17 Mb/s on Sonic Fusion!

[SMS]

I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

[Mark Reinhold]

Post by SMS
I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

I love love Dane and his group at sonic. i just wish I was not on a RT
now and could get fusion

Somewhere on the left coast

My Parole Officer says cigars calm me down

[SMS]

Post by Mark Reinhold

Post by SMS
I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

I love love Dane and his group at sonic. i just wish I was not on a RT
now and could get fusion

Somehow Sonic has to do some more clever marketing. There seems to be a
great reluctance of some people to port from AT&T over to Sonic even
when the cost savings and performance improvements are pointed out to them.

I think that part of the problem is that the subscribers don't
understand that the phone service on Fusion is still over copper, and is
not VOIP, and they don't think that such a thing is even possible so
they're equating Sonic's phone service with VOIP like Comcast offers, or
to something like Vonage.

[John Higdon]

Post by SMS
I think that part of the problem is that the subscribers don't
understand that the phone service on Fusion is still over copper, and is
not VOIP, and they don't think that such a thing is even possible so
they're equating Sonic's phone service with VOIP like Comcast offers, or
to something like Vonage.

I kept an AT&T POTS line for my alarm up until last week. Finally, I
connected to the alarm system to one of the Fusion POTS lines and tested
with the alarm company. Worked just fine.

I couldn't call AT&T fast enough to get that POTS line disconnected. I
now have no AT&T wired service at the home. None.

[Thad Floryan]

Post by John Higdon

Post by SMS
I think that part of the problem is that the subscribers don't
understand that the phone service on Fusion is still over copper, and is
not VOIP, and they don't think that such a thing is even possible so
they're equating Sonic's phone service with VOIP like Comcast offers, or
to something like Vonage.

I kept an AT&T POTS line for my alarm up until last week. Finally, I
connected to the alarm system to one of the Fusion POTS lines and tested
with the alarm company. Worked just fine.
I couldn't call AT&T fast enough to get that POTS line disconnected. I
now have no AT&T wired service at the home. None.

Oh? Unless you're in Los Gatos, where does the copper from your home
terminate? Surely it's an AT&T CO, right? And, if so, you're still
under AT&T's thumb. :-)

[John Higdon]

Post by Thad Floryan
Oh? Unless you're in Los Gatos, where does the copper from your home
terminate? Surely it's an AT&T CO, right? And, if so, you're still
under AT&T's thumb. :-)

How so? I don't talk to AT&T, I don't get a bill from AT&T, and I get
instant repair. When I and not Sonic was the customer, it took AT&T
weeks to fix problems. Now, they do it in two hours. The fact that the
loop goes to Sonic's equipment which happens to be housed in AT&T's
building is a poke in AT&T's eye as far as I'm concerned.

[Jonz]

Post by John Higdon

Post by Thad Floryan
Oh? Unless you're in Los Gatos, where does the copper from your home
terminate? Surely it's an AT&T CO, right? And, if so, you're still
under AT&T's thumb. :-)

How so? I don't talk to AT&T, I don't get a bill from AT&T, and I get
instant repair. When I and not Sonic was the customer, it took AT&T
weeks to fix problems. Now, they do it in two hours. The fact that the
loop goes to Sonic's equipment which happens to be housed in AT&T's
building is a poke in AT&T's eye as far as I'm concerned.

Did Sonic actually pull a new loop from their equipment at the CO to
your premises or are they using the existing AT&T copper loop?

Jonz

[John Higdon]

Post by Jonz
Did Sonic actually pull a new loop from their equipment at the CO to
your premises or are they using the existing AT&T copper loop?

They are using AT&T loops. These loops meet Sonic's specs. (The loops I
used as an AT&T customer couldn't have met anyone's spec.) Now, Sonic
AT&T's customer. I don't have to deal with AT&T at all; Sonic does. I
expect that AT&T will give one of its largest customers (Sonic) far
better service and response than it ever gave me...but again, that's not
my problem since my provider is now Sonic, not AT&T.

[SMS]

Post by Thad Floryan
Oh? Unless you're in Los Gatos, where does the copper from your home
terminate? Surely it's an AT&T CO, right? And, if so, you're still
under AT&T's thumb. :-)

Not really. AT&T leases the copper to Sonic, but with Fusion, from what
I understand, it's all Sonic's equipment in the C.O.. You don't deal
with AT&T at all. Sonic has to deal with them on various levels,
including if there's a problem between the CO and your house.

Clearly AT&T has decided that they are getting more revenue from the
arrangement with Sonic than they would get if the Sonic customers chose
other providers, since there is no assurance that Sonic customers would
choose AT&T for landline and Internet service if AT&T were to decide to
not continue with this arrangement. I suspect that the churn on Sonic is
very low.

[Mike King]

Post by SMS
There seems to be a
great reluctance of some people to port from AT&T over to Sonic even
when the cost savings and performance improvements are pointed out to them.

There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company. Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

[John Higdon]

Post by Mike King
There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company. Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

Or that uverse is nothing more than DSL to the home and that all the
services provided share a common bandwidth pool.

[David Kaye]

Post by Mike King
There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company. Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

I've recommended Sonic to various of my customers, gone back months later on
some new problem and found that they were still with AT&T. People tend to
stick with a company unless they're driven away, and then they tend to go
with only the biggest companies.

It's like the McDonald's paradox: people like to visit different places to
enjoy the local culture, but then they head for the nearest McDonald's.

[John Higdon]

Post by David Kaye
I've recommended Sonic to various of my customers, gone back months later on
some new problem and found that they were still with AT&T. People tend to
stick with a company unless they're driven away, and then they tend to go
with only the biggest companies.

