| BT under fire over broadband-
19th July (Surrey and Hampshire Herald Group)
INTERNET users in Alton who are frustrated at the lack of ADSL
Broadband services in the area, have started a lobby group to
pressure British Telecom into providing the service.
ADSL Broadband is a highspeed digital internet line that
is capable of carrying data at up to 500 kilobits per second,
10 times the speed of a conventional 56k modem. This allows
for much faster downloading, smoother video and audio streaming
and quicker MP3 loading.
Other benefits of Broadband is that it is always switched on,
eliminating the wait to connect to the web, and that it does
not affect the service of your phone line, allowing you to make
and receive calls while online.
'Broadband Alton' was formed at the start of June this year
by Peter Garner and Duncan McGregor after enquiries to BT about
getting connected to its new BT Openworld service drew a complete
blank.
They were told that to receive Broadband services, premises
have to be located within approximately five kilometres of the
nearest telephone exchange, and that this exchange must be fitted
with the appropriate ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line)
technology.
Although towns as close as Bordon and Farnham are equipped
with the new service, Garner and McGregor were told that the
exchange serving Alton was not going to be equipped with the
appropriate technology, as BT felt that there was a lack
of demand.
Mr McGregor explained how Broadband Alton came into being:
"I had just seen BT had finally, after two years, changed
their policy from, 'we're going to bring ADSL, it's just a matter
of time', to, 'we have no plans to bring ADSL due to lack of
customer demand'.
"They didn't announce this, nor tell those people from
whom they had accepted pre-orders. They just changed the wording
on their website if you went to specifically check whether your
exchange was ADSL enabled.
"I was incensed, especially as they are running a national
advertising campaign for broadband. So I looked up "broadband
and Alton" on a search engine, found Peter's site, and
mailed him, saying, 'This can't be allowed. I think it's time
for some campaigning.
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