Do all ISP’s suck?

Dave is complaining about Verizon. The “install” of the DSL service branded his browser, changed his homepage and changed all the email server settings. Yeah, Roadrunner’s “install” did the same thing, when all it really needed was the gateway IP and DNS servers. In fact, once I got my router pointed at the correct gateway, I didn’t need ANY of the other crap that an install would have put on any of my machines!

Actually with dial-up it’s even worse. Can you even get a list of local numbers for AOL without using their software (what is it, 150MB now?) to download the list? Let alone actually creating a connection? Nope. I tried to use SBC/Yahoo/Prodigy while on the road and had to install all of their junk, including Yahoo Messenger and Parental Controls, to get it to automatically grab a local number for me. The funny thing is, once you find where they have the access numbers, you can manually create all the local connections you want and uninstall all of their software. You never needed any of that stuff to actually connect to the internet. AOL doesn’t work that way. But it could, if it wanted to. How much cheaper could their service be if they just mailed you your username, password, local dialup number, mail server and DNS info and let you enter that to get connected? How much faster would you get connected to the internet if that was all you needed? It takes me all of about 2 minutes to setup a new dialup connection on my laptop, about the same as it takes to add a new machine to my home network and point it to the router as the internet connection. Try getting your “install” CD’s done that quickly!

Oh wait, if you don’t use their custom software they can’t give you their custom content, including all their ads. I guess I’m missing out on that! Poor, poor pitiful me…

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