| Mona Lysa Overdrive
I am on the Net.
Big surprise, you say, Eolake Stobblehouse has been pestering us with several web sites and ceaseless e-mailing now for years. No, what I mean is I am connected right now, while writing this.
If you are living in the USA, you probably don't see the big deal. If you are a European, and not independently wealthy, you probably do see it.
In Europe, unlike the US, local calls cost money. Which means that a couple of hours of Internet use every day is not a trivial expense. I moved from Denmark to Scotland recently, and I got a nasty little surprise. Which was that the minimum call charge, meaning the charge for making a call at all, even if it is only half a second in duration, is five times the one in Denmark. Meaning 5 Pence (8 or 9 cents, I think). For someone who makes all his business and much research, and a substantial part of his social life on the Net, and who likes to check his e-mail really often, this is bad.
So I was beginning to think that this was a serious fly in the ointment. When suddenly from peripheral sources I find out that BT (British Telecommunications) has a new service from the first of March 2000. In short, free Internet access in weekends and evenings (6 to midnight).
So I called them up. (Actually, what I thought they had was a 40 pound (70 dollars) per month service flat rate for unlimited access, but that service will come "in spring". No, what we can get now is the evening/weekend deal, and even covered by the price of my current subscription.) The sales person wanted to send me a CD-ROM with the software. I wanted to know how much software it takes to make a free connection. What does the software do? All the sales person could tell me, but with great confidence, was that I "accessed the software through the CD-ROM drive". Well, that is helpful. "So can I sign up through the web site without the CD-ROM?" I asked. He had heard of a couple of customers who had managed that, but it was apparently a big deal, so he would really prefer to just send me the CD-ROM. I let him, and then went to btinternet.com.
Once there, I followed a couple of links and found out two things: 1, the software for Windoze was about 300k. Not really a big deal. 2, For the Mac, the entire process consisted of changing your call up number to an 800 number! (How come I always know more than the "consultants" who are supposed to guide me to the right purchasing decisions? What do they DO to keep useful information from seeping into their minds?)
So in other words, right now I am, for the first time in my life, connected to the Net, downloading art (right now Lysa's stunning art), writing this article, and e-mailing, all at the same time, without sitting on pins and needles because the bill is growing by a couple of bucks for every hour I am connected. Trust me, that is a whole new world.
This is very valuable. I begin to understand why the USA, despite being so culturally behind (he, he), is still ahead in Net connectedness. Free information, free art, free communication. Think about it, just knowing that a couple of failed dial-ups will cost you the price of an apple (the fruit, not the computer) does tend to put a damper on enthusiasm, doesn't it? And when you have a download like, say, 25 megabyte, if it fails, it is not only hours wasted, but also the price of a meal. No more, the UK at least is finally stepping into 21st Century connectedness. This is a small taste of the future when everyone will have gigabit connections for free.
I can explore the Net in leisure for the first time. I learn something from doing almost anything, so I have never wasted time, but money has been a concern. Well, no more, not outside business hours at least.
I get the feeling we are not in Kansas anymore. Or Copenhagen, for that matter.
- Stobblehouse |
