iBurst softlaunch prices

Guys guys lets be realistic here. I also want unlimited bandwidth at 1mbps for R300, but for the foreseeable future that is not going to happen in SA. The reality of the situation is that bandwidth is a commodity just like bread and milk and you are going to pay for what you use. Iburst has at least come clean and not tried to promise what it can’t deliver. The package so far gives your 3G at a little less than the "going rate". Let’s wait and see what the extra bandwidth will cost.

One thing I really don’t get and Iburst please think this one through. There is no need to shape the ports if you have a user cap. I have paid for that bandwidth and should be able to use it how I feel fit. What’s important for me may be very low priority for the next person, and in effect port shaping is discrimination. Don’t tell me to pay for my milk but I can’t use it in coffee!!!!
 
I'll consider using a service that provides:
-Completely unshaped access with a 3GB cap
-True 64k access after cap (not the ADSL version of this), this is VERY important. Won't hurt to have it in black and white either.
-Cheap cap "top-ups" (buying more ISP accounts is just crazy)
-No clause in the contract that reads "we can change the above when we feel like it"

All that I ask is that you try out a Mac, coke and fries - martin
 
look forward to my 2mb line in NZ just mnot looking forward to the weather oh well id almost give my left ball for decent bandwidth , pity that will never happen here

<b>in chaos all things are harmonious</b>
<i>Tower 82 14% Signal 512k package </i>
 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by martin</i>
<br />I'll consider using a service that provides:
-Completely unshaped access with a 3GB cap
-True 64k access after cap (not the ADSL version of this), this is VERY important. Won't hurt to have it in black and white either.
-Cheap cap "top-ups" (buying more ISP accounts is just crazy)
-No clause in the contract that reads "we can change the above when we feel like it"
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Yeah, Let me second that. Unshaped is way more important to me than uncapped.
 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Kaptain Khaos</i>
<br />oh well id almost give my left ball for decent bandwidth , pity that will never happen here
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Of course not. What would anyone do with your left ball?
 
Anakin, here's a summation of constructive criticism to relay to your buddies at WBS:

1.) 3GB Cap
This has GOT to be applied to international ONLY. There is no way in hell that I'm gonna switch from ADSL if I'm getting capped at 3GB. Additionally the cap should be more like 5GB.
2.) Shaping
This is typical Telkom crap. The only way I'd accept any kind of shaping would be to have it kick only once I've exhausted my [reasonable!!] cap.
3.) Modem cost
If IBurst really wants to fly in SA, they should allow anyone and their gran to become Iburst modem importers. That way you have competition on the price of modems, which will drive prices down.
Modem cost is a definite barrier to entry for any new customer.

Basically I think WBS needs to really get realistic about who they are targeting here.

As a soon-to-be ADSL user, I can tell you that mobility really isnt a major factor for me, and I think this is true for many potential clients out there. Hell even 1Mbps is cool, but not critical.

What I want is an always on connection with speeds of 384K or more, unlimited, unshaped local access and a decent lump of dedicated intl bandwidth. As a gamer I also want decent pings.
When I compare ADSL384 to iburst, theres basically no difference in price (when one factors in the iBurst modem cost), and ADSL satisfies all my needs except for the crappy cap.

To make me switch, Iburst needs drastically lower pricing or drastically improve the product offering.

<font color="blue">Telkom needs a leash, ICASA needs some guts, and the </font id="blue"><font color="red">SA consumer</font id="red"><font color="blue"> needs to make it happen</font id="blue">
 
No ISP likes to have users who are heavy on bandwidth.

The iBurst offering is obviously constructed to attract the "Shiner" user who wants to impress clients by opening his laptop and immediately have internet access.

Techies and gamers are expensive clients - they burn bandwidth - and profits! These guys are obviously not the prime target market of any ISP.

Part of Sentechs problems are that the first users where very heavy bandwidth consumers, and with that all the profiling stats went down the drain. I guess the heavy bandwidth users were also the first to abandon the ship, so they should be smiling now.

