🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <4ivmh7$dtp@juliana.sprynet.com>, gg@sprynet.com (David E.
Brown) wrote:

  :I'm wondering how the users of Mindspring justify paying $35 a month
  :plus a $35 startup fee when there are plenty of services around for
  :$20 a month.

No one else offers as much for the money. And I have plenty of friends who
get along on the $20/mo. Mindspring plan.

  :I know most of these services are crap from experience
  :but does everyone else?

They do if they ask their friends who are more experienced users. And
Mindspring users are second only to Herbalife vendors in their zeal to win
over their friends.

  :I'm thinking about switching to MIndspring but am having hard time with the 
  :rates since I haven't been able to try them myself to see if they
measure up.  
  :How's the newsfeed, the speed, the mail?

Speed has been a little spotty; I only have a V.FC modem (I can't quite
justify the money to move up to V.34), and I consistently connect at
26000, occasionaly at 28.8. 

The newsfeed is the fastest I've seen; often hours before AOL, and
sometimes days ahead of my suck-ass feed at work. 20,022 groups, according
to my full group list.

Mail .. what are your criteria? Fast. Reliable. Allows remote POP
connections (but no shell access).

  :What exactly is their software?  Is it some kind of dialer?  
  :How well does it work under win 95?

Primo licensed/shareware stuff on Mac. On Windows, I'm not so solid;
there's a list for the latest version at:

http://www.mindspring.com/specoffers/download/upgrade.html

  :It's my conclusion you don't get good access for $20 a month.  I've
  :had a half dozen providers since I graduated from college and none of
  :them has yet to measure up to the account I had in college.

If you had Ethernet in the dorm, nothing short of a T1 is going to make
you happy at home. In any case, .edu accounts have more money per user,
and are a whole different matter from the "real world."

  :I'm convinced a high priced service such as concentric or Mindspring
  :will at least have fewer subscribers leaving their respective system
  :load low.

Mindspring's user base is growing rapidly, but they've done a pretty solid
job of staying ahead of the curve. The occasional drop/reconnects have
become less and less frequent, and are only when Eudora tries to retrieve
mail while I'm downloading (thus, I suspect, at my end); I haven't had a
busy signal more than half a dozen times in a year and a half, and all
within a few weeks' span several months ago.

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"The original seven words were, fuvg, cvff, shpx, phag, pbpxfhpxre, 
zbgureshpxre, and gvgf. Those are the ones that will curve your spine, 
grow hair on your hands and (laughter) maybe, even bring us, God help 
us, peace without honor (laughter)  um, and a bourbon."
                                                        --George Carlin
                   From FCC V. Pacifica Foundation, 438 U.S. 726 (1978) 
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Andy Walton * atticus@mindspring.com * ROT-13
http://www.mindspring.com/~atticus/