OpenWeb ADSL Feedback Thread (Pt2)

Leon's response to clarifying how Telkom could cause issues with only OW and not my pre-paid WA account:




Now as someone in the IT business I may not be a network specialist, but I know what may be plausible and what sounds like utter bull****. This would be the latter.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place now. Yes, I could call Telkom and when they (eventually) get around to sending someone out to diagnose the problem there are 2 scenarios:
1) If I tell the techie that one ISP is fine and another isn't I know the response will be "Well your ISP is the problem.
2) If I don't mention the above and the techie tests a Telkom account, inevitably seeing no issue when he does the conclusion will be the same.

In both I have to foot the bill for a callout for an issue that isn't Telkom's.

Save yourself the headache and simply do what's right.
 
Quit on the ****ers and complain at DD/IS.

Complaining at IS does not work..... I'm not happy with the response from IS as they are essentially saying that if you get a @mynetwork.co.za user name you are at the hands of openweb and if you paid R899 for a account or R299 you might actually get the same performance depending on what openweb decides. No way at all for the consumer to know for certain what shaping is applied to their account or whether they are over or under paying for their account. They also allow the ISP to restrict access to userstats.isdsl.net.

Serious loophole I think and it openes the door for ISP's to take consumers for a ride. You are totally at the mercy of the ISP which is totally wrong.

"Good day ******,

We have received your complaint in regards to your account with Openweb and have taken it up with Openweb.

As Internet Solutions, on the @mynetwork.co.za realm we provide the bandwidth and the tools to do the shaping. The rules and provisioning levels are however decided on by Openweb.

This service is not bought per account. So in this case We don’t believe Openweb is misrepresenting IS products in any way. The positioning in the market versus the service level is a separate issue that are both completely at Openweb’s discretion in this case.

The Openweb account manager at IS has engaged them regarding your complaint and they have assured her that they will address the issue with you.

Regards,"
 
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Complaining at IS does not work..... I'm not happy with the response from IS as they are essentially saying that if you get a @mynetwork.co.za user name you are at the hands of openweb and if you paid R899 for a account or R299 you might actually get the same performance depending on what openweb decides. No way at all for the consumer to know for certain what shaping is applied to their account or whether they are over or under paying for their account. They also allow the ISP to restrict access to userstats.isdsl.net.

Serious loophole I think and it openes the door for ISP's to take consumers for a ride. You are totally at the mercy of the ISP which is totally wrong.

"Good day ******,

We have received your complaint in regards to your account with Openweb and have taken it up with Openweb.

As Internet Solutions, on the @mynetwork.co.za realm we provide the bandwidth and the tools to do the shaping. The rules and provisioning levels are however decided on by Openweb.

This service is not bought per account. So in this case We don’t believe Openweb is misrepresenting IS products in any way. The positioning in the market versus the service level is a separate issue that are both completely at Openweb’s discretion in this case.

The Openweb account manager at IS has engaged them regarding your complaint and they have assured her that they will address the issue with you.

Regards,"

typical African mentality...
 
As Internet Solutions, on the @mynetwork.co.za realm we provide the bandwidth and the tools to do the shaping. The rules and provisioning levels are however decided on by Openweb.

This service is not bought per account. So in this case We don’t believe Openweb is misrepresenting IS products in any way. The positioning in the market versus the service level is a separate issue that are both completely at Openweb’s discretion in this case.

And to think I was ridiculed for saying there's no proof of the mob's claims that OpenWeb resells accounts and not bandwidth. Well that's one 'fact' that just kicked the bucket.
 
And to think I was ridiculed for saying there's no proof of the mob's claims that OpenWeb resells accounts and not bandwidth. Well that's one 'fact' that just kicked the bucket.

Eh? People thought they were account resellers? Where? Are you maybe thinking of things ±1 year ago or longer?
 
It was widely regarded as a 'fact' at one point. Many people used the unfound allegations of OpenWeb accounts being subject to the Star Rating system as 'proof' that OpenWeb resells accounts, not bandwidth. When I questioned the validity of these claims, I was ridiculed and told I know nothing.
 
I was one of the people that stated that Openweb resell accounts and not bandwidth. I still believe that...as a fact, but with the he says vs she says rule, it is now just my opinion.

How Openweb got it right that IS now says the same things to certain questions...I don't know, although I guess one has to be more specific.

Reselling IS adsl accounts/bandwidth in my opionion works like this.
- Uncapped accounts you buy on a per account basis, and resell that account.
- Capped accounts, you buy on a per bandwidth basis, and resell that bandwith on as many accounts you like.

With those 2 things in mind, I believe it is possible that Openweb is allowed to say they resell bandwidth, pointing to the few capped accounts they sell, they are in fact reselling bandwidth. However they then keep to themselves, when it comes to the IS uncapped accounts, they are most definitely not buying bandwidth, but buying uncapped accounts and reselling them.

As long as one is not perfectly clear as to which accounts you are referring, both IS and Openweb can say, that Openweb is in fact reselling IS bandwidth and not accounts.
 
I was one of the people that stated that Openweb resell accounts and not bandwidth. I still believe that...as a fact, but with the he says vs she says rule, it is now just my opinion.

How Openweb got it right that IS now says the same things to certain questions...I don't know, although I guess one has to be more specific.

Reselling IS adsl accounts/bandwidth in my opionion works like this.
- Uncapped accounts you buy on a per account basis, and resell that account.
- Capped accounts, you buy on a per bandwidth basis, and resell that bandwith on as many accounts you like.