It's hard to relate to that since in the twenty-five years I've been
"Internetting", my MO has been to go with small companies and then
jettison them when they outgrow themselves. I've never had AT&T (or
PacBell or SBC) DSL since there were many smaller companies to choose
from from the getgo. The latest DSL I've dropped was Speakeasy.

But even AT&T can "drive away" customers. When I noticed that my alarm
POTS line went up five bucks a month, I called the AT&T business office
to find out why. Rate increase. I quipped to the phone rep that a rate
increase seemed an odd way to stem an exodus of customers. Her response?
"Yeah, whatever." I was infuriated and when I called back to cancel the
service and was asked why I was leaving, I mentioned the previous
contact. "Whatever? This is the 'whatever'."

Post by David Kaye
It's like the McDonald's paradox: people like to visit different places to
enjoy the local culture, but then they head for the nearest McDonald's.

Of course, Internet connectivity isn't food.

[David Kaye]

Post by John Higdon
It's hard to relate to that since in the twenty-five years I've been
"Internetting", my MO has been to go with small companies and then
jettison them when they outgrow themselves. [....]

Once again (jeez, this is like pulling teeth) *we* are not the usual
customer. We're geeks. We look at things differently.

CLASSIC GEEK TEST: When you get your PG&E bill, what do you do with it
first?

(1) Glance at the bill and toss it aside
(2) Toss the bill aside unopened
(3) Open the envelope and read the insert

I remember years ago reading the insert in my PG&E bill and then later that
afternoon going to my girlfriend's house. In the bathroom, right next to
the toilet was her copy of the same insert, which she had obviously also
read that morning. That's why we got along so well.

Well, most people aren't like that. Most people aren't curious. Most
people go with the flow. Most people aren't inquisitive. Most people sit
and watch TV at night. Most people drink Budweiser or if they're
adventurous, Miller Lite. Most people's idea of a date is going out to a
movie.

Post by John Higdon
But even AT&T can "drive away" customers. When I noticed that my alarm
POTS line went up five bucks a month, I called the AT&T business office
to find out why. Rate increase. I quipped to the phone rep that a rate
increase seemed an odd way to stem an exodus of customers. Her response?
"Yeah, whatever."

If you're the crotchety old man on the phone that you appear to be here, I'd
probably "whatever" you, too. Y'know, I love you and all that, but you
really don't come across as a very likeable kind of guy.

[Keith Keller]

Post by David Kaye
CLASSIC GEEK TEST: When you get your PG&E bill, what do you do with it
first?
(1) Glance at the bill and toss it aside
(2) Toss the bill aside unopened
(3) Open the envelope and read the insert

(4) Very carefully look at the usage numbers, try to figure out why you
used so much electric and/or gas this month, think about writing that
database to track your usage over time while waiting for the SmartMeter
rollout, then, finally, read the inserts if they seems interesting

Post by David Kaye
If you're the crotchety old man on the phone that you appear to be here, I'd
probably "whatever" you, too. Y'know, I love you and all that, but you
really don't come across as a very likeable kind of guy.

How many likable geeks do you know?

--keith

[David Kaye]

Post by Keith Keller
How many likable geeks do you know?

Actually, many. Tonight I'm going out with a geek to a science lecture. We
get along very well, actually.

Come to think of it, nearly everyone I know is a geek. For the most part
they're gamers, jazz musicians, and software developers.

The ultimate geek experience I had a few years ago was to travel with my
then girlfriend and a gamer friend by Amtrak from Oakland to Sacramento. We
then went to the train museum in Oldtown Sacramento (definitely worth a
visit) and then spent the next next 8 hours playing rail games (North
American Rails, etc) at a friend's home. Any normal person would have gone
to a swimming pool, given that it was about 90 even in the evening. But,
no, we played rail games and took turns sitting in front of the fan.

[John Higdon]

Post by David Kaye
If you're the crotchety old man on the phone that you appear to be here, I'd
probably "whatever" you, too. Y'know, I love you and all that, but you
really don't come across as a very likeable kind of guy.

Huh. You don't even know me as well as I thought you did. But that's
irrelevant. I wasn't rude, or even mildly unpleasant. I wasn't holding
the rep responsible for her companies practices and made that very
clear. What we had was someone who probably should have lost her job if
overheard by a supervisor.

Just prior to that moment, I felt that all AT&T had to offer was
impeccable customer service and relations. Then, that too, was removed
as a reason to stay with the company. As soon as I could put my ducks in
a row, AT&T was removed from my list as a supplier of landline services.

[David Kaye]

Post by John Higdon
What we had was someone who probably should have lost her job if
overheard by a supervisor.

Looking over your previous post I'm revising my take on it. I agree. They
shouldn't be doing customer service.

Post by John Higdon
Just prior to that moment, I felt that all AT&T had to offer was
impeccable customer service and relations.

And what planet are you from again?

Make no mistake, I've gotten excellent support from techies when I needed
things and they were allowed to provide them (such as slowing down DSL to
avoid packet collisions), but the front office folks have always annoyed me,
such as when I tried to correct their screwup on an order and was told that
the sales office was closed for the weekend and they couldn't turn back on
the service they'd mistakenly turned off until the following Monday.

[John Higdon]

Post by David Kaye
Make no mistake, I've gotten excellent support from techies when I needed
things and they were allowed to provide them (such as slowing down DSL to
avoid packet collisions), but the front office folks have always annoyed me,
such as when I tried to correct their screwup on an order and was told that
the sales office was closed for the weekend and they couldn't turn back on
the service they'd mistakenly turned off until the following Monday.