By restricting eg SSH to 64k max uncapped, iBurst shouts that they don't want techies as clients.

The question is how many lightweigth users are willing to pay this kind of money?




South Africa needs World Class Broadband at World Competitive Prices.
 
I think Kaspass has pretty much hit the nail on the head. They're targeting the very small market of look-at-my-new-interweb-thingy people.

Good luck to iBurst. I will be watching in interest from the sidelines to see how many customers you can attract.

I remember how many people were delerious with joy when MyWireless was launched. .... And they only have a few thousand customers now.

Looks like iBurst isnt going to generate 1/10the the launch buzz. So good luck ... you're going to need it.



-Information anarchist-
www.sentechhatesfreespeech.org.za
I support:
www.hellkom.co.za
www.poopband.co.za
 
Broadband will never catch on in SA at this rate, R600+/month for low-usage products (1/2/3gb cap, wtf!?) is just not worth it .. R300/month maybe, not R600. These companies are shooting themselves in their feet, because if they had any brains (and balls) and decided to go the "competition" route instead of the "price-fixing" route, they could sign up hundreds of thousands of users IF they priced it reasonably, e.g. R300/month. And these could/would mostly be low-bandwidth users, the "Web + E-mail grandma-type" users, the type who use dial-up now. I mean, if all you want to do is a bit of web and e-mail, then just *get* yourself dial-up .. it'd be cheaper! But as you say, they don't seem to want hundreds of thousands of users ... like ST and Telkom, they seem content to aim at a tiny number of users who have enough money to pay rip-off prices. The main thing to keep in mind is that in the *mainstream* market, you're not competing with ST/ADSL, you're competing with *dial-up*, so the price has to be competitive against that of a dial-up user with a low-bandwidth-usage profile. People like my parents don't care about "always-on", they just want to do the odd e-mail, and they're not stupid enough to fall for R600/month just to do that. There's a HUGE market out there in SA - at least a million users I'd say, mostly people like that, just waiting to be tapped by the first service provider that comes alongs that has the balls to actually try it and not fall for the same old price-fixing and "this-is-a-premium-product" trap.

I like the month-to-month option though ... means the service provider is more likely to be 'kept on its toes' because it becomes easier to switch or cancel .. unlike the Sentech fraud where they know they can give you 2KB/s bandwidth because you're locked into a 2-year contract. No way I'll sign another contract like that. The modem though is overpriced. As someone else said, they should make it easy to get modems and make money from the service, like MWeb used to do (still does? I don't know) ... honestly, iBurst, you're NOT in the "modem-selling" business, don't try use the modems as an income stream, your primary revenue will be from the Internet connections, the modem should be cheap so you get more sign-ups.
 
A 64 kbps segment on SAT3 costs about ~R6k pm retail afaik.

3 GB's fills up ~5 days of that segment or bout R900.

Until telkom's grip on sat3 is broken you can forget about higher international caps.

Local bandwidth is another matter altogether. I don't know the actual figures but I'm guessing its less than 1/10th of what SAT3 costs.

Ergo ... int caps are well justified (in the limited context of a telkom monopoly). Local caps certainly arn't ...



-Information anarchist-
www.sentechhatesfreespeech.org.za
I support:
www.hellkom.co.za
www.poopband.co.za
 
Local bandwidth is whatever Telkom wants for it. It costs them nothing and its all been paid for by us so anything they charge for it is pure profit. They can stream movies to connections 24/7 and it will cost them bugger all. The interconnect charges also kill competitiveness but soon things will change, soon.


<font color="navy"><font size="1"><b>Where others have progress, we have Telkom.</b>
Hellkom website - www.hellkom.co.za</font id="size1"></font id="navy">
 
Why don't we as a community start to focus our attention on the SAT3 cable instead of hammering the companies who have to try and gain access to them.

