is
too
small

mdf

ehhh...an ISP doesn't need a licence. It's a business choice whether AOL start up here or not

Beruthiel

doubt they'll be thinking of starting up anything for some time, they just moved their french department from East Point, Dublin back to Marseille, France....

Dustaz

Dont AOL have local phone numbers here?
I know a few ppl who use AOL, not sure what number they dial.

Digi_Tilmitt

A got a aol cd and tried to connect using it, but it made wierd noises and didn't work

stormkeeper

I tried signing up to AOL ages ago, and I was told that I could do it, no problem, but then there was the fact that we needed a credit card (Laser doesn't get accepted, only Switch... Dispite it being the same thing ::sighs::). Then we phoned a few other people and they said that you incur extra charges calling AOL from Ireland, so I'm not sure how it is...

jmcc

Originally posted by timod

i.e. no comptetition. Eircom have a stranglehold on the market, so even if you're dialling up to Esat, you're still paying Eircom etc..

AOL decided not to set up any real dialup operations in Ireland a long time ago. The primary reason I think was the size of the market and the monopoly of Telecom Eireann as it was then. There was always a Dublin AOL contact number though.

Regards...jmcc

TomF

I subscribed to AOL while in America in 1995, and still use it, although IOL is my ISP now, and I connect to AOL through IOL (!). I keep AOL because of the periodic failures of IOL and because my kids all like their AOL addresses.

A few years ago an AOL spokesman made periodic appearances on Irish TV in short interviews and his point, if I remember it right, was that Ireland needed untimed telephone access to the Internet if the country was going to get anywhere trying to make people interested in doing business or keeping in touch over the Internet. As I remember he had some strong words to say about Telecom Eireann and the Irish government's do-nothing approach.

When IOL periodically drops out of sight, I can dial up AOL and get on the Internet that way. There are three numbers in Ireland, but they're expensive to use.

Cork: (021) 427-8273, 9600 bps, and a surcharge of US$6.00/hr
Dublin: (01) 246-1020, 57.6 bps, surcharge of $3.95/hr
Shannon: (061) 474-503, 28.2 bps, surcharge of $$6.00/hr

I went through the whole list of International access numbers that AOL has on its site, and there are only six other countries in the world that have a 9600 bps connection to AOL. Here they are: Ireland, Egypt (Luxor), Ghana, Haiti, Hungary (3 locations), Venezuela and two mobile 9600 bps lines for Germany.

There are only ten other countries in the world that have 28,600 bps connections: Ireland, Albania, Bolivia, Denmark (does it have something to do with the cows?), Ecuador, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Martinique, Reunion Island, Romania and Ukraine.

This doesn't exactly put Ireland in the big league of Internet connectedness! But at least it lets us know what the rest of the world really thinks of Ireland when it comes to the Internet.:mad:

bricks

I see the referance to it on their webpage.
This is the kind of net connection charge that you'd expect to pay over a decade ago.

segadreamcast

Originally posted by Digi_Tilmitt
A got a aol cd and tried to connect using it, but it made wierd noises and didn't work

Hm - I bought a Mariah Carey album last month and the same thing happened...but HMV insisted it was fine *Sigh*

I blame the setup :P

TomF

The $3.95 or $6.00 an hour charges are "surcharges" for using these local numbers in Ireland to connect via AOLNet Or AOLGlobalNet. If you don't use them you only get charged AOL's subscription fee, which now is something like $14.95 a month.

So, If IOL is down and I ring one of AOL's numbers, I get charged by Esat for my call, then Esat's per-second charges, then AOL charges me their rate per minute, and of course I am still paying the AOL monthly fee and the IOL annual fee and naturally I am paying Eircom their monthly fee for having a line to my house.

Maybe sending a letter via snailmail isn't such a bad idea.