Litigation is a machine which you go into as a pig and come out as a sausage - Ambrose Bierce, allegedly
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Ofcom tells off broadband suppliers
TELECOM WATCHDOG Ofcom has barked at broadband suppliers saying that they have not done enough to inform punters about what speed they will be getting for their cash.
Ofcom has warned Internet Service Providers (ISPs) that if they don't get on with it they will feel the cold hand of regulation.
Ofcom has been looking at the way that ISPs sell broadband. It revealed that 74 per cent of customers were not told that the advertised maximum speed on their line was likely to be much higher than what they would end up with.
Using mystery shoppers to find out what different ISPs say when customers are about to sign up, Ofcom was a little spooked. It found that while 85 per cent were told what the speed on their line would be, 42 per cent had to prompt sales staff to tell them this information.
The mystery shoppers also found that ISPs often gave very wide estimates of broadband speed and sometimes gave different estimates for the same line.
Ofcom wants ISPs to agree on consistent testing to make sure speeds are mentioned early on in sales conversations with the great unwashed.
Sebastien Lahtinen, co-founder of thinkbroadband.com, told the Inquirer that the research shows that broadband service providers are still failing to address fully the needs of today's consumers, who are not necessarily as technically literate as those buying broadband connections a few years ago.
"We were disappointed that Ofcom did not publish the results for each broadband provider, as we believe that consumers have a right to know how each broadband provider performed, as this may well indicate how open and transparent they are likely to be with regard to other problems" he said. µ
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After years of helping to promote hypocrisy and connivingly pretending to be defending the weak and the meek, these over-indulged Stuffy-A-Lots are telling others that they'd discovered fire. Someone should tell these jokers that most of the houses have been razed to the ground and the horses, bolted. Now, why are some people so thick skinned? 'Cos they know that reality is always hidden between polarities. All you need is a little black and white is no longer so. All you need is a mere dripping of favoured satisfactants and the dissatisfied will have less voice. All you need is a little confusion, and the thief gets away with the loot. Ofcom, go suck your toes - better yet, repent and suck ours. "But, but … we's are jest doings our jobs …" - of sucking the toes or your masters … in the Inland Revenue, the Whitehall 25/8 partying and especially the bed-wetting sessions with your bum pals in Industry. Only in nation where colonisation is a career can such dumbing-down be possible. How so? 'Cos of the wood for the trees. When you know-it-all, your cup is always filled and thereafter, nothing good can fill the really know-nuffings know-it-alls. Especially reality, like broadband speed and equality. Afterall, reality looks more real when fingering at others' relativity/lack-of-reality.
I have been tracking and logging my speeds and my average is only 13Mb. Virgin claim that fiber does not slow down so what is the problem. If I change to 10MB will they drop the speed? you can see the logs here -
http://www.michaelhreed.com/index.php/2010/03/virgin-internet-speeds-50mb/
Regulate seven shades of shvt out of them. I for one am fed up with my 50% advertised speeds. New modems, engineers round, everything. "Uh, the cable signal is poor in your area." well, any plans to fix that for everyone over here? "...Uh.... no."