Lets revisit "Bandwidth Hog"

slimothy said:
My question is to all these people who are paying for a 1mbit line and downloading under 3GB a month is what do you need a 1mbit line for? It's not as if webpages open any faster, on a 384 line they load pretty much instantly already... so whats up?
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What's up??? It's still the best deal out there. And no Telkom.
 
I evaluate Linux distros. Downloading Linux is NOT illegal ! SuSE 9.2 was 3.2 GB. That was ONE distro !!!!!!!!!! Now i'm waiting for 9.3 :)
 
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and you know what, if you got suse around march or april then as it completed you either noticed a) it failed the md5sum and you had to get it again or b) 9.3 came out :P
 
Point is. Doesn't matter what you do with your bandwidth. It's yours to do with what you please. If pr0n or torrents are your thing, or gentoo, or even the damn Java2 SDK it has nothing to do with anyone one these forums, and even less to do with WBS.

What is of concern, is that they advertised a product with a 3Gb cap, and then 64Kbps access. They have lied. Blatantly.
 
I spent about 40 minutes on the phone with Sassan yesterday. His one and only point is that "bandwidth abusers" are irresponsible and deserve to much heavier punishment then they are getting. He seems to think that WBS are actually being very kind, after having "gifted" us with so much extra bandwidth, to allow us to buy more and get back online.

Here are my arguments against his "bandwidth hogs / irresponsible customer" arguments:

a) WBS capping software did not work correctly as advertised, this is their fault, not ours, why should we pay for it?
b) We did not sign up to be "responsible customers" or "partners" of WBS, however nice, right and good that may be, it is not legally binding and if we don't do that, WBS cannot take action on that basis
c) We did not sign up to help WBS sort out their problems - they cannot expect us to spend our time informing them if we are not capped
d) It is entirely possible that some people did not realise they weren't capped - iBurst speeds haven't been exactly consistent have they - and what about those who have never had broadband before (eg. me) and don't know what to expect?
d) When we did realise we were capped, how were we supposed to limit our connection? We bought a line which AFAIK we should be able to leave maxed out 24/7 if we want to. Should we have disconnected ourselves or stopped our downloads because WBS couldn't get their act together?

I think this counters his argument pretty well - could be the basis of a letter to management.
 
And I caved in to them and bought an extra GB to be online again..... I am addicted. It's like going from a clean lifestyle straight to heroin.... :)

(I had 56k dialup modem which someone else paid for before... )
 
Amber said:
It seems to me the only reason why WBS did this was to protect themselves. Do you think 70-100 or even 300 users leaving Iburst will affect there growth as opposed to 50-60% of their user base leaving because of bad speeds? Broadband is in demand and cheap broadband.

I will repeat that the way WBS chose to protect their business was short sighted and had very little consideration of their users, but which users. Their move only had a positive influence on my connection and many others who were suffering from slow speeds.
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Yes it would affect it , This product is based on perceptions and word of mouth. It has not been in the market long enough to lt itself grow using its own reputation. The perception that has been created since this product has gone live has been worse than negative and I really think that WBS needs to invest some time and money into some DECENT pr , otherwise they are going to see their arse.

If you were looking at getting a solution and you heard it was crap , would u buy it ?
 
Gary Waterworth said:
Yes it would affect it , This product is based on perceptions and word of mouth. It has not been in the market long enough to lt itself grow using its own reputation. The perception that has been created since this product has gone live has been worse than negative and I really think that WBS needs to invest some time and money into some DECENT pr , otherwise they are going to see their arse.

If you were looking at getting a solution and you heard it was crap , would u buy it ?
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Well Telkom has a crap service thats a given fact (anyone who has dealt with them knows the truth) and yet everyone gets there service?

This forum is one tiny dot in the customer base for people like I burst or Telkom, face it, if you have a 56k modem you wouldent even bother looking here because youd go bankrupt looking.
How did everyone find this site? i got here by luck.
So if I burst is Advertising its Product country wide, How many of those people marketed to have even heard of this site? I am willing to bet less than 1%.
How many users does i burst have?
And who ever said 150 people will talk badly to thousands LMAO. please man, out of those 150 odd, how many of there friends even have a computer let alone an internet connection? Probably 1 in 20 or something like that, this is Africa man not Europe or the states lol.
So basically after all that rambeling by moaning here you are looking at a tiny perception of what is happenign out there. And i doubt it would worry I burst.
Let alone Telkom.
 
Yeah, another thing worth mentioning here is, WBS is a lot smaller than Telkom. You guys seem to have the cellphone numbers of all the people at the top. You certainly don't have the cellphone numbers of Sizwe Nxsana, Steven White, and all those top exec's do you? In other words, all telco companies in SA are beasts to deal with but those who are on iBurst have a better chance of getting things done about their problems. Telkom is a maze of endless departments and many, many phones that they can put you through to. It seems to me within WBS is a very short chain to the top management.

The CEO of my company knows some of the top management in WBS, and if necessary, if I have problems I will pull that string. I'm now e-mailing the reseller to let him come install it, next Friday.

Having been twice through the meat mincer that is Telkom, I'd rather go through the WBS turnstyle from now on.
 
wls / Kei - your both new here - take a look around the wealth of info about the broadband scene here.

The management of this site are very well respected in the industry - the entire ICASA ADSL hearings were a direct result of activists who maintain this forum !

Believe me, things are getting done by these champions of the consumer - the only way we can actually catch up with the world in terms of broadband is through the efforts of people like this.

The bigger picture of affordable broadband cannot be ignored - just on the job creation side, the benefits would be enormous. Then we go onto education - to be able to equip our schools with affordable bandwidth opens up avenues of possiblity not dreamed of here !

Don't assume this forum is full of whining kids.

Here we have IT professionals at the top of their game, journalists, DJ's, Lawyers - you name it !

So browse around - sure, there's a lot of cr@p posted (I post my fair share too), but there's a lot to be learnt - we need broadband here, not just so people can download as much as they want, but for the reasons I indicated above - it has become essential for economic growth.
 
Kei, also - as IBurst Management were doing everything but offer personal pelvic massages to new customers in December, they also spread their business cards with their cell-numbers on them, to everyone they came in contact with.
Thats why many forumites have those numbers.
 
Fair enough, please know that I do support your cause. I was part of those ICASA hearings, although not in presence. I completed the questionnaire in January and, recently made another submission to ICASA about the Draft Price Cap regulations. I did my homework on that one too, took me a lot of time to compile all of that.

I do agree that we need to reform the telecoms industry in SA and, like I've said before, WBS was wrong to do what they did, it was a low jab. But I am not happy with, what I perceive as being bullied into boycotting WBS now. I haven't got a backup plan OK. I do have a modem, but no Telkom line and no hope of getting one (probably ever) due to Telkoms bureaucratic bull****. I have zero, zip, nada internet access at home, and I need it. Not only for me, but for my fiancee, who is trying to complete her studies.

By all means, take whatever action is necessary but please don't make me feel like a complete outcast because I am willing to put up with some bad customer service to get a little bit of internet access.

I believe that, as soon as Telkom can be dealt with, all other companies will be much less full of crap and this bull**** with caps might go away or be much more liberalised
 
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