How is Telkom managing to keep control of this part? I know they invested money in it but wasn't this done when they were still a state owned company? If you ask me, governtment should take control of the SAT3 and make it dirt cheap to use, as currently only half of its capacity is used (not sure about this, feel free to tell me if i'm wrong).

FREE THE SAT3!!!!!

"Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness, experiencing itself subjectively. There's no such thing as death - life is only a dream - and we're the imagination of ourselves.” – Bill Hicks
 
I am reading this thread with a growing sense of despair.

Does anyone actually believe that the iBurst service will really deliver 1Mbps for anything other than local bandwidth?

"Up to 1Mbps" is all well and good but we've already been stung by ADSL "up to 512k" and MyWireless "up to 128k" (and Mweb "up to 3x faster"). Don't say what it *peaks* at, tell us what speed it *works* at!

If iBurst wants a foot in the door they should have a "basic" package at around R300 without the modem, and performance the same as Mweb/Tiscali dial-up (not eject/ICL). Then offer "booster" packages with extra bandwidth/international downloads similar to the ADSL model.

Even MyWireless would sell contracts if they had an "always on" basic package for R300 that works between 48k and 64k. But they they're too dumb to do anything other than make promises.

<hr noshade size="1">
Donn Edwards <font size="2"><div align="right">MyWireless: Diva-style reliability, dial-up performance (or worse)</div id="right"></font id="size2">
<font size="1">“If our government ever goes bad, as sometimes happens in a democracy... As we extrapolate our [surveillance] technologies into the future, if the incumbency has that political advantage over their opposition, then if a bad government ever comes to power, <b>it may be the last government we ever elect</b>.” See http://privacy.4mg.com </font id="size1">
 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by donn</i>
<br />

Even MyWireless would sell contracts if they had an "always on" basic package for R300 that works between 48k and 64k. But they they're too dumb to do anything other than make promises.

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

If they gave you a 64k line and you used it exclusively for international use it would cost them R6k pm. This is why we simply wont be getting any R300 offerings for the forseable future.

Of course with ISDN you can get 64k 12/7 but thats because the number of ISDN users is &gt;100k of which only a minute fraction are active at any one time. The people who sign up for ADSL/ST/iBurst are generally "power users".

Other countries with similar or longer submarine cables e.g. Australia charge less than 1/10th what Telkom does for bandwidth over their cables.

PS you might want to visit www.safe-sat3.co.za

Given this situation one would expect local ISPs to differentiate between local and international bandwidth and limitations in their offerings. Telkom does to a large extent. Sentech and iBurst don't. Rather ironic.

All in all it's a catch-22 [8)]


-Information anarchist-
www.sentechhatesfreespeech.org.za
I support:
www.hellkom.co.za
www.poopband.co.za
 
The details of the package courtesy of Rodent are
http://rodent.za.net/files/iburst.pdf

&gt; Even MyWireless would sell contracts if they had an "always on"
&gt; basic package for R300 that works between 48k and 64k.

Tiscali and Mweb provide a service for R145 that works between 32k and 56k. I'm not talking about peak congested time when nothing international works faster than a snail's pace. I'm talking about general usage. I wish I could be more specific, but my experience of both Tiscali and Mweb's ISDN offerings (64k version) is that you pay R300 and it works at a decent speed.

My experience of ADSL is that it works at a decent speed until your cap runs out. Then you and a zillion other users all share a single 64k line, which explains why Telkom said it worked like ISDN. They neglected to say how many other users shared in your experience.

My experience with MyWireless is that you pay a lot more than Mweb or Tiscali and don't get any better, apart from the fact that your phone bill is lower. But they advertise 128k (or more) which we all know is just wishful thinking.

Now iBurst is throwing around figures like 64k and 1024k but they aren't saying whether its ADSL/ISDN-style speed or MyWireless-style speed. My fear is that iBurst is no better than MyWireless by giving us *peak* speed figures with no mention of actual *working* speeds.

