I was in the middle of a complicated order online for my business the middle of last year when suddenly my connection to the site I was on went dark. Turns out that a truck had turned to sharp and pulled 1800 feet of pole mounted fiber with it before stopping. Needless to say they weren't going to fix that real quick.

Before I knew what was going on I began to make a serious of ping tests to see how limited my new network was. I could reach several sites that I know exist on the NOANET network whom my ISP gets their connections from, but not any further. Luckily I could still reach my office over the VPN as the ISP that I use there also uses NOANET.

What really surprised me that day was how many were affected by this fiber string 6 miles away from my home. 911 phone systems at centers across the sound along the I5 corridor  had gone quiet. And three states worth of customers of my large cable ISP were without...

But also surprising was the fact that the VOIP phones at the office which I could reach were still live. If they had any down time at all I never saw it... Remoting into the desktop at my station there I was able to reach the rest of the world.  Very weird, I remember thinking... They must have a redundant route...  I later found out they did. By some quick changes to my firewall I was routing over the VPN and through my office gateway to and out to the internet. It was slow, but I got the order finished on time to get it shipped that day.

Another half hour of the outage I could of had email coming in also. But the fiber had been restrung before I got that far and I wasn't to worried.

What I later learned is that my office ISP, a small local hole in the wall establishment had not only an OC3 into NOANET's fiber (Actually NOANET manages PUD fiber in the state) but that they had redundant routes into the Qwest network. And while this event overloaded that redundant line, they still had connectivity to the rest of the world when my large multistate cable ISP fell down. To their credit the cable company sent fiber techs and bucket trucks to assist in the rebuild of that line... and they made sure that fact was mailed to all their commercial customers via a postcard about the event... But have we become that complacent? To run mission critical connections over single vulnerable routes?  Then when they fail, we pat ourselves on the back for being Johnny on the spot?  Its really the 911 services that went down that I worry about more than anything.

When I was growing up my parents had bought me a subscription to "Elementary Electronics" magazine. Even at 10 years old I had a pretty good understanding of electricity and how the power got from the electric meter of the house to the tv in the living room...   So needless to say I looked through the magazine from cover to cover the moment it arrived...

My favorite issue, and the only one I remember to this day, showed a modern kitchen of the time (1978) with a woman with dark blonde hair in a bun, dressed in a button up shirt, apron, skirt to her knee's, nylons and heels with a broom in one hand and looking at a computer screen and her other hand on the keyboard. The scene included a large dot matrix printer on a shelf next to the table and the computer next to that. Id hope my wife would look like that from day to day.  She doesn't and I totally understand why now...  And probably because I dont look like Fabio as I get home also... 

I can't imagine the authors or the readers of those articles though ever understanding what the future would become as they pondered woman storing their recipes, or the men of the households keeping track of vehicle maintenance, or banking records...  or visa versa.

But the prediction... Yes that prediction that many households by the next couple of decades, would own their own computer could not have been any better spot on...  I can't even tell you how many computers and related devices I have in the same room with me here without first counting them out. Then still I bet Id miss one or two. But I will tell you that my 16 port switch is filled. And I have a wireless access point that handles a few wireless devices in the house.

The point?  As we depend more and more on these devices in our day to day lives, and we remove ourselves further from the days of paper and relying on our outdoor skills, keeping track of our expenses and the little phone book next to the phone that would actually work during a power outage...  Would we be able to go back in a instant...  Could we still provide for our households and employee's if we lost the all important technology we have become so dependent on?

Keep this in mind. Things we buy have always gone up in price. Thats what inflation gets us. But the amount of things we buy and pay for are also increasing. 20 years ago, how many of us had cell bills and internet connection bills? Or "as seen on tv" items that we could call up and buy?   Don't know about you but my income isn't growing as fast as technology is.

I know one thing...   Id sure like to get a reprint copy of that magazine...

Need I say more

For the longest time AT&T has allowed email to go out for 3rd party and business on SMTP outgoing port 587 to reduce some of the abuse on there system..   About DEC. 28th they decided to block 587 and open port 25. That's great in some respects if you don't have over 200 computers using port 587. This was done to all customers from U-verse to DSL and it was fun getting calls from all over during the holiday season.
Altho for U-Verse customers your forced to call in and tell them that your not able to use Port 587 that you've been using based on there rules and ask for port 25 to be opened.. What they don't tell you is that they will hit you with a $29 fee to this.
NOW.... If your a AT&T Business customer with U-Verse and business Telco in more them one location or even at the same location. They decided to move the U-verse end to the business area finally.. But again this had to be done during the holidays.. That can make for some confusion for users.. So if you goto login to your account now.. Go to the business login and use the drop down menu to get to your "Business U-Verse..

I do Want to Thank AT&T for making New Years Day into a wonderful Day...
I'm sure this wont be the worst of it, as Congress revs up to mess up the web with a rule that won't work when they need to look at that set of rules closer.. and maybe concentrate on the economic garbage we're all in.
Updated see post.
HAPPY NEW YEAR     

Such as AT&T Comcast and Megapath. As of late AT&T has what seems to have a shortage on U-verse parts, components and refues to upgrade you to U-verse if you have a preexisting DSL from another provider even if you request a Dry line.. But most of all there short on people to sell and install the equipment. So if you want U-verse you get blackmailed into getting rid of your other provider that's on your shared line

Comcast or as I like to call them Con-cast, has had its short comings. Price is a Big factor and they seem to not keep agreements with there customers. They also seem to have more outages and never have to follow FCC rules when it comes to keeping there phone service running.. Example: The Snow storm that hit Chicago this year. Put the phone service off line for several days. Where DSL and phones from the Telco worked fine. Even Satellite worked threw the storm.

Since Megapath started working a bunch of providers and doing the billing for them such as covad and speedstream complaints are all over the web about the currant management. They seem to be short handed and not putting out outage reports properly...

Personally I feel bad for all the people that have to do phone support because they have there hands tied with the rules these companies setup So I never YELL or SCREAM when trying to help my predicament. I try to keep it as much fun as possible after all its not brain surgery.
I do blame the companies for not being better prepared to handle what they sell and the companies that supply the equipment.. They should do a better job and stop running there businesses like congress.

Times are tight with money for all of us including a lot of businesses...
I'd like to hear from you on what problems your having with the providers Cause it seems like it might get worse. I decided I won't be making to many changes till after March 2012..
After that I might take my $300 a month communications bill to Magic Jack

Here's to a Great New Year