Diana the Valkyrie's Guide to the Internet
A hard man is good to beat
Several months ago, I explained to web site members how they could (legally) get free internet access, especially if you live in the UK. Now US surfers can get free ISPs (actually, you could before, but not many people knew about it).
This time, it's AltaVista. There are no monthly fees, and your time online is unlimited. You simply fill out a brief questionnaire to help them deliver advertising and offers that are customized to your tastes, and then you can download and run the software.
Uh ... yes. That's the downside. You get to have adverts shoved at you while you surf. Like TV or radio. free stuff has to be paid for somehow. They say their thing takes up 5% of your screen (they don't say how much download speed you lose, but if they're pumping bytes through your modem, that's speed you don't have any more). So what you're doing, is trading 5% of your computer for the free internet access.
I haven't tried it, so I don't know how good it is. There's a hint that this might become available internationally some day.
You can get free internet access in the USA (in the UK, it's increasingly difficult to find people who actually charge for this!) at NetZero and FreeI.net and Tritium and Microworkz. And I guess there's others, I didn't do a full search. But you have to be within their list of local numbers. I think that AltaVista have a wider range of access numbers, but if yours is on the list of one of the others, that doesn't matter to you.
Freeserve is a service available in the UK, it's a free internet connection. It's entirely free, at no point do you have to pay a penny. Freeserve aim to make money out of selling advertising, just like many TV and radio channels.
The easiest way, is to install it from the CD Rom that you can get free, from Dixons. But if that goes wrong for some reason, here's an alternative way.
Warning - this is a bit complicated. If you don't understand step 1, then don't try any of it, use the CD Rom.
If you need technical support, then Freeserve offer it at one pound per minute, on 0906 553 5600
This is really aimed at people who are in the UK; from anywhere else, the phone calls will be rather expensive.
1. Create a new Dial-up Networking Connection, using the phone number 0845 079 6699. Let's call it "cherwell", but you can call it anything you like. I'll use cherwell as an example here. In the properties ... server types, all the check boxes should be cleared except the TCP/IP one which should be checked.
Under properties ... server types ... TCP/IP settings, uncheck the "Use IP Compression"
2. Double click on the Cherwell connection. Give it the username freeservesignup, password signup. That will get you a connection. But only a connection to step 3.
3. Using your browser, go to https://signup.freeserve.net (you can only access this while you're using the above connection). Note it is https and not http
4. Create a new account, giving it your name, address, and the other marketing information it wants. You can check the "no junk mail" box if you want.
5. Then it will ask you to choose your email address. This is very important, because it becomes part of your domain name. So, if you live at Cherwell Manor, you might choose John@cherwell.freeserve.co.uk. Or you might use your company name. You'll also choose a password.
6. The server will then send you a file called "install.ins". Save it to your hard disk, and read it later. At this point, don't click on any of the buttons on the page, all they do is save another copy of that file. You should hang up your connection, because you're going to change the dial-up details.
7. Right-click on the dial-up Cherwell icon (or whatever you called it), and choose "connect". Now you have to change the user name and password. Use the ones you chose in 5 above. So the username will be cherwell.freeserve.co.uk
8. You are now all signed up and ready to go! Double-click on Cherwell, and it should connect you via Freeserve. You can now surf the internet, and all you'll pay is your local phone call.
9. From now on, you can dial up via Freeserve by double-clicking on the Cherwell icon. Your web space is accessed at http://www.cherwell.freeserve.co.uk and you can ftp to it by ftp- connecting to uploads.webspace.freeserve.net using the username cherwell.freeserve.co.uk and your password.
Your smtp server is smtp.freeserve.net and your pop server is pop.freeserve.net, and the login name is cherwell.freeserve.co.uk, and the password is the one you chose. The nntp server is nntp.freeserve.net The main Freeserve page is at http://www.freeserve.net/
10. Read the install.ins file. It contains most of the information I give above, and has your password in plain text. The rest of the information here, came from the CD they distribute in a file d:\win95\en\demobin\signup.isp and the yellow folder that the CD comes in.