@Home and SMTP servers.

[John Oliver]

Darrel Lawrence wrote:

> Both of you are missing the forest for the trees.  Yes, we were never
> *officially* allowed to run services, but we did anyway, and they looked the
> other way.  They didn't want to make it policy to *allow* it, but didn't want
> to alienate their customers either.  As long as nothing changed, everyone was
> happy.  Well, something changed.  Now you can either just take it from them
> and shut up, or call them, cancel, and tell them why.  The only way you can
> affect their decision whether or not to make this permanent is to let them
> know that there is a *COST* to them associated with doing so.  Otherwise,
> they'll only see the benefit.  But go ahead, be a good little consumer and
> keep shelling out for less and less and less.....

Another example of my much-vaunted prescience... :-)  I remember a
couple of years ago saying that this would happen... while their AUP
forbade running "servers", "looking the other way" meant *nothing*.  You
never have a defense when an oversight is corrected.  "But officer...
I've done a California stop at this stop sign every morning for 10 years
and you never stopped me before!"  I said this would happen.

I've got my fingers crossed that my old Cox contact will get back to
me.  If he still works there, in the same or higher position, there's a
good chance that I could maybe get a few changes in if Cox runs their
own ISP.

-- 
John Oliver
System Administrator
Hosting.com, an Allegiance Telecom company
Formerly CONNECTnet
mailto:john.oliver at hosting.com
t 858.638.2020
http://www.hosting.com/