See an unfamiliar term? Check the newsletter glossary.
newsletter://mv.com
May 2000
New DSL agreements
We are pleased to finally be able to tell you what we are doing to
provide DSL access. We have two announcements: our provision of residen-
tial DSL over existing voice lines via Bell Atlantic Infospeed Service, and
our provision of DSL service via separately installed data lines using
Choice One fabric.
We're still working on nailing down the details on these services, so
please watch the product offerings on our web page for continuing informa-
tion. Go to www.mv.com, and click on the link for our rates and services.
Infospeed DSL
Infospeed DSL: we have entered into an agreement with Bell Atlantic to
offer DSL service to Bell Atlantic residential telephone customers. This
service will be available to residents in a number of New Hampshire commun-
ities who live close enough to the CO (the Central Office) to be eligible
for the service. (Please refer to our web page for a discussion of the the
service and parameters for eligibility.) The DSL feature is added to an
existing phone line, allowing you to use the same line for your normal calls
and for your high-speed data connection to the Internet - simultaneously.
Choice One DSL
We are pleased to announce that we have entered into a DSL partnership
agreement with Choice One Communications, a competitive local exchange car-
rier based in New York. With this agreement, MV will be able to provide
high-speed DSL service to customers in a growing number of areas in New
Hampshire.
This DSL service will, initially, be provided over a phone line that's
reserved for this service, and is ideal for business and SOHO use, with
residential rates also available. We also expect to use it to provide IDSL
connections for those who may be distant from the CO or who may be served
by SLC cabinets and thus are not eligible for other forms of DSL. This
will complement our Infospeed DSL offering which is targeted for residen-
tial use over an existing voice line.
Usage Policies
We'd like to remind you that we have a usage policy statement (often
referred to as an AUP, or Acceptable Usage Policy) online on our web
server. This online AUP is the reference policy document for terms of
acceptable and unacceptable use at MV, and is subject to change periodi-
cally in the future. We ask that you read it now, and make a habit of
referring to it from time to time in the future.
You can get to this policies page by going to our home page
(www.mv.com) and finding its link (currently, you can find it by going to
the MV Information pull-down, selecting the Usage Policies item, and click-
ing the corresponding Go button).
Cidera Dish for Usenet News
MV Communications continues to operate a local server for Usenet News,
a service that has progressed from the Usenet news servers operated by
Software Innovations, Zinn Computer, and MV Communications from 1981
through today. (Usenet news is, grossly speaking, a globally distributed
bulletin board system, with conversations occurring in tens of thousands of
newsgroups categorized by subject.) The traffic contained in these news-
groups uses up a great deal of Internet bandwidth, which is why we have now
contracted with Cidera to receive a Usenet news feed transmitted via satel-
lite. We expect this feed to remove a substantial amount of traffic from
our Internet backbone connections, thereby improving service to you. We
will also have the option of using this service for delivery of web data to
our local web cache.
Collocation facility
We are in the process of building a collocation facility as part of
our offices in Manchester. This will allow us to officially provide a ser-
vice whereby you can place a server at our location to take advantage of
the high bandwidth available here (in other words, to co-locate a computer
at our facility (yes, the dictionary spells it "collocation" even though
"colocation" seems to make more sense)).
Typically a computer that provides Internet services likes to be able
to make use of high bandwidth for its transactions, even if on the average
the bandwidth usage is low. Collocation provides the best of these things:
your server gets to use bursts of high bandwidth as needed, but you only
pay for the average bandwidth that you use over time - and in fact the
basic collocation price includes sufficient bandwidth for most small busi-
ness needs. In addition, you get to operate the software that you need on
your own computer system.
Please watch our rates and services page for developing information.
NHISPA News
In the past we've mentioned our membership in and participation in the
NH ISP Association (the NHISPA). The NHISPA is a non-profit organization
formed to foster cooperation amongst New Hampshire ISPs and to present a
unified front for common issues. MV is a founding member of the NHISPA,
and MV's President (Mark Mallett) is the current NHISPA President.
In April, representatives of the NHISPA met with Congressman Bass to
discuss his selection to a "Cyber-Security Team" and make him aware of some
of the issues we believe are important to the Internet in New Hampshire.
Also in April, the NHISPA continued to participate in the Public Util-
ities Commission docket 99-020 investigating congestion on the public
switched telephone system. We also registered as an "intervenor" in docket
00-054 which addresses the disparity in the situation where a customer of
an independent telephone company can call a Bell Atlantic number as a local
call, but can not call a non- Bell Atlantic number service the same area
without incurring toll charges. The results of the initial session of this
docket look promising for relief of this issue.
Peering
One of the efforts of the NHISPA is to encourage peering between
member ISPs. "Peering" provides for interconnection between ISPs or other
entities, allowing the participants to exchange data directly without going
through what might be an otherwise long path through the Internet backbone.
Over the last few months this peering community has grown to include more
than a half dozen ISPs, including MV, FCGNetworks, jlc.net, Destek,
Metro2000, and even a couple of non-member organizations. The communica-
tions between all of these peers has improved as a result.
Keep us up-to-date!
Just a quick reminder: if there's a change to your address, phone
numbers, or any contact info we have for you, please let us know. Of
course, we need up-to-date billing addresses, but we also like to keep note
of other ways to reach you if we need to contact you quickly. And if
you've set up email billing with us and you change the email address for
that, let us know, too. Thanks!
MV Communications PO Box 4963, Manchester, NH 03108 (603) 629-0000