This is beginning to kill me! This guy comes from the cmu.edu domain and obviously has never tried to get an account on a system outside of his institution. Much less on one of the "expensive on-line services", as he put it.
ha ha ... BTW: I did get an internet mail address not in the cmu.edu domain.
Here's some news! Currently the Delphi service offers full Internet connectivity (e-mail, FTP, Telnet, Gopher, News) for $20 a month for 20 hours of access. Delphi can be accessed through SprintNet which means that most metropolitan areas will have a local dial in point. In the near future America On Line has stated that in the near future they too will go full connectivity, they charge $9.95 a month for 4 hours worth of access. AOL currently has e-mail available. That's just two of the services that can be accessed from just about any city of any real size in the states.
True. But I could just as well set up my own BBS for about the same price.
Now, let's talk about those sysops that want to get connected to the Interet. Here in Waco, Texas (a city of about 150,000 people... 250,000 people if you count all the outlying cities) to get a 56K dedicated Internet connection would cost something like...
$ 3000.00 Router $ 1500.00 CSU/DSU $ 600.00 Local Loop Termination/Installation --------- $ 5100.00 One-time costs.
$ 75.00 Regional Network membership fee $ 250.00 Local Loop Charge --------- $ 325.00 Monthly costs.
These figures are ballpark, and some are gueses based on experience in dealing with the regional networks here in Texas. I know several sysops here that would easily spend $5000.00 on their board in one shot, and could easily spend the $300.00 a month for the connection. On top of all that, it is a proven fact that people will *pay* for Internet connectivity.
Yes, I know there are sysops who could afford this, but the vast majority couldn't. I know it's certainly over my budget.
These costs are based on a dedicated 56K connection. A 14.4 or 19.2K SLIP connection would probably be *much* less!
And, as Duncan and so many others are so fond of pointing out. If the gummint would get out of the way and let competition happen for the local loop these prices would drop dramatically.
Of course... Isn't this what cypherpunks have been wishing for all along?