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To: tekboy who wrote (30845)	9/1/2000 12:16:24 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 54805

I have DSL with Flashcom her in LA. Have been down once, and was back on line 20 hours later. Service is fast, but it locks up if I leave it on overnite and I have to crash the computer to restart. The word here is, don't buy DSL in LA from Pac Bell! terrible install problems and downtime.

To: tekboy who wrote (30845)	9/1/2000 12:41:49 AM
From: kumar	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

tekboy, have u considered a Mac as an alternative to a Wintel PC ? cheers, kumar PS: Wintel : its one of those things with the Intel chips/motherboard, and Windoze as the operating system.

To: tekboy who wrote (30845)	9/1/2000 8:44:21 AM
From: StockHawk	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

>>What all you techies fail to appreciate is just how much anxiety computers generate in us normal humans. << I think that is a very big factor. Not long ago my sister's computer would not work. She was sure it had a virus, and she called me to ask what she should do. Every one of my questions/suggestions (can you boot up in Safe Mode, can you get to the DOS prompt, can you type a backslash) was met with the same 'what the hell are you talking about'. And she is no dope, she is a well-educated upstanding member of society, but I would have had as much luck trying to explain how to tune the jets in a carburator. (And in her household, she is the tech-savvy one!) And I still remember, years ago, when a phone-tech person asked me 'when was the last time you defragged' What??? My wife uses a PC all the time, and has for years. When something goes wrong at work she calls tech support, and when something goes wrong at home, well you know - it's probably something I did anyway. The point is, plenty of people don't know anything about troubleshooting computers. They do not want to know, and don't think they should need to know, and they are right. So anything that makes computers easier - anything that will just make the damn things work, is embraced. And that embrace is not easily given up. StockHawk

To: tekboy who wrote (30845)	9/1/2000 1:39:45 PM
From: janet_wij	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

Tekboy O/T RE: AOL's success--relentlessly reinventing itself. A power company? <<America Online, the world's largest Internet access provider, and computer maker IBM have joined with Enron to form a new power company to deliver gas and electricity to residences and small businesses.>> yahoo.cnet.com My AOL confession is similar, with a twist. I purchased my first computer about five years ago with AOL preinstalled. I set up, logged on, and began surfing at 28.8 kbs. I felt a great rush of self efficacy. It was fun jumping around AOL's quirky "intranet." The interface was clunky and slow, but I felt comfortable. Heck, I didn't know any better. Then we got a T-1 line at work, and the love affair with AOL ended. I kept my account, but used it less. Too slow. And then a few things happened. More and more friends and family joined AOL. They upgraded their interface, offered more proprietary goodies, offered an AOL credit card which enabled me to garner enough points to pay for my AOL, and yes, there's that E-mail address thing. Sticky, but still not enough. This spring, I was ready to leave for the promise of broadband, which was finally offered in my town. So what does AOL do? They launch this new service, their very own broadband service dubbed AOL Plus. What the heck, I ordered it. They authorized the DSL provisioning through Bell Atlantic, mailed me an Efficient Networks SpeadStream 4060 modem, which I connected to my computer's USB and voila, I'm now surfing and getting my phone calls on the same line. And I'm decidedly non-tech. It's been two months with no down time. I understand this is in limited roll-out, but once again, AOL has found a way to make it easy for the average person. And for me this is good enough. What's next for AOL? Demand side management of energy usage, telephony, online bill presentment and payment, AOL TV... All of which they're already doing, and doing just good enough. Janet