Article in Sunday Times by Jane Suiter..

mayhem#

Did anyone read this nonsense?
(see attachement)

E.

corkey

Seems the reporter has filled the article with quotes :mad:

MDR

anyone got an email addy for her ... the Irish Times website is most unhelpful.

pork99

Thank you for setting us straight Sunday Times

well obviously broadband is only for "whining anoraks" so nobody wants it; everyone wants Sky Digital though!!!!

listening to BBC 6 Music over ADSL at work as I type this, I would listen to it at home if I had broadband - whats wrong with that?, oh yes Rupert ain't getting his cut, of course!

MDR

Ok peeps this is back to you again,

let her know how wrong she is

Jane Suiter

seamus

Anyone who's going to email her, please be civil and comprehensible, we might get another supporter in the ranks.

2 main things that should be pointed out to her:

25% 'not going to get broadband' and 30% 'unlikely to get broadband', leaves 45% who 'are' or 'are likely' to get broadband. That's a huge figure considering internet penetration isn't much larger then 45% in many countries.

Also, Broadband penetration relies heavily on internet exposure and reliability - Ireland's poor penetration figures show that enough isn't being to done to convince people the internet is useful, let alone broadband.......

Dustaz

I would encourage everyone with a minute or two to spare to email Ms Suiter and educate her on the issues that she clearly doesnt fully understand.

The 45% who do want broadband, the fact that eircom has not hit its target because of the ludicruous price put on I-stream, the lack of FRIACO as a gateway. We all know the facts, lets share them with another journalist who can spread them further.

Please be polite, Its understandable that she might be taken in by the spin on the report and remember, A journalist armed with the facts is worth more than 100 aimless rants.

mike65

I read that and just shugged, I've given up on journos trying understanding this issue they'd sooner re-write press releases
and dodgy survey results.

Mike.

De Rebel

There is an odious whiff of rat-speak or rat-spin about this article. And I have a feeling that we well hear a lot more of this "well there are 500,000 lines and only 2,000 takers and the odtr was right all along; there is no interest in broadband and didn't jupiter call it just right and in these difficult economic times shouldn't we be making the best use of what we have and not pandering to vocal minorities........."

Somewhere there is a propaganda machine hard at work. I'd imaging that the thinking is - we have spent enough money on this nonsense, now lets stop it and keep the gold mine producing.

As well as individual e-mails to the author, I think we need a considered response that demolishes the misconceptions one by one, and sets out the real situation.

If I am right, it will be worth a bit of time putting a paper together - there are likely to be many opportunities to use it - we are already faced with counteracting the Rat's full page advertising campaign, and ESAT haven’t got going yet.

Are there 2 or 3 others who are willing to co-operate on preparing a response to this? pm me if you are interested

Lemming

time to sit down and write an email taking that article apart line by line ......

/me cracks knuckles

David C

MDR, the link above is http and so leads to a webpage..

jane.suiter@sunday-times.ie

Best of luck

PiE

Just sent mine, dealing with most of the points in the article

Hello,

I read your article in Sundays Sunday Times regarding eircom I-Stream and broadband internet access. I was sad to see that you were taken in by eircom's view that Broadband isn't wanted in Ireland.

"While millions has been spent on rolling out broadband ... Eircom has only sold DSL to less than 2000 customers despite the availability of the service in 500,000 homes and businesses."

- The reason for the low uptake of DSL is the fact that Eircom has priced it too highly. In the UK, including Northern Ireland, DSL is available for around 25-30 euros per month with NO download limit. Eircom's DSL costs 107euro per month together with a 3GB download limit and a charge for every MB thereafter. DSL is priced at around 30euro in just about every European country, aswell as in the US.

"..One problem is the lack of content to persuade many small businesses to make the investment. Simply having internet access that is "always on" is not enough of a carrot to tempt many firms and individuals"

- This is a blatant lie. It has been proven again and again the world over that internet access can be vital to a businesses dealings with its customers. Why have so many Irish businesses bought "always on" leased lines (which cost about 25,000 euro per year) from eircom if they don't need/want it? Individuals at home simply cannot afford the price eircom are asking.

The Jupiter Research's findings show that 25% would not get broadband while 30% said they were unlikely to. That's fine, but what about the other 45% who DO want broadband? Why didn't you highlight that fact?

"The cost of broadband is set to fall slightly when Esat BT delivers it's 50euro per month offer in time for Christmas"

- The service EsatBT are launching is a 256k DSL service, which is HALF the speed of Eircom's 107euro per month service. So basically, its half the speed for half the price. Big Deal.

"However the company's top-speed service will still cost 89euro per month..."

- Wrong. It will cost 89euro per month BEFORE VAT is added at 21% which brings it to about 107euro per month.

