>>I see your point. If you ask a potential candidate for your ISP
>>business about UQWK, and they don't have a clue, then that is a major
>>warning sign right there.
>
>Yep. Then, you have to consider: Am I talking with a tech support
>person, or someone whose knowledge is limited to what pricing plans they
>have?
That's right. After all, if you are talking to a customer service rep,
then he/she may not know a hell of a lot about unix and the like. But,
if and when you have the time, perhaps you should ask about the
person's position when you call the ISP for info. Just a suggestion...
>Too much competition here, is the real problem. Too many choices, and
>you never know if it's a *real* ISP, or something some yahoo runs out of
>his spare bedroom.
I see. But, locally or otherwise, do any of those ISP's have Web
sites? If so, then, perhaps, you can get a better picture of what
services they have to offer. In my area, there is a Web site that is
devoted to local ISP's, and it is impartial in its description and
analysis of the features of each of them. One can look at charts, and,
at a glance, make comparisons. IMHO, this makes things a lot easier
when one is shopping around for an ISP.
>>I noticed this, too. However, I never tried uploading my Souper95
>>.newsrc file to my shell account to run the trn/uqwk routine because I
>>was not sure if the article numbers in the PC .newsrc matched the ones
>>in the .newsrc file of my shell account. You might want to give a
>>shot... What the heck? It might work :)... If it does, would you
>>please let the rest of us on the list know?
>
>The numbers seem to match up well. The problem will be if my ISP has a
>problem with their news server, and resets all the numbers...as has
>happened at least a few times.
Yes... Another Yarn list user pointed this out in a recent post.
>>Anyway... Good luck to you in your search for a "real" ISP, and in
>>your use of souper.
>
>Doing well on the latter, have given up on the former for now. Not
>enough time to pursue it, unfortunately.
I am glad to hear that you are able to work with Souper, and I can
understand how time constraints can keep you from shopping around for
an ISP.
Take care.
Debra Walker
-- Debra Walker debraw@wwa.com Chicago, IL