🚀 go-pugleaf

Chris Baird (cjb@brushtail.hna.com.au) wrote:

:  > He also stated categorically that bulletin boards were not the
:  > specific target of the revised charges and that it was more a
:  > "tariff correction" applied to all lines which impose a more
:  > significant load than average on the PSTN.

: That would be a case if we were still using the old technology
: telephone exchange. :/

No matter what kind of exchange we're using, we're paying for the privilage!
We put a higher than average load on the system, but we're bloody-well
shelling out significantly more per quarter than the average telephone
company customer ever will.

Now they want to double what we pay.

Telecom makes huge amounts of money out of BBSs:  Mine only has four
dial-up lines, yet when you total up the calls that people are making
to access it plus my own phone bills you reach a figure of about $10,000
per annum:  From a very small BBS!

The "you give us more load, so you pay more money" argument falls flat
on its face:  Telecom already makes more money out of us, in direct
proportion with the load we impose on the PSTN.  This is simply a
case of Telecom charging as much as the market can bear, then pushing the
prices up a bit more to see if it can bear any more.

Vive l'Optus!

   - mark
     http://www.communica.com.au/~newton/telstra/telescum.html