[Richard King]

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/020524/242019_1.html

 

[Adam Richey]

Apparently Starband isn't pleased that Dish is just dropping them like a bad habit.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Ok when do we start taking bets on when Starband goes offline?

Starband was a good idea but not good enough.

Scott

 

[Richard King]

when do we start taking bets on when Starband goes offline?

I can remeber a few years back when someone made a total fool of himself by posting daily messages on the Echostar newsgroups with a Tick tick tick message implying a countdown to Echostar's demise. It hasn't happened yet though. I must admit though that I am worried about Starband's ability to continue without the cash infusion that Dish provided. After installing a Direcview system (the install interrupted by the fire mentioned in Potpourri) I must say that I am not impressed. Why would they require a land line to download the software and satellite coordinates? How dumb. ... Posted using Starband.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

There are a lot of internal problems at Starband that most folks are not seeing, because I work in the business I know many of the things going on that many people dont.

There have been many starband customers (and dealers) who have lost their service over the past few weeks, calls to support just start pointing fingers, its not a good thing for a business to run the way it is.

 

[Richard King]

Being a dealer, I haven't seen any disconnections (without request), but I have seen the passing the buck on service problems. The biggest problem here is that DSL is making serious installation progress and Starband churn is horrendous. Over 50% of the customers that I have installed have cancelled and switched because of DSL becoming available. It should be interesting to see if any of this is discussed in next week's dealer chat.

 

[Richard King]

Another link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1495-2002May23.html

It looks worse than I thought.

 

[jrjcd]

it's one thing to fail in business because you didn't count the cost or your expected customer base didn't materialize-it's a whole 'nother kettle of fish when one of your "partners" vindictively deep sixes you...and you think heaven will appear on earth when the merger goes thru and charlie holds all the aces...

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Just got this in my email, its a letter that was sent to Starband dealers.

StarBand has filed a lawsuit against EchoStar Communications to transition back our customer base and secure money rightfully owed to us.

As you may know, EchoStar has been collecting customer fees on behalf of StarBand. However, EchoStar has failed to pay millions of dollars owed to us resulting from this agreement. After exhausting all other means, StarBand came to the conclusion that legal recourse was the only option to secure our customer base and future revenue stream. It was a last resort for us to resolve these issues. We always prefer to settle business matters in a business environment, not in a courtroom.

Click Here to see the press release we issued today announcing our lawsuit against EchoStar.

Let me assure you:

The StarBand network is up and running.

Today's action was taken to protect our company and your decision to sell StarBand high-speed Internet service.

Customers are receiving StarBand-quality service and support.

We are doing everything we can to maintain the StarBand-quality service and support you deserve and expect from us.

The StarBand Dealer Direct Commission program remains in place.

We have StarBand Residential and Small Office product available and we're continuing to take your orders.

Thank you for your continued commitment to the Dealer Direct program.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to call 703.287.3007 or e-mail us at: [email protected].

We are here to support you.
Zur Feldman
StarBand Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

 

[Kevin]

Since neither cable modems or DSL are available in my area, I was looking into getting Starband for a while. After seeing the steep prices, I decided to just wait until high speed cable or DSL becomes available here. With prices like that, I don't think Starband ever stood a chance against the growing availability of cable modems and DSL throughout the states.

 

[lee635]

I had the direc pc dial return when I lived in an area with no cable modems or dsl and it was farily decent. Late at night here on the west coast the download speeds were breathtaking, actually faster than my current dsl. However, it was quite pookey in the early evenings and you noticed the latency while surfing webpages. Still kicked the pants off the old dial up modem connection.

The price isn't too steep either at about $40 a month with the dial up access included, if memory serves. And you can buy a complete setup on e-bay in the one hundred dollar range. So it's more affordable than the full fledged 2 way systems.

 

[MarkA]

I think this is good, Echostar needs to be shown they aren't the centre of the universe

 

[Marcus S]

The biggest problem with Starband was all the IP ports they blocked. Then digital cable came down the road and offered higher upload speeds at half the price of Starband. Even Charlie admited that they lost money per sub.

 

[scooper]

Even Charlie said that if you had terrertrial broadband options available, take them instead. The ground based (both DSL and Cable Modem) are both cheaper and faster in terms of latency, and it sounds like they have less restrictions for use at home as well.