At my residential peak, I had seventeen lines from AT&T (PacBell). When
David Whitacre's AT&T finally took over, I was finding alternatives to
those POTS lines. All during that time, right up until the recent
disconnection of the last POTS line, there were complex adds, moves, and
changes made routinely. Hunt groups, numbers, and billing groups were
changed. LD carriers were shifted. Listings were shuffled. Lines were
changed to ground-start.

I can't recall over a period of more than twenty years where one single
order was handled improperly. Not one. That's what I call impeccable
customer service.

[Jonz]

Post by John Higdon
I can't recall over a period of more than twenty years where one single
order was handled improperly. Not one. That's what I call impeccable
customer service.

Then why the h___ do you keep complaining about every aspect of AT&T
service?

Jonz

[John Higdon]

Post by Jonz

Post by John Higdon
I can't recall over a period of more than twenty years where one single
order was handled improperly. Not one. That's what I call impeccable
customer service.

Then why the h___ do you keep complaining about every aspect of AT&T
service?

Customer service is great. But having useful product offerings,
competitive pricing, flexible configurations, reliability, and repair
competency are also important.

[Malcolm Hoar]

Post by John Higdon
I can't recall over a period of more than twenty years where one single
order was handled improperly. Not one. That's what I call impeccable
customer service.

WOW. I've never had a PacBell or AT&T order handled properly.

There's always a mess to clear up after any change. Usually,
the job was only half done. And it seems that the pro-rata
fees are overcharged every time. That has been so consistent
that I have a hard time believing that it's caused by anything
other than specific policy.

I enjoy a visit to the dentist more than having to call
AT&T customer service.

[John Higdon]

Post by Malcolm Hoar
There's always a mess to clear up after any change. Usually,
the job was only half done. And it seems that the pro-rata
fees are overcharged every time. That has been so consistent
that I have a hard time believing that it's caused by anything
other than specific policy.

I never hung up with a rep until he or she had accurately repeated back
my order in his or her own words. I guess care up front pays off in the
execution.

Post by Malcolm Hoar
I enjoy a visit to the dentist more than having to call
AT&T customer service.

I never enjoyed it, but it wasn't ever a real problem.

[SMS]

Post by David Kaye

Post by Mike King
There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company.  Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

I've recommended Sonic to various of my customers, gone back months later on
some new problem and found that they were still with AT&T.  People tend to
stick with a company unless they're driven away, and then they tend to go
with only the biggest companies.

My sister-in-law was complaining about the cost of the various monthly
fees (3 cell phones, cable TV, broadband Internet) and I told her how
to significantly cut her monthly expenditures. She could save at least
$100 a month by moving her TV to Dish network, her internet and land
line to Sonic, and her three Verizon phones to Pageplus, with no
decrease in the services she uses (actually an increase in the level
of services). Nothing has changed though, except she did cut her
programming down on cable to the point where it's about the same as
much more programming on Dish Network, with a DVR.

I think people think that it's more of a hassle than it actually is to
make such changes. Also, though it's decreased in popularity, a lot of
people still use e-mail addresses tied to their ISP, but even that's
less than a hassle than they may thing to change.

You probably still have people paying for anti-virus and anti-malware
software when Avast and Microsoft Security Essentials are free and
usually better than the alternatives with yearly fees. It's hopeless.
Give up.

Post by David Kaye
It's like the McDonald's paradox: people like to visit different places to
enjoy the local culture, but then they head for the nearest McDonald's.

It's safe. And actually in many rural parts of the country it may be
as good as you're going to get. Went through some of those places last
summer. Tried this Chinese restaurant in Windom, MN <http://
i56.tinypic.com/72yjv4.jpg>. It's rural American-Chinese food that
only <I don't know who> could love. They were thrilled to have a party
of 7 in the restaurant since we were the only ones there, and they
were very nice. It was basic American Chinese food, and gave us
something to talk about.

[jcdill]

Post by SMS
My sister-in-law was complaining about the cost of the various monthly
fees (3 cell phones, cable TV, broadband Internet) and I told her how
to significantly cut her monthly expenditures. She could save at least
$100 a month

Tell her you know how she can save more than $1000 a year. For some
reason, $100/month doesn't sound like a lot of savings but $1000/year
does. Most people can think of more things they would like to do with
an extra $1000 (once a year) than with an extra $100 (per month).

jc

[David Kaye]

Post by SMS
I think people think that it's more of a hassle than it actually is to
make such changes.

I still have about 5 customers using dial-up! Even when I tell them they
can ditch their second phone line or they're be able to talk on the phone
while using their single line for Internet, they *still* don't want to
change.

The other day, I told a customer that it would take about 3 hours to do all
the various patches and upgrades he'd been putting off and paying me to do.
I offered to take the computer with me, do the upgrades and bring it back,
but no, he didn't want the computer to leave. So he paid me for 3 1/4 hours
to sit there and watch progress bars move v-e-r-y slowly.

Post by SMS
You probably still have people paying for anti-virus and anti-malware
software when Avast and Microsoft Security Essentials are free and
usually better than the alternatives with yearly fees. It's hopeless.
Give up.

Depends on the customer. I've managed to talk most of them into MSE or
Avast because they absolutely hate the nag screens, and obviously if their
Norton or McAfee worked as well as claimed, then I wouldn't have had to
visit them in the first place. That they can manage to wrap their brains
around.

But even so, once in awhile I'll make a return visit and they've installed
Norton again. Sheesh.

Post by SMS
It's safe. And actually in many rural parts of the country it may be
as good as you're going to get.

I remember some years back the "News & Review" weekly paper in Chico had a
Best Restaurants guide as voted by readers and EVERY SINGLE ONE was part of
a chain.

