Welcome to ISP Tips

Usenet

Usenet news is a lot like e-mail but messages are public, not private, and many people can participate in the same conversation. There is a lot of information available exclusively via Usenet. While most ISPs offer Usenet access, some (especially free ISPs) do not. When comparing ISPs do not forget to check whether or not they provide Usenet capabilities. Usenet archives can be searched via Google Groups.

Calling All Devices

Today, any broadband device with access to Internet can be used as a telephone with the right hardware and software. Using a technology called VoIP, or Voice over IP, companies like Vonage, located at www.vonage.com have developed software to call anywhere in the world for a fraction of the price to call using a traditional phone. One product that they offer, SoftPhone, is an add on service to Vonage's call plans. SoftPhone enables you to use your computer as a phone with its own phone number. VoIP is an emerging technology; however, keep in mind that it is not as reliable as the phone today. But a VoIP technologies develop, competition between companies offering it and traditional phone companies will heat up.

Comparing ISPs

If you're in the market for the services of a national ISP, you've got many to choose from. They all offer different ISP services, sport different ISP technologies, have different records regarding both ISP security and ISP reliability, and of course charge different amounts of money. Sites like the ISP Buying Guide can help with these comparisons. You find an ISP directory with feature list comparisons, cost comparisons, and more. You will also be able to drill down and do some comparisons based upon state, so you can even see some of the local ISPs alongside the national ISPs.

X-Face

X-Faces were devised to make both e-mail and Usenet news a little more human-friendly. They are ISP-neutral and will work with any ISP provider that provides an e-mail and/or a Usenet ISP service. They do require a savvy e-mail / Usenet application to create and display them properly, though. When an e-mail message or Usenet news item has an X-face attached, it will be displayed as a small monochromatic image (usually somewhere in the header) by applications that support them when viewing the owning message or item. Sometimes they feature miniature portraits of the author, but more often they're used just to give a little insight into the author's personality.

Using S/MIME

S/MIME is used to securely encrypt e-mail messages. Many e-mail applications have support for it built-in. To enable it, one must obtain a security certificate (they're available for free). S/MIME is not really an ISP safety service per se; for it to work both the sender and receiver must have both S/MIME capabilities in their e-mail software and valid certificates. It can hide the e-mail message from everyone except the sender and receiver (including the ISP provider). While it cannot guarantee 100% full privacy and ISP safety (nothing does) it does come about as close as anything can.

Family ISPs

Several ISP providers offer adult website-free access to the Internet, one form of online ISP parental controls. One such ISP is Christian Net located at http://www.christian-net.com/. Their Family Internet Plans include budget access, premium service, business service, and low-cost add on service that will filter content from your existing ISP.

iCalendar

When one wants to make calendar events readily available through a Web site, one can use the new ISP technology known as iCalendar. This provides a standard way of syndicating individual events and whole calendars. Usually people do not edit iCalendar information directly; it's more common for an ISP provider to include iCalendar support as part of an ISP Web hosting package. Usually it will require some sort of Content Management System (CMS) built on top of dynamic Web hosting in order to work. With such a system in place, uploaded events are automatically displayed on the Web and made available via syndication for people to download to handheld computers and PDAs.

Traffic Jams

Don't get in a jam by signing up for an ISP service without knowing how much bandwidth or Web traffic you're allowed each month. If you build a Web site that attract a lot of visitors, your provider may charge you additional money for the traffic. If you download a lot of files, you may be hit with additional charges. Ask your provider to explain how they measure traffic if you're unsure and how it may affect your ISP pricing.

MUDs, MOOs, MUSHes, etc.

MUD stands for Multi-User Dimension, MOO stands for Multi-user Dimension Object-oriented, and MUSH stands for Multi-User Shell. They (and other less common variations besides) all mean basically the same thing. It's an ISP service that's a little like a chat room, but in addition to the other people present also provides an environment and atmosphere. This key difference tends to make it into a vibrant ISP online community. People usually connect to MUDs via either SSH or Telnet.

Introductions and Definition

ISP reliability is perhaps the single most important factor in choosing an ISP. If your ISP provider costs you little or no money but isn't dependable when you try to get online, is it worth it? Let's face it: you get what you pay for. Often, discount ISPs or free ISPs have several connectivity problems because of high user-to-modem ratios, indirect high-speed connections to the Internet's backbone, saturated network capacity, and few access numbers. Before you decide to go with an ISP, check out the company with the Better Business Bureau's reliability report: http://search.bbb.org/search.html.

Finding Local ISPs

Let's say you're in the typical scenario of having moved to a new place and are now looking for an ISP. Let's further say that you've had bad experiences with national ISPs and are looking for a local one. This can be a little tricky as doing a Web search for keywords like "ISP" or "Internet Service Provider" will pull up all sorts of irrelevant sites and a handful of national ISPs, but probably nothing useful. There are three things that can help: the first is to include your state or province name along with your other search terms, something like "Massachusetts ISP" for example. The second is to utilize something like DMOZ that includes listings by region. The third is to find the local Web site for your new town and the local Web site for the closest large city and see what ISP lists they have; they quite possibly keep an ISP directory, and maybe even have some customer feedback.

Local IP Addresses

When setting up a home network, it is important to use local IP addresses for individual. IP addresses are an ISP technology used (along with ISP routers) to direct network traffic, and they are always of the form xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx where 'x' can range from 0-9. Legal local IP addresses include the ranges 010.xxx.xxx.xxx, 172.016.xxx.xxx, and 192.168.xxx.xxx. Using other addresses can lead to complications later. Note that connecting a device with a local IP address directly to the Internet is even worse. It's important to have a router separate the Internet from devices with local IP addresses.

ISP Search Facilities

Some ISP Web hosting companies provide a special type of ISP search service that enables your Web site to be searched. If you configure your Web site appropriately, visitors will be able to search it for particular words or phrases. While this is not too useful for the typical home site, it's a huge advantage for large business sites. Businesses looking for Web hosting providers should always check in advance whether or not the provider has some sort of searching ISP technology. Most ISPs with dynamic Web hosting capabilities will have searching technology; most ISPs with only static Web hosting capabilities will not.