Blah Blah Flowers

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to prevent Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from filtering content for UK users.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to commission a momument to Oliver Postgate, Peter Firmin and the children's TV characters they created.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to acknowledge that a large proportion of the workforce in this country is single, and that reference should be made to 'the hard-working population' of this country rather than the constant references to 'hard-working families'.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to scrap ID cards. (again!)

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to cancel the 2012 Olympics in the face of the current recession and the country's existing debt burden.

Labels: censorship, children, Government, ID cards, internet, Internet Service Providers, Olympics, petitions, Television

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to give the disabled the same benefits as the pensioners get each year especially the fuel allowance.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Uphold the principle of 'Net Neutrality'.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to force isp's to abandon plans to make content providers pay for elevated speeds on there network.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to support the campaign by Terry Pratchett and the Alzheimer's Research Trust for a drastic increase in public funding for dementia research.

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Revoke the VAT-exempt status of the Church of Scientology Religious Education College Inc.

Labels: Alzheimers, disability, internet, Internet Service Providers, petitions, Scientology, Terry Pratchett

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Stop ISP's from breaching customers privacy via advertising technologies.

More specific information, involving the mysterious Phorm, here.

Labels: Government, Internet Service Providers, petitions, privacy

Well, I've begun the process of dumping my old ISP and going to a new one. Even though I should be able to sign up with my new provider within 10 days and my subscription to my old takes 30 days notice to come into effect I am half-expecting to be stranded without broadband for a short while. I wouldn't be dumping them if their customer service was any good would I?

I signed up with Freeserve for their Broadband service and didn't have any problems. Then after a while they were bought out by Wanadoo. I still didn't have any problems. Then a year or two back they were bought out by Orange. Suddenly my modem wouldn't connect for hour long periods most days (to be fair that has subsided in the last six months), e-mails wouldn't be received from this account until days later in some cases, and e-mail lists that I'd been happily subscribed to for years were suddenly giving me bounce reports. And whenever I phoned Orange technical support I was flat out told that any problems I had were caused by the rest of the Internet, not them.

And when I visited my parents my Dad showed me the latest review of Broadband ISPs where Orange had slipped from a previous position of three quarters of the way down the list to the bottom in terms of quality of service, user satisfaction and quality of support. So that clinched it, Orange are a crap ISP and it's time to jump ship from this barely-floating rubbish heap.

So really I should have done this this time last year, although I was a little preoccupied with other stuff and didn't want the hassle. So I phoned Orange tonight and quit, tomorrow morning I will phone the ISP I have chosen and hopefully sign up with them and all will be well in the eternal land of milk and pixies.

Labels: Internet Service Providers, Orange Broadband