I got on line with Prodigy and Compuserve in '94 or '95, then on to AOL

The IP companies are as bad as banks when I look back at the history. I didn't want to join AOL, I knew enough about the Internet that I didn't want all of their interface stuff. I found Sprynet, a subset (probably an acquisition) of Prodigy, and joined in the mid-90s. Sprynet and Prodigy were gobbled up by AOL for a while, and then AOL spit out the folks at Sprynet who didn't want to use all of the AOL nonsense. We knew how to get there from here. So sprynet was sold to Mindspring out of Georgia, and that was where the most pain was inflicted over the years. There were some big hardware and software changes that required calling Techs and going through steps over the phone. Then a few years back Mindspring and Earthlink merged. Ironic, that I first tried to join Earthlink before getting to Sprynet, but for whatever reason the logon just wasn't working and I bailed.

I've had "DSL" for a number of years, but it is very slow. I found out how slow last month when I inquired about keeping my email for a few dollars a month if I switch to a cable access. They want to keep customers so the tech guys looked into it. I was getting about 350kps upload and download instead of 1.5mps as is advertised. They were able to get it boosted to about 750kps but can't go any faster because we're too far from the telephone switching station and it would be unstable. I've had this for nearly five years like this. The tech suggested I speak to customer service about a refund. Yes, I will, but I'm probably also going to go to cable for Internet only. I hate their television offerings so won't do that, but I can get 10 times the speed by switching, so I probably will.

Sorry you asked? ;-D

SRS