With those 2 things in mind, I believe it is possible that Openweb is allowed to say they resell bandwidth, pointing to the few capped accounts they sell, they are in fact reselling bandwidth. However they then keep to themselves, when it comes to the IS uncapped accounts, they are most definitely not buying bandwidth, but buying uncapped accounts and reselling them.

As long as one is not perfectly clear as to which accounts you are referring, both IS and Openweb can say, that Openweb is in fact reselling IS bandwidth and not accounts.

With your mindset, you wont believe IS or Openweb no matter what they say.
 
Yes a lot of people are speculating about it but only IS and Openweb knows how they get charded or how the accounts work.

Here is another interesting theory. What if the @mynetwork.co.za realm allows for IS accounts to be crated but the shaping is tweaked per account once created. What happens when more than 1 user connect to those created accounts?

We just not know..... However I highly doubt that Openweb buys bandwidth per 1Mbps since they mostly do uncapped accounts. This will ruin them financially and cause their bought bandwidth to be at max most of the time....
 
I was one of the people that stated that Openweb resell accounts and not bandwidth. I still believe that...as a fact, but with the he says vs she says rule, it is now just my opinion.

How Openweb got it right that IS now says the same things to certain questions...I don't know, although I guess one has to be more specific.

Reselling IS adsl accounts/bandwidth in my opionion works like this.
- Uncapped accounts you buy on a per account basis, and resell that account.
- Capped accounts, you buy on a per bandwidth basis, and resell that bandwith on as many accounts you like.

With those 2 things in mind, I believe it is possible that Openweb is allowed to say they resell bandwidth, pointing to the few capped accounts they sell, they are in fact reselling bandwidth. However they then keep to themselves, when it comes to the IS uncapped accounts, they are most definitely not buying bandwidth, but buying uncapped accounts and reselling them.

As long as one is not perfectly clear as to which accounts you are referring, both IS and Openweb can say, that Openweb is in fact reselling IS bandwidth and not accounts.

Why would IS lie on Openweb's behalf? They have absolutely no reason to and an upstream provider as big as them would be taking an unnecessary risk in doing so.

This has now officially crossed over into conspiracy theory territory. Seriously man, come on. It is undeniable that OpenWeb shares accounts, nobody will deny that. But here you are presented with proof that Openweb buys capacity instead of reselling accounts and you'd rather think up some improbable convoluted story so you can continue telling yourself that Openweb buys and resells accounts.

Come on mate. Really?
 
Why would IS lie on Openweb's behalf? They have absolutely no reason to and an upstream provider as big as them would be taking an unnecessary risk in doing so.

This has now officially crossed over into conspiracy theory territory. Seriously man, come on. It is undeniable that OpenWeb shares accounts, nobody will deny that. But here you are presented with proof that Openweb buys capacity instead of reselling accounts and you'd rather think up some improbable convoluted story so you can continue telling yourself that Openweb buys and resells accounts.

Come on mate. Really?
You ask the wrong questions. Also, I don't see any proof that Openweb buys capacity. I've also received messages from the Plugg representative about that, still, I don't have to believe it, it is not proof, just something that someone said.

Since you don't believe me, let me make a suggestion. Become your own reseller ISP. Sign up with IS and ask them about all the options available to you, what you can buy from them and what you can resell.

Then once you have done that, come back to me and list the options available to you, and what is true and what is not. We can then have a proper conversation as to who is lying and what is conspiracy or not.

Most importantly, I did say this is now my opinion and not fact. Something which I am entitled to. If you think that is ridiculous, why do you even read my posts? I only made my previous post because people asked about it.
 
That email was responded to by an official IS rep. I ask again, why would IS lie on behalf of OpenWeb?
Why would they not protect the reputation of one of their bigger clients?

But reading it again, they state the @mynetwork.co.za realm is used to buy bandwidth capacity. Thus the @openweb.co.za realm which has the shared accounts, is used to resell uncapped accounts.

So the IS representative didn't lie, but carefully sidestepped the issue.
 
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interestingly: http://mynetwork.co.za/
is registered on behalf of an Afrihost client ...

I assume one of two things has happened either:
the @mynetwork.co.za realm was created by IS independently of somebody acquiring the domain
or
the realm was created when Afrihost used the IS backbone and a website hasn't been developed

either way it is a good illustration of the interconnectedness of services and providers
 
Why would they not protect the reputation of one of their bigger clients?

But reading it again, they state the @mynetwork.co.za realm is used to buy bandwidth capacity. Thus the @openweb.co.za realm which has the shared accounts, is used to resell uncapped accounts.

So the IS representative didn't lie, but carefully sidestepped the issue.

And in your mind it's not possible that @openweb.co.za is a sub-domain of the capacity bought from IS? Do you even understand how capacity works? Why would an ISP both buy capacity and accounts? Do you understand that it's possible for Openweb to share accounts out of the capacity they bought?

Let's say OpenWeb buys 50mbs capacity (example figure) from IS. They then divide it into 50 1mb/s accounts. They then share them between 100 users, meaning there is 2 users to an account. The actual process is a bit more complex seeing as contention ratios and the like come into play, but that should cover the basics of how it works.

You're grasping at straws to prove something when all evidence thus far points to the contrary. Yes, OpenWeb shares accounts. I've got the proof of this for myself in my SAIX portal. However, there is no compelling evidence that OpenWeb is reselling accounts as well as buying capacity and so far there is no compelling motivation for them to do so in the first place.
 
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