Re: [tlug] Choosing an internet provider

[PF2K-WLKN@example.com (Keith Wilkinson)]

I'm currently working on updating my ISP Japan FAQ, 
and one of the things that is, or is going to be, 
important in these days of insecure WiFi access 
is secure mail access (POP/SMTP over SSL).  It 
seems that Asahi Net, NEC BigLobe