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Wed, 8 Jun 2011 14:03:51 -0700, "David Kaye"

Post by David Kaye
The other day, I told a customer that it would take about 3 hours to do all
the various patches and upgrades he'd been putting off and paying me to do.
I offered to take the computer with me, do the upgrades and bring it back,
but no, he didn't want the computer to leave. So he paid me for 3 1/4 hours
to sit there and watch progress bars move v-e-r-y slowly.

Usually, I can kidnap the computah, especially if it's a laptop.
However, I sometimes have the same problem. What I do is make a list
of necessary updates (using Belarc Advisor), download them at my
office, drag them back to the customers computah, and install them. If
it's already installed, the update will complain. Getting the order
right is always a problem, so I just do it numerical order.

Pet peeve is laptop owner going to a coffee shop to do the update
cerimony.

I'm not sure I believe you can update a typical machine in 3 hrs. At
dialup speeds, I can usually do 25 MBytes/hr download. That only
gives you 75 MBytes worth of download data, which my guess(tm) is
perhaps about 6 months worth of Windoze updates (assuming the last
monster service pack was installed and that Office had been
installed). I just did a Win 7 laptop that hadn't been updated for
about a year, and downloaded about 500MBytes of updates.
<http://www.convert-me.com/en/convert/data_transfer_rate>

Also, watching the progress bar makes it move slower. Microsoft can
tell that you're watching through the web cam.

[David Kaye]

Post by Jeff Liebermann
Usually, I can kidnap the computah, especially if it's a laptop.
However, I sometimes have the same problem. What I do is make a list
of necessary updates (using Belarc Advisor), download them at my
office, drag them back to the customers computah, and install them.

Some updates, most notoriously, those from Adobe, don't allow saves anymore.
It appears that you have to download to the actual machine you're using.

As for Belarc, they're laughable. They marked my computer as having
security problems because such things as Remote Registry and Indexing were
turned off! Heck, no way would I turn Remote Registry on. Maybe they've
fixed that; I haven't scanned recently.

Post by Jeff Liebermann
I'm not sure I believe you can update a typical machine in 3 hrs. At
dialup speeds, I can usually do 25 MBytes/hr download.

That's about right. There weren't that many updates needed. And some of
them such as XP SP3, IE8, and Acrobat 9 I took from a disk. I said I'd get
to Acrobat 10 if and when it was needed, but I really couldn't afford the
extra time with the customer that day.

[d***@30.usenet.us.com]

Post by Jeff Liebermann
Pet peeve is laptop owner going to a coffee shop to do the update
cerimony.

At the coffee shop in town, they kicked out the guy who brought in three
of his customers' laptops to upgrade on their free WiFi.

[d***@30.usenet.us.com]

Post by Mike King
There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company. Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

Is U-Verse phone service VoIP, or just digital?

There was a CLEC in Santa Rosa offering something called T-Fire, I think,
around 2000. It was a T-1, split for digital phone service and the
leftover bandwidth given to internet. It was not VoIP.

Currently MediaCom Cable offers phone service, which might be similar.
The Data sheet for my DHG534 modem says "Voice is supported using the
PacketCable 1.5 standard NCS protocol or, if so desired, using the SIP
protocol."


Maybe it could be said that it is not VoI (Voice over Internet), since it
never reaches a public data network. ;-)

[Roy]

Post by d***@30.usenet.us.com

Post by Mike King
There definitely are people who believe that AT&T is the ONLY phone
company. Some of them don't realize that phone service through
U-Verse is VOIP.

Is U-Verse phone service VoIP, or just digital?

U-verse voice seems to be VOIP but goes over AT&T to the PSTN and never
crosses over any other network network

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/AT%26T_U-verse

Post by d***@30.usenet.us.com
There was a CLEC in Santa Rosa offering something called T-Fire, I think,
around 2000. It was a T-1, split for digital phone service and the
leftover bandwidth given to internet. It was not VoIP.

This comes in both flavors. I just worked with a customer that bought
VOIP from Verizon. It was delivered via a T1 line. It was then broken
out into POTS at the router and fed to the customer's PBX. Since
Verizon controlled the equipment at either end of the line, they were
able to prioritize VOIP. When the voice bandwidth wasn't being used,
it could be consumed by data.

I have also worked on T1s where the voice occupied some T1 slots and
other slots were fed into the data portion of the router. In this mode,
bandwidth for the voice channels is fixed and can't be reused for data.

Post by d***@30.usenet.us.com
Currently MediaCom Cable offers phone service, which might be similar.
The Data sheet for my DHG534 modem says "Voice is supported using the
PacketCable 1.5 standard NCS protocol or, if so desired, using the SIP
protocol."
Maybe it could be said that it is not VoI (Voice over Internet), since it
never reaches a public data network. ;-)

[Jason Riedy]

Post by SMS
Somehow Sonic has to do some more clever marketing.

Agreed. A friend just moved to SF and started griping about her
network service choices... until I pointed her at Fusion.

I think a first step would be to have a big "compare your old
phone service to our phone service here" button of gizmo on
www.sonic.net... If you look only at the home page, it's not at
all obvious what Sonic offers.

[SMS]

Post by Jason Riedy

Post by SMS
Somehow Sonic has to do some more clever marketing.

Agreed. A friend just moved to SF and started griping about her
network service choices... until I pointed her at Fusion.
I think a first step would be to have a big "compare your old
phone service to our phone service here" button of gizmo on
www.sonic.net... If you look only at the home page, it's not at
all obvious what Sonic offers.

I think there may be the issue of directly comparing against a
competitor from whom you are dependent for infrastructure. Just like
Pageplus refrains from doing comparisons against Verizon, Sonic might
not want to do comparisons against AT&T.