If they charged half of what they are charging and gave the same speed as Tiscali/Mweb I'd risk the money and buy a modem. So its really a case of asking what they really mean by the speeds they are mentioning.

And if they start talking about "broadband" without proving they are capable of delivering broadband speeds, they're going to be talking to the ASA much sooner than Sentech did.

<hr noshade size="1">
Donn Edwards <font size="2"><div align="right">MyWireless: Diva-style reliability, dial-up performance (or worse)</div id="right"></font id="size2">
<font size="1">“If our government ever goes bad, as sometimes happens in a democracy... As we extrapolate our [surveillance] technologies into the future, if the incumbency has that political advantage over their opposition, then if a bad government ever comes to power, <b>it may be the last government we ever elect</b>.” See http://privacy.4mg.com </font id="size1">
 
I have just read everything that has been said around I-Burst.
Heres my opinion:

At the end of the day its all about money. For a while now I have been waiting for I-Burst to offer something or the other because I am a "Disgruntled Sentech User" as they put it. At a first glance of their I-Go Everywhere product... well they acting as a plugin or should I say clone of Telkom. People want value for money. Thats something that alot of people tend to forget. If you weigh what you getting, with what you are paying, and if you getting more than what you paying for, then thats value for money. Unfortunately this country has been subjected to being ripped off in every sense of the word and in every sense of any product out there.

So I dont really expect any company to be changing their marketing and business plans. Its all about "How much can we squeze out of the customer". If anakin's first description of the product is correct then in my personal opinion I dont see how they are any different from Telkom. Doest mean that they offer 1MB Line and mobility then its all dandy. I want value for my money.

If hypothecially speaking you put aside Communication Constraints (e.g. cost of International bandwidth, etc...) tommorow prices will actually go up instead of come down. Take the US Dollar to the Rand. When it was sitting at a rediculous 13-1 prices shot up and if you asked why, youd get a "Because of the High Price of the Dollar". Now that the dollar is sitting at a stable 6 to 7 Rand to a dollar no prices have come down. Everything keeps going up and up. Take discovery health for example. If you watch their adverts its says "Now Announcing our lowest increase of ONLY 5.4%". I mean common thats just blatent. The point that i am trying to make is no matter how much you scream, cry, bitc* and moan things will always be pricy.
Thats the fact of the matter. As some one high up in government told me once after my crying and screaming "If you dont like it leave".

Mark my words, as anticipated as we are all about the new SNO, they probaly wont be any different from Telkom.
Good luck to you all including I-Burst. I just now have to beg for a salary increase so that I can afford this.

Tower 90, 256K Package
 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by donn</i>

Now iBurst is throwing around figures like 64k and 1024k but they aren't saying whether its ADSL/ISDN-style speed or MyWireless-style speed. My fear is that iBurst is no better than MyWireless by giving us *peak* speed figures with no mention of actual *working* speeds.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

The thing is, given the minute cap it actually shouldn't be all that hard for them to provide the service they advertise. This is further strongly supported by offering a monthly rental option.

One source of drama could be the way they tweak the service as they go on. This is expressly discussed in the pdf. I suspect they will hold back on the shaping etc. initially in order to generate a good media buzz and then start limiting the offering as more people join.

One thing's for sure they won't be seeing my business until the end of 2005, if ever.


-Information anarchist-
www.sentechhatesfreespeech.org.za
I support:
www.hellkom.co.za
www.poopband.co.za
 
Well, the offering is worse than ADSL, in all aspects of it except for mobility. And who cares about mobility, I can access Telkom's hotspots at all the places I regularly go drink beer, so to me there's no point.

If you can't get ADSL in your area, mebbe go iBurst. If you can, ADSL is still a better, more stable, and lower-ping option.

<center><h6> MyWireless <s>Hacks</s> Tweaks & Tech Info || Have you checked the fawking FAQ? <br /> <font color="red">Tired of Sentech's bad service? Want to compare speeds? We at least listen...</font id="red"></h6></center>
 
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