Jane Suiter Is Now "On Message"

mike65 · 01-12-2002 1:08pm #1

Jane Suiter writing in todays Sunday Times sems to have taken our campaign to heart and head. The article in todays paper is to the point and clearly shows the failure of broadband so far in Ireland
because of pricing and indeed will, on eircoms part.

Another small victory.

Mike.

SkepticOne · 01-12-2002 1:17pm

Well done, Jane.

PiE · 01-12-2002 2:40pm

Hurrah! :]

Any chance of a link/scan?

mike65 · 01-12-2002 3:10pm

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/section/0,,5,00.html

Everything except Suiters article.

Mike.

Paddy20 · 01-12-2002 3:21pm

I hope the article is good, and I hate to point out, He, He, but I did ask that you " Give Jane a chance to put matters right " in my last post to OHP on 24/11/2002 at 23.30pm.

Anyway, as I have not read the NEW article, anyone know of a LINK?, Please.

Yours,

Paddy20:cool:

topgold · 01-12-2002 3:33pm

"If Ireland is to compete as a global player, it will need the technology at a price it can afford," writes Jane Suiter in the business section of The Sunday Times on December 1, 2002.

I've blogged that several times.

[..]

Internet users are so familiar with the rhetoric they could put it to music. Ireland, we are promised, is to become an e-commerce hub, a veritable digital oasis. In this brave new e-society we will move in seamless fashion from manufacturing high-tech equipment and software to digital distribution of goods and services via a digital hub strategically placed between Europe and the US.

The reality, as usual, is different. Years after this vision was first outlined to a sceptical public, Ireland is still an effective wasteland for broadband services while domestic and small business charges are ammong the highest in Europe. Ireland is slipping inexorably down the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development league tables for wired societies and up the league tables for cost.

Fewer than 2,000 people in Ireland use broadband services, a figure put down to the failure on the part of government to tackle the cost of provision.

[..]

excerpted from The Sunday Times Business Features 3-7, December 1, 2002

Dangger · 01-12-2002 4:11pm

Its a very comprehensive piece, an excellent article and I'm grateful to Jane for contacting us for comments for it, and for following up in such a thorough manner to the letters from IOFFL members about her first piece on ADSL.

Dangger · 01-12-2002 4:36pm

Also grateful for the last word!

Even as the pricing and access arguments stack up, Eircom maintains that the public simply has little interest in broadband.

In particular, Eircom cites the absence of a "killer application" as the prime reason for the low take-up. The company says the carrot of "always on" e-mail and speedy downloads is simply not enough for most people.

Critics dismiss this line of argument. David Long, chairman of lobby group Ireland offline, says: "There is no single killer application and never will be. To speak of one and say it is needed is flawed." There are, he says, a multitude of "killer" applications already available in several guises for different markets.

Fallschirmjager · 02-12-2002 12:33pm

i always said she knew her stuff, i always said it DIDNT I DIDNT I...ok i didnt and i said she was a wee bit crap....

but at least i have the chestnuts to say sorry...

good for you miss Suiter....

spongebob · 02-12-2002 12:45pm

well done Jane , nicely balanced article.
would any journo like to tackle the Pairgain scandal in Rural Ireland.......start off by taking a few pictures of the boxes and headline the article with

"Have you seen one of these on a Pole near you"

followed by

"If so you are being ripped off by Eircom. You are being charged full line rental for as little as a quarter of a 'real' line. These boxes are used to share lines because it is simpler than running a real cable back to the exchange for you. You will NEVER get Broadband as long as the Pairgain is on your line"

They are illegal now but Eircom have done nothing about removing them.

How bout a Sunday Times campaign on the great Irish Line Rental Ripoff ?

M

daveirl · 02-12-2002 11:44pm

This post has been deleted.

spongebob · 03-12-2002 12:43am

Originally posted by daveirl
Great Article! I think we can safely say that Ms. Suiter has been re-educated!

I saw in an article in the Indo about Irish teleworkers. There is an Irish teleworkers association or something. Anyone know anything about this?

been around years, head based in Scarriff Co. Clare ISTR

daveirl · 03-12-2002 1:02am

This post has been deleted.

highlight · 03-12-2002 11:41am

They're not in Scariff. Try www.telework.ie

spongebob · 03-12-2002 12:13pm

The Chair IS in Scariff Co. Clare as I Recalled. She was chair of it this time 6 years ago too ISTR

M

tribble · 03-12-2002 12:37pm

Should someone mail her to say job well done?...

Dangger · 03-12-2002 1:02pm

Should someone mail her to say job well done?...

Go right ahead. I did yesterday!

Chips Lovell · 03-12-2002 1:30pm

Daveirl,
We ran that piece on teleworking on the front page of the Appointments supplement. I'm editing it at the moment.

The article was glowing! Pity we couldn't get an article of that size about us.

I wouldn't go as far as that. We did say that the level of teleworking penetration had remained static over the last two years. We also did mention the broadband situation, saying Ireland was falling desperately behind. Telework Ireland highlighted this as one of the main issues it is facing.

Dick O'Brien

daveirl · 03-12-2002 7:37pm

This post has been deleted.

stormkeeper · 03-12-2002 8:04pm

Originally posted by Muck
well done Jane , nicely balanced article.
would any journo like to tackle the Pairgain scandal in Rural Ireland.......start off by taking a few pictures of the boxes and headline the article with

"Have you seen one of these on a Pole near you"

followed by

"If so you are being ripped off by Eircom. You are being charged full line rental for as little as a quarter of a 'real' line. These boxes are used to share lines because it is simpler than running a real cable back to the exchange for you. You will NEVER get Broadband as long as the Pairgain is on your line"

They are illegal now but Eircom have done nothing about removing them.

How bout a Sunday Times campaign on the great Irish Line Rental Ripoff ?

M

Is Kildare counted as rural, or do you mean the real rural?

If you include Kildare, I can send them a picture, or they can come down here... I'm still working on a letter btw. (my mum is looking at it, so I'd be able to get an opinion and extra info from her).

Lets expose Eircom for the crooks they really are.

spongebob · 03-12-2002 8:09pm

Kildare,Meath and Westmeath are PAIRGAIN heaven and yes, they are really rural, thats what green fields do when they collect in packs, they make 'rural' of it.

Send her an email with a picture.

stormkeeper · 03-12-2002 9:04pm

Will do, is there anything I should write to accompany the attatchment?

Edit: I have no idea where to send it, does anyone know the email addy of the person I'm meant to send it to?

spongebob · 03-12-2002 9:27pm

mailto:jane.suiter@sunday-times.ie

stormkeeper · 03-12-2002 9:33pm

Thanks, I'll send a picture ASAP.

sceptre · 03-12-2002 9:44pm

Kennett, I'm sure the eircomtribunal.com lads could well do something with such a picture as well

Can't remember if they have contact details on the site - if they haven't, drop me a line, I've an email address here somewhere

stormkeeper · 03-12-2002 9:52pm

Sure, I'll look into that straight away as well.

stormkeeper · 04-12-2002 12:58am

Here's a copy of the email I sent to Jane a few moments ago:

Dear Ms. Suiter,

I recently read a forum thread on one of your articles on the Ireland Offline Forum. It was mentioned to me that you would be interested in a picture of a pairgain as a follow-up to the above article. Attached to this email as a picture I've taken of the splitter that was installed in my home quite recently. However, this should not have been done as Pairgains are now considered illegal, as of April 1st of this year. One of the main problems of having a Pairgain (line splitter) is that it slows down the speed of an internet connection by half.

It also degrades voice calls, and in many cases (like mine), it takes a lot longer to dial up to the internet, and also it takes on average about 3-4 dialup attempts before I'm even online. As well as this, I have found that most of the time, I can only get a very slow connection rate when I'm online, which can render it useless for many applications. I have seen such a downgrade exhibited on my line, and I find it costs me a lot more now to dial up before the line was split, whan I used to be able to dial up on my first attempt.

Also, because of the nature of this device, I would now be unable to get DSL due to the way it splits a full line in two, which I never asked for. I am currently in the process of writing a letter to Eircom to request that they remove the line splitter and install a full phone line instead, which I wanted in the first place.

I'm sure many other people have a line splitter installed in or near their homes, so this is not an isolated incident. If you want any other information on line splitters, or more photos of the device, please let me know, and I'll do my best to assist.

Thanks,

Joe Soap

P.S.: Any problems I have mentioned about line splitters are from my experences, but I am sure others would have similar problems to what I have outlined above.

stormkeeper · 04-12-2002 1:00am

I'll probably direct her to the thread that mentions my case and the one about Line Splitters being illegal, but I can refer her to you guys as well. I just thought I'd set up some sort of middle ground for now.

Edit: I forgot to mention that I sent a(n)(couple of) emails to Eircomtribunal... I forgot to send the picture in the first email

Jane Suiter Is Now "On Message"

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