In the appendix of a presentation I give called "Smart Phones, Dumb
Prices" I added a slide on Sonic Fusion versus AT&T, that compared them
side by side.

Slide is here: <Loading Image...>

Basically, before taxes and fees, equivalent landline + DSL service on
AT&T would be $86.25 (versus $40 for Sonic Fusion), after any
promotional offers expire. "Equivalent service" is a misnomer of course,
since AT&T does not offer a) VPN, b) unlimited data on DSL, c) Usenet,
d) FAX services, or e) competent technical support.

The $86.25 is for AT&T's fastest DSL speed which many people would not
pay for anyway, either because it's too expensive or because they're too
far from the CO office for it to work. This is the price after the
expiration of the $20 per month promotion for DSL Elite, and of course
you can bargain for a lower price when the promotion expires after 12
months.

Maximum DSL speeds on Sonic tend to be much faster, even though
supposedly they are capped by the distance to the CO and any issues with
the copper.

On AT&T you do get access to their paid Wi-Fi hot spots which you don't
get with Sonic (if you camp in California State Parks this is a nice
feature).

The AT&T site is so convoluted that it's hard to find your actual costs.
Also, AT&T's prices for some services are so high that few people would
ever subscribe to those sevices in the first place, so the comparison is
not so straightforward, i.e. few people would sign up for unlimited long
distance from AT&T, they would use some other provider like OneSuite;
few people would pay $5 per month for voice mail; and most people have
probably learned the trick to avoid the unlisted number fee.

[SMS]

Post by SMS

Post by SMS
Somehow Sonic has to do some more clever marketing.

Agreed. A friend just moved to SF and started griping about her
network service choices... until I pointed her at Fusion.
I think a first step would be to have a big "compare your old
phone service to our phone service here" button of gizmo on
www.sonic.net... If you look only at the home page, it's not at
all obvious what Sonic offers.

I think there may be the issue of directly comparing against a
competitor from whom you are dependent for infrastructure. Just like
Pageplus refrains from doing comparisons against Verizon, Sonic might
not want to do comparisons against AT&T.
In the appendix of a presentation I give called "Smart Phones, Dumb
Prices" I added a slide on Sonic Fusion versus AT&T, that compared them
side by side.
Slide is here: <http://i51.tinypic.com/2cy4n45.jpg>

Oops, just realized I have an error in that, the "DSL Cap" should be
"None" rather than "Included."

[Tage J.]

Post by SMS
Oops, just realized I have an error in that, the "DSL Cap" should be
"None" rather than "Included."

I was wondering about that!

[SMS]

<Loading Image...>

I may send this to people, too... Just as a quick note, I've
never managed to get AT&T wifi access working in airports even
though they promise it. Boingo works in the same airports
(unless the airport's network is completely busted, which happens
far too often).

The airports I use the most now all have free wi-fi, San Francisco, San
Jose, and Fort Lauderdale. The past year or so has seen a lot of
conversions from paid to free wi-fi.

Here's one listing:

<http://www.wififreespot.com/airport.html>

though it's not up to date. I know that Dulles and National airports in
the D.C. area have free Wi-Fi as of April of this year, and it's likely
that there are many others that have added it as well.

Before SFO had free wi-fi I was sitting outside the International
Terminal waiting to be picked up and I was getting sonic.net wi-fi. Dane
suggested that perhaps there had been a Santa Rosa Airporter bus nearby,
and indeed there was.

[Brad Allen]

In article <4dee4e2a$0$2142$***@news.sonic.net>,
SMS <***@geemail.com> wrote:
" Maximum DSL speeds on Sonic tend to be much faster, even though
" supposedly they are capped by the distance to the CO and any issues
" with the copper.

Hm? They are capped, by various forces. This is for sure. I can
100% attest to that from personal experience. Fusion is a fantasy to
me, not a reality, because of this very reason.

[SMS]

Post by Jason Riedy

Post by SMS
Somehow Sonic has to do some more clever marketing.

Agreed. A friend just moved to SF and started griping about her
network service choices... until I pointed her at Fusion.

So was your friend willing to try Fusion? That seems to be the biggest
obstacle. It takes a tiny bit of effort to make a change, while throwing
money away month after month for an inferior product is easy.

There's a good quote by Mark Crispin, inventor of the IMAP e-mail protocol:

"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

[Tage J.]

Post by SMS
"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

Love this ^^

[SMS]

Post by Tage J.

Post by SMS
"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

Love this ^^

But are they losing in peace, or are you at peace for having made the
effort to get them to not lose? Or both?

[Jason Riedy]

Post by SMS
So was your friend willing to try Fusion?

Yes (as far as I know). Considerably less expensive for far
more, as you noted. She was moving in from out of state, so
there was no change from existing service.

Now if they'd just serve the Atlanta area... ;)

[Jeff Liebermann]

Post by SMS
"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

It doesn't work that way. Even the best ideas are ignored without the
requisite salesmen, cheerleaders, and evangelists. It's called follow
through. It's insufficient to proclaim a superior alternative. It
must be sold, explained, documented, blessed by the priesthood,
approved by the pundits, and have a catchy acronym. There's also a
natural law that states "For every great idea, there exists a group
dedicated to proving the superiority of the old way of doing it".

IMAP4 is a great example. Years ago, I ignored it because few ISP's
offered IMAP4 mail servers. Then, along came the iPhone which
requires IMAP4 in order for email to function sanely. That was also
enforced by Apple allowing exactly one email application on the
iPhone. So, yielding to pressure from the iHorde, ISP's began to
offer IMAP4. I tried it, liked it, declared it to be the superior
protocol, and nothing happened. My customers were used to using POP3
and were not interested in anything new. So were the support staffs
at certain un-named ISP's. Having declared it superior and giving my
stamp of approval was insufficient. I had to sell customers on the
idea, pester ISP's to support IMAP4, and then teach both how it works,
how it can be used, how to set it up, how to document the setup, and
how to fix odd problems (such as iTunes sync wiping out all the mail).
I don't know how many demos I've given on IMAP4.

