Subj : z1b link
To   : Todd Cochrane
From : Carl Austin Bennett
Date : Wed Apr 18 2001 06:14 am

 TC> I know what the technology cost and it did not justify the dollars they 
 TC> were charging. At 20 per head per month cost were covered in short order.

Yes, and the feeds they were selling came with some strings attached, too.

Usually this meant inability to feed out-of-net nodes without paying more.

Not sure why, as this didn't mean any extra expense incurred by the uplink.

For instance, when Ken Wilson left, a number of nets in our region received 
offers from BobS. He was offering a great deal where he'd take this free feed 
he'd picked up from Brenda and resell it to us for only $20 per net per month.

Beauty, eh? It would certainly save having to deal with more respected names 
(such as some of the Z1B hubs, as well as Brenda herself on the NAB side) who 
might even try to pawn off a free feed on us when we're not looking. Thanks!

Unfortunately, there's a catch. Bob said $20 a net, right?

Yes, 1:249 is a net. We picked up echomail from JohnS for $US5 before he 
announced his shutdown, only restriction being we don't resell for profit.
We pay nothing now to pick up direct from 1:379/1. Same situation elsewhere.

However, 1:249 also feeds all of net 248 (one node), all of net 246 (one node) 
and at least one individual node in some other local net out west.

Egads! That means that somewhere between three and four nets are fed here. 
End result? At $20 a net, this could potentially run as high as $80 a month.

A little expensive for sysops of free BBSs. I don't get that much to be RC12.

All they gave me as salary was a broken copy of NLMake (which I had to port to 
linux and fix myself), a "KICK ME" sign which I could wear in the zone echos 
every time another useless R18-vs-R12 war starts and the vague promise that I 
could pawn the whole mess off on someone else come election time. :-)

--- Msged/LNX TE 06
 * Origin: Pause-Cafe Kingston 613-549-5599 telnet:cafe.dyndns.org (1:249/116)

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