From what I hear, excite@home is in bankruptcy court, and the bondholders want the judge to turn off the service to millions of subscribers including my own ATT@home. I never thought it would get this far, but if you have excite@home service, your cable access may be turned of tomorrow. Ain't life fun??
When it comes to ISP service, it sucks!!! I had internet service since 92, back when Mosaic was the only browser. I tried every major ISP service since then. Nothing comes close to @home service. The T-1 service at work isn't even as reliable or as fast. What bugs me is they only charge $29.95 a month. It's going to cost me $49.95 for DSL service that's about 20% of the speed of @home. If @home is losing money, please charge us an extra $10 or $20 bucks a month so you can stay in business. That's how strongly I feel about their service. Bob
Excite service poised for shutdown Bankruptcy ruling may mean yet another setback for broadband 12/01/2001 By VIKAS BAJAJ / The Dallas Morning News A federal bankruptcy judge in California gave At Home Corp. the right Friday to shut down its high-speed Internet service, which serves 4 million consumers. As early as 2 a.m. Saturday Dallas time, millions of customers were set to lose their Internet access, e-mail addresses and personal Web pages, but negotiations between At Home and its cable company partners continued into the night. In Dallas-Fort Worth, 22,000 cable modem customers get At Home service via Charter Communications Inc., and an undisclosed number receive it from AT&T. At Home creditors are seeking higher rates for its Excite@Home service from some of the nation's biggest cable companies. Charter, AT&T and other cable companies appealed the decision and were in talks with At Home creditors to keep the network alive. AT&T has previously offered $307 million to buy At Home, but the struggling firm's lenders say that's not enough. The service's failure is one in a series of shutdowns and bankruptcies to afflict high-speed Internet, or broadband, services. The bankruptcy of NorthPoint Communications Inc. early this year left hundreds of thousands of businesses with no Internet service, and this fall AT&T Wireless Services shut down a wireless high-speed service leaving thousands with no high-speed options. "There are a lot of people who were disconnected from wireless Internet services, or who didn't like DSL and went to cable modems," said David Goldstein, president of Channel Marketing Corp. in Addison. "Now their providers are shutting down," Mr. Goldstein said. "Where else do they go? They have no other alternative for high-speed Internet access." Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell urged U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas E. Carlson to implement a transition period for At Home users, saying the disruption could be a serious setback to broadband deployment nationwide. Judge Carlson said his decision wouldn't be influenced by the plight of subscribers. "Bankruptcy typically causes much disruption all the time, leading to loss of jobs and services to communities." St. Louis-based Charter said it has been sending customers software that lets them shift to the company's own Internet provider, Charter Pipeline. Customers who haven't received the software or need help with it can call 866-413-9096 or 888-843-0707 toll free. The company has been informing subscribers about Pipeline for weeks now, but it's barred from telling them outright to drop Excite, because that would violate Charter's contract with At Home, said Andy Morgan, a company spokesman. "We are in a touchy situation where we can't be as aggressive as we might otherwise be," Mr. Morgan said. AT&T officials said it was building its own network in case it can't buy the company. A hearing before Judge Carlson on AT&T's purchase is scheduled for Wednesday. If the purchase isn't approved, some customers could lose their service temporarily, spokeswoman Sarah Eder said. More than half of AT&T's 1.4 million cable modem subscribers rely on At Home. The rest are served directly by AT&T. To re-create At Home's network, AT&T and other cable companies must install routers, switches, fiber-optic lines and other equipment to connect their customers to the Internet. Despite being a highly popular, fast-growing service, At Home struggled to make enough money, analysts said. The Internet company said it was losing an average of $6 million a week. "At a very superficial level, we have to figure out how to build a company and make money on a data service," telecommunications analyst Jeffrey Kagan said. Technology editor Alan Goldstein and The Associated Press contributed to this report. http://www.dallasnews.com/business/stories/STORY.ea80aa7602.b0.af.0.a4.4352.html
For all those on AT&T broadband don't worry, yes there will be a service interruption but you service will be back up in a few days no more than 3 or 5 hopefully less, it's just a matter of rebuilding your account. As far as the other cable companies I'm sure they have a back up plan but I am not sure how long it will take them to implement it. Don't ask me how I know but think ATT Worldnet
I am (was?) an AT&T AtHome cable customer. Opened my browser this morning, and surprise, surprise, I'm at AT&T. None of my bookmarks or homepage buttons work. They all send me right back to AT&T. I ran the "configurator" program and everything is working again, even Netscape. No problemo.
Rigel. Count your blessings. I'm online through my stinking MSN dial-up account. How did I ever do without broadband? Two days and counting. MrX, I hope you're right about "no more than 3 or 5" for AT&T...
Att broadband was down about 53 hours, but I got the call they are up again. I did the automatic configuration option. I had to redo my email...no more user@home.com. Your email is now username@attbi.com. Life is good.
Did anyone have problems with Cox new network last week, they say disruptions are possible for the next few days as they are setting up their own network.
I had 2 interruptions last week in the middle of the trading day. My understanding is that you don't really need to download the conversion software if you don't use your email and personal webpages .