You can lead a horse to water, but if you want to make it drink, you
have to nearly drown the horse.

[Dane Jasper]

Post by SMS
"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

My problem with this outlook is that I want them on the network!
Particularly now, as we're driving fiber toward areas with highest customer
density, we really want everyone to adopt.

[David Kaye]

Post by Dane Jasper
My problem with this outlook is that I want them on the network!
Particularly now, as we're driving fiber toward areas with highest customer
density, we really want everyone to adopt.

You're not doing it the American Way(R). See, what you need is to get a law
passed that requires fiber and can only be fulfilled by Sonic.net. That's
how the Big Guys do it.

Witness last night's unanimous vote/boondoggle to develop Treasure Island.
Wonder of wonders, it seems that of all the developers available worldwide
to put together what would be an international showplace, only Lennar of
Miami managed to fulfill the requirements to develop Treasure Island. Only
Lennar. And guess what -- they're also developing Hunters Point.

Frankly, I'm surprised that AT&T hasn't gotten some kind of laws put into
place favoring only them. I do know that they've been lobbying HARD to
install ugly sidewalk equipment boxes all over SF. I think they want to put
in 140 of them. They're crying that people won't "get a choice" in their
Internet providers unless this is allowed. (Of course, nobody mentions that
today's Comcast, which doesn't require sidewalk boxes) is the system that
was once ATT Broadband Internet. But MAN, AT&T is lobbying hard for those
sidewalk boxes.

[John Higdon]

Post by David Kaye
Frankly, I'm surprised that AT&T hasn't gotten some kind of laws put into
place favoring only them. I do know that they've been lobbying HARD to
install ugly sidewalk equipment boxes all over SF. I think they want to put
in 140 of them.

We've had those boxes in this area for years. I can assure you that they
don't eat small children or small animals. They are certainly no uglier
than anything on the streets of San Francisco or anywhere else.

Seems that San Francisco is always behind the curve in getting
communication services, but when it finally arrives, it's always a Big
Deal one way or another.

[David Kaye]

Post by John Higdon
We've had those boxes in this area for years. I can assure you that they
don't eat small children or small animals. They are certainly no uglier
than anything on the streets of San Francisco or anywhere else.

San Francisco has LOTS of walkers and sidewalks that are often already
congested by newsracks, bus stop shelters, light poles, traffic signal
poles, and sometimes bike racks. This is quite different from San Jose where
the sidewalks are uncluttered.

Once again, AT&T managed to have broadband Internet in the past without
resorting to sidewalk boxes. That broadband is now called "Comcast". It's
their own fault that they sold it off. Maybe they should take a cue from
their own previous wiring and do it again with Uverse. Y'think?

[SMS]

Post by David Kaye

Post by John Higdon
We've had those boxes in this area for years. I can assure you that they
don't eat small children or small animals. They are certainly no uglier
than anything on the streets of San Francisco or anywhere else.

San Francisco has LOTS of walkers and sidewalks that are often already
congested by newsracks, bus stop shelters, light poles, traffic signal
poles, and sometimes bike racks. This is quite different from San Jose where
the sidewalks are uncluttered.

No it's not, those boxes are an abomination _everywhere_. Not only are
they ugly, they are noisy.

Post by David Kaye
Once again, AT&T managed to have broadband Internet in the past without
resorting to sidewalk boxes. That broadband is now called "Comcast". It's
their own fault that they sold it off.

That was very strange. U-Verse (and Verizon's FIOS) have not been a
commercial success like cable. What were they thinking?

[AES]

Post by David Kaye

Post by John Higdon
We've had those boxes in this area for years. I can assure you that they
don't eat small children or small animals. They are certainly no uglier
than anything on the streets of San Francisco or anywhere else.

San Francisco has LOTS of walkers and sidewalks that are often already
congested by newsracks, bus stop shelters, light poles, traffic signal
poles, and sometimes bike racks. This is quite different from San Jose where
the sidewalks are uncluttered.

I'm in a community / semi-rural neighborhood where the residents spent
a lot of time discussing potential installation of Uverse with AT&T.
One of the secondary factors in the discussion was the need to install a
certain number of the "B-52" boxes as they were then called (is that a
model number of some sort?). In our case they could probably have been
hidden in various wooded corners and nooks, but some still objected, and
the whole effort eventually died.

Call those who objected to them nimbies (nymbys?) if you like, but:

1) They are unarguably butt-ugly.

2) They're not guaranteed not to hum and buzz.

3) They'll be graffitti magnets for sure, especially in a city
environment.

4) And mostly, city sidewalks are for _walking_, and for social
interactions; and not for the kind of ugly over-sized clutter
represented by these boxes.

I hope San Jose hangs tough.

[SMS]

Post by AES
I'm in a community / semi-rural neighborhood where the residents spent
a lot of time discussing potential installation of Uverse with AT&T.
One of the secondary factors in the discussion was the need to install a
certain number of the "B-52" boxes as they were then called (is that a
model number of some sort?). In our case they could probably have been
hidden in various wooded corners and nooks, but some still objected, and
the whole effort eventually died.
1) They are unarguably butt-ugly.
2) They're not guaranteed not to hum and buzz.

That's an understatement--they are _guaranteed_ to hum and buzz.

Post by AES
3) They'll be graffitti magnets for sure, especially in a city
environment.
4) And mostly, city sidewalks are for _walking_, and for social
interactions; and not for the kind of ugly over-sized clutter
represented by these boxes.