"The full rollout is likely to cost in the region of €300m and the government may be reluctant to proceed with such huge spending given that the take-up has been so disappointing"

- Again, Eircoms high retail price is the cause of the disappointing uptake and why exactly would the Government be spending 300m euro? It's eircom who would be paying to upgrade their network, not the Govt. And God knows eircoms network needs upgrading.

Sorry for the long email, but I feel you should know these things, if you don't already and I hope you can help raise awareness of Eircom's rubbish service in the future.

For more info visit www.irelandoffline.com and www.eircomtribunal.com

Regards,
PiE

I get the feeling she won't really care though

Dangger

I'm going to mail her too, and hopefully as the BBC gave us an opportunity after we contacted them, the Sunday times will do likewise.

MDR

*claps his hands with glee*

hmmm

The funny thing is the Sunday Times obviously detest the Tony O'Reilly stable, so I'd have thought they'd take every opportunity to attack one of his companies.

Make sure you point that out.

Chips Lovell

Good email PiE. The Sunday Times piece had me scratching my head though. I've never come across any business looking for more 'content' from their telco. I don't know who in Eircom was talking about this one. As for demand, as with so many other things, people ain't going to be looking for broadband until they see friends and neighbours benefitting from it. I got i-stream early this year for business purposes. At the time, eircom told me they'd be launching a lower priced residential service within a year. Perhaps they were hoping to make more money from the first batch of customers?

sceptre

The "lack of content" bit intrigues me - given that no-one but Eircom ever brings up I'm convinced the entire article was pieced together from an Eircom press release.

Just a thought.

In any case, we all know the content isue is irrelevant. How much stunning content did Eircom feel necessary to introduce the 33k Internet to us in the first place?

Lemming

Oh God ....


this email is f*cking HUGEEEE .. and I haven't even gotten half-way through the article

who wants some??

PiE

Post it, you know you want to ;]

And it might help others write theirs.

Lemming

Originally posted by PiE
Post it, you know you want to ;]

And it might help others write theirs.

Oh believe me I want to

I'll wait until the committee have had a perusal of it first though.

Stonemason

I read this last sunday and it made my blood boil what really got me was the bit about only 2000 people out of 500,000!!! firstly the reason their is only 2000 is probably due to the rediculs pricing,secondly 500,000 my arse what she means is Eircon told her that going by how many exchanges were enabled x the number of people connected to those exchanges the figure would be 500.000 what eircon probably forgot to tell her is that 498.000 people were either to far away from the exchange for ADSL to work or their phone lines were so poorly maintained by eircon that they failed the line test and finaly in these hard times its hard for people to justify the €107 pm for a connection that has a 3gb cap.

MDR

tell her, not me

Dustaz

Originally posted by MDR
tell her, not me

Take the advice stonemason

Rather than writing stuff that we already know, put it in an email and send the post to her

meglome

I've sent off my 'views' to our Ms. Suiter. This should be funny by the time everyone has replied.

mayhem#

Oh my god, what have i started?!

******GRIN*******


E.

Stonemason

Should i edit out the arse bit


PS Can anyone Either post her email or PM me it please

Tellox

jane.suiter@sunday-times.ie is her email addy, for the third time

vinnyfitz

I don't believe JS ever wrote about technology or communciations issues. Anyone with access tot the on line IT archive want to confirm this for us?

This may be a bit of a learning curve for her. Do we expect her to cover this area for the Sunday Times on an ongoing basis?

I suggest someone from the committee contacts the editor and asks will they publish a "right of reply" piece.

crawler

Hmmm......is it just me or is it strange that Mr Murdoch owns Sky & the Times - he also cant provide broadband directly himself......he is afraid that other Companies may be able to offer telco , Broadband and digital TV - not that ntl or Chorus have any cash to spend but Mr Murdoch would very very very much like to see a monopoly in his favour........if you think this is scary , it is.

Mr Murdoch will try to keep BB under wraps until he can offer it - then it will become the best thing ever and will probably come with a red button.

I personally dont like the guy but you have to admire his way of thinking.

De Rebel

Originally posted by vinnyfitz
I don't believe JS ever wrote about technology or communciations issues. Anyone with access tot the on line IT archive want to confirm this for us?

This may be a bit of a learning curve for her. Do we expect her to cover this area for the Sunday Times on an ongoing basis?

I suggest someone from the committee contacts the editor and asks will they publish a "right of reply" piece.

This article sounds like regurgitated spin. In addition to tackling it on a once off basis we need a considered paper to tackle any more outbreaks. Politicians and the media alike will be susceptible over the coming months to "well there is loads of broadband and nobody is using it". We need to shift our short term focus from Fraico/broadband availibility to broadband cost and wireless availibility.

It seems to me that IOFFL is now setting the agenda. It is most important that we do not loose momentum.

crawler

I just send a long but justified email to Ms Suiter....I'm not happy. everyone else should take 5 minutes to do the same. This kind of stuff is very damaging.....on lots of fronts.