Categories
TechNews Bytes

N.Y. Attorney General Prods AOL on Cancellation Policies

Everyone knows how horrifically difficult it is to cancel your subscription once you’ve signed on with AOL; in fact to the point that many people just don’t bother, or set aside time in their schedules for the repetative “no, I want to cancel” they have to keep saying to the AOL rep on the phone when they call to cancel. It’s pretty sad, in my opinion, but it was a fact of life if you were an AOL subscriber, and it’s a testiment to how badly AOL is doing in the face of other ISPs offering similar or better services for less money, and in the face of ever father-reaching broadband internet access.

Even so, Eliot Spitzer, the Attorney General for New York (bless that man) put his nose into the fray after recieving over 300 complaints from AOL users mad that they were getting the short end when they tried to cancel, or their cancellation requests were outright denied. Spitzer, the friend of the consumer that he is, prodded AOL about their customer retention practices, and out of it comes a settlement where AOL promises to go easier on customers who want to cancel their service. Wonderful news. Read all about it:

[ http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,122306,tk,dn082505X,00.asp< ?a> ]

Categories
TechNews Bytes

Google’s Latest Is All Talk

Now I’ll preface this with the fact that I haven’t tried Google Talk. I realize it’s just another Jabber client, and I can connect to it using any Jabber-capable client, but the Mac in the office can’t use the voice-calling features that I think are cool (actually, the only version available is the Windows 2000/XP version, Mac and Linux users are waved to their favorite Jabber-capable client) and at home I can’t think of many reasons to use it over my trusty IM client.

This is the problem though inherent with Google Talk. There’s no one on it, and no real compelling reason to switch to it aside from the fact that it’s cool and it’s Google, but that’s not really enough, and since I don’t know anyone on it, I’m probably not going to switch until there are people I know. Granted it takes time, but it looks like there isn’t much of a flood to move, and no features that absolutely make me want to move. And Wired News reviewer Simon Burns agrees with me, and sees some of the same flaws in the new project that I do. His article is a more in-depth than mine, but it’s definitely worth a read. Here’s to Google Talk’s success, but they’ll have to make the service really compelling in order to get more users.

[ http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,68642,00.html]

Categories
Programming and Podcasts

Security Now! // Episode 1

Another podcast is in town, this time hosted by Leo Laporte and Steve Gibson, of ShieldsUP and SpinRite fame, both at GRC [ http://grc.com/ ] called Security Now! and it looks good. The first episode was actually posted on August 18th and mentioned in TWIT episode 18, but I’m catching up on such things and it looks like the first one has been released and is riding on TWIT bandwidth for distribution. Download it and check it out-the first episode is only about 18 minutes, but it’s definitely a winner!

Security Now Episode 1 // August 18, 2005 – [ episode notes | download ]