Well stated!

Post by AES
I hope San Jose hangs tough.

Me too.

AT&T got the boxes through in some cities the same way the early
wireless carriers got a lot of towers up--no one realized early-on how
obtrusive those boxes would be and city councils dreamed of revenue from
taxes on U-Verse.

Unfortunately, there was no rush for subscribers to move from Comcast
(formerly AT&T cable) to U-Verse, nor would any satellite TV subscriber
be likely to switch to a more expensive service.

[John Higdon]

In article

Post by AES
I hope San Jose hangs tough.

San Jose has had those boxes for years. Again, I think it's a non-issue.

[David Kaye]

Post by AES
4) And mostly, city sidewalks are for _walking_, and for social
interactions; and not for the kind of ugly over-sized clutter
represented by these boxes.

EXACTLY. Sidewalks are not for mega-corps to use at their will because
they're too lazy or cheap to figure out other methods. We have such
precious little public space that is not invaded by advertising, commercial
entities, and clutter, so sidewalks play a most important part in the life
of neighborhoods.

I have zero sympathy for AT&T and their boxes. Underground them if they
need them so badly.

[Mark Reinhold]

On Thu, 9 Jun 2011 11:53:55 -0700, "David Kaye"

Post by David Kaye

Post by AES
4) And mostly, city sidewalks are for _walking_, and for social
interactions; and not for the kind of ugly over-sized clutter
represented by these boxes.

EXACTLY. Sidewalks are not for mega-corps to use at their will because
they're too lazy or cheap to figure out other methods. We have such
precious little public space that is not invaded by advertising, commercial
entities, and clutter, so sidewalks play a most important part in the life
of neighborhoods.
I have zero sympathy for AT&T and their boxes. Underground them if they
need them so badly.

But they pay money for the space to the cities, and I bet they would
go underground if the cities could get more.
Somewhere on the left coast

My Parole Officer says cigars calm me down

[Brad Allen]

" 1) They are unarguably butt-ugly.
"
" 2) They're not guaranteed not to hum and buzz.
"
" 3) They'll be graffitti magnets for sure, especially in a city
" environment.
"
" 4) And mostly, city sidewalks are for _walking_, and for social
" interactions; and not for the kind of ugly over-sized clutter
" represented by these boxes.
"
" I hope San Jose hangs tough.

While I hate Death Star as much as or more than anyone, I have to
disagree about the premise that infrastructure buildings are so bad.
Today, there's no spot for the buildings, because there wasn't a
particular need in the past. However, there's a need now. There's
some things that you can look at, responding point by point to your
points:

1) They are ugly. I think they ought to take that into consideration
when looking at how to resolve this issue. If they get it out of
sight or make it shaped different, then that could go away. But they
aren't super ugly in my experience.

2) If they humm and buzz, then they ought to be located away from
sleep, rest, and concentration (office) areas.

3) Graffiti is a problem, and the solution could be solved by putting
them out of reach, or if that is not available, by continually
painting them.

4) There's usually enough space that you can find someplace to put the
boxes without causing big blockages in sidewalks. If they are
blocking sidewalks, then they shouldn't be allowed to.


All this can be solved by making smaller subunits that sit on poles
that only have a portion of the existing boxes in them. For
underground areas, underground vaults could be built. Since that
might be a flood hazard, then they could rent space from private
property owners in the area.



The more I think about it, the usual solutions to this problem are
fully available to modern ISPs: fiber can be spliced and moved around
to whatever property owners are renting out that month, and it can
also be put on umbilical cords that could raise up out of the ground
for underground vaults. Coax is similar: one more connection but you
just run it to whatever neighbor allows you in. Furthermore, in both
fiber and coax, the headend can be further away -- single mode fiber
can go for miles extra, and coax allows some maneuverability (it's not
as much as fiber!). But, old-fashioned twisted pair is simply maxed
out.

The equipment needed to squeeze the rest of the product out of the
twisted pairs takes more room than the simpler coax and even simpler
fiber. That means it takes more space.


So, actually, it seems like a technological deficiency. I think this
means we ought to introduce market forces to the U-Verse boxes: sure,
AT&T, you can put them there, but you have to pay for them according
to their true costs to the society and to the immediate neighbors; buy
the houses that it disturbs the quietness of, at market prices and
moving costs; pay for the reduction in value of the street for the eye
sores; compensate the neighbors for the medical cost of having to walk
around the boxes rather than right by them, in cases where they
actually block sidewalks in such a way that you cannot pass them.
Which begs the question, are you really that fat? Most of those boxes
allow you to walk past them.

[John Higdon]

Post by David Kaye
San Francisco has LOTS of walkers and sidewalks that are often already
congested by newsracks, bus stop shelters, light poles, traffic signal
poles, and sometimes bike racks. This is quite different from San Jose where
the sidewalks are uncluttered.

We have indoor plumbing and running water just like San Francisco. We
have bike racks, traffic signals, street lights, news racks, and even
VTA bus stop shelters. In many ways, San Jose is actually a real live
city. Golly, it has been years since I had to manually pump water from
the well.

Post by David Kaye
Once again, AT&T managed to have broadband Internet in the past without
resorting to sidewalk boxes. That broadband is now called "Comcast". It's
their own fault that they sold it off. Maybe they should take a cue from
their own previous wiring and do it again with Uverse. Y'think?

I think it's a non-issue.

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Wed, 8 Jun 2011 15:28:55 -0700, "David Kaye"

Post by David Kaye
Of course, nobody mentions that
today's Comcast, which doesn't require sidewalk boxes.

Huh? Comcast has sidewalk boxes. For example:
<Loading Image...>
Notice how well the aesthetic design blends in with the neighborhood
green ambience. Incidentally, I know where most of those boxes are in
the SCZ and SLV areas. Comcast (actually TCI and United Artists) had
the bad habit of placing them next to roadways, unlike AT&T, who knows
how to fortify their equipment boxes. As near as I can guess, nearly
all the roadside boxes have been hit by something.

[David Kaye]

Post by Jeff Liebermann
<http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/crud/CATV-Pedestal.jpg>

I've seen a few of them but not many, and not the monstrosities AT&T wants
to put in. In many neighborhoods Comcast has undergrounded the mess or put
them on private property and easements so as not to block public walkways.
I know someone who has a Comcast box on his property; I think they discount
his cable service or something for the privilege.

[SMS]

Post by Dane Jasper

Post by SMS
"It's best not to argue with people who are determined to lose. Once
you've told them about a superior alternative, your responsibility is
fulfilled and you can allow them to lose in peace."

My problem with this outlook is that I want them on the network!
Particularly now, as we're driving fiber toward areas with highest customer
density, we really want everyone to adopt.

Outside of Sonoma county, Sonic.net lacks sufficient name recognition
for the adoption rates you want. Those of us on ba.internet know about
Sonic, but it would be rare for me to find anyone else in my area that
has heard of Sonic.

On the way to REI the other day I saw a Sonic billboard on Lawrence
Expressway near Saratoga Avenue, but it was advertising T1 service, not
Fusion. I question whether those researching T1 options are influenced
by billboards, though OTOH at least it makes them aware that there are
options other than AT&T.

Personally, I think that advertising in weekly community newspapers
would be a more effective use of marketing and ad dollars than
billboards. Be sure to include a QR code.

[Otto Pylot]

Post by SMS
I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

I'm 3800 copper feet from our CO in SouthEast San Jose and I'm capped
at 18Mbps but was originally getting 20Mbps on a max line of 21.2Mbps
with Fusion. They dropped my cap because of some line noise but I can't
see any difference. I still get a consistent 15-16Mbps wirelessly
anywhere in my house so I'm happy.

[steamer]

--ARGH! I'm sick of hearing these stories about how 'wonderful'
Fusion is!! I'm in an area with not only no Fusion but crappy DSL to boot! I'm
paying DSL fees and getting not much better than fast dialup service! It's
never been over 3MB/sec in my neck of the woods and I'm less than 5 miles
from Sonic central in Santa Rosa. Harrumph!

[m***@gmail.com]

We have CableONE internet and they forced everyone who had 50 Mb/s to upgrade to 100 Mb/s. My Grandma has AT&T 45 Mb/s. I am currently downloading a game on my PC, and I am getting 11 MB/s to 11.6 MB/s. I downloaded a game at my Grandma's house and I got 2.4 MB/s max it did not go past that. Also in my area CableONE is a lot better than AT&T because CableONE is 100 Mb/s for $55 and AT&T is 18 Mb/s for $45. Also if anyone doesn't know this, Mb/s and MB/s is different. I used MB/s because that is what the Steam uses for downloading games.

[Roy]

"they forced everyone who had 50 Mb/s to upgrade to 100 Mb/s"

Actually CableONE followed in the footsteps of other cable companies
gave out free speed upgrades.

Also CableONE does not cover California at all.

Post by m***@gmail.com
We have CableONE internet and they forced everyone who had 50 Mb/s to
upgrade to 100 Mb/s. My Grandma has AT&T 45 Mb/s. I am currently
downloading a game on my PC, and I am getting 11 MB/s to 11.6 MB/s. I
downloaded a game at my Grandma's house and I got 2.4 MB/s max it did
not go past that. Also in my area CableONE is a lot better than AT&T
because CableONE is 100 Mb/s for $55 and AT&T is 18 Mb/s for $45.
Also if anyone doesn't know this, Mb/s and MB/s is different. I used
MB/s because that is what the Steam uses for downloading games.

[n***@sbcglobal.net]

Post by SMS
I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

As some of you have read or know ATT have finally made broadband usage stats available by logging into your account. Now that they are enforcing data caps they are also enforcing them. So my 12 Mbps service went from 300 GB a month limit to 600 GB. Thing is from looking at my stats I was right that my monthly usage in spite of watching a lot of streaming HD has only been around 200 GB a month. What's more is new codecs like VP9 and h265 dramatically reduce the amount of data for a streaming show. For the geeks here one big reason is that h264 (AVC) uses 16x16 blocks whereas those two codes use 64x64 blocks for creating the display.

I've been running some tests around here with both codecs (using newest versions of FFMpeg) I can get some surprisingly good results with VP9 which is the royalty free codec developed by Google. MPEG-LA wants big money for the use of h265 and there may be a court battle looming but more likely MPEG-LA will back off on the fee.

[n***@sbcglobal.net]

Post by SMS
I had lunch today with a friend who followed my advice to dump AT&T and
go to Sonic. She is in Palo Alto and her AT&T Internet service had
somehow been over a city-owned fiber optic network in Palo Alto (not
U-Verse) and had been very slow. She had Sonic installed (they had to
roll a truck to her condo) and they installed it. She is getting a
whopping 17 Mb/s on DSL. She's pretty near the CO in downtown Palo Alto.
Meanwhile, I'm getting 3.1 Mb/s down.

I posted here about this last week but the message didn't get delivered. Wave (formerly Astound) is building out in my area and I talked to their reps at a local event last week. They are dropping their 110 Mbps service and offering a 250 Mbps for $50 a month guaranteed two years. Unfortunately they are having problems building out in my area they say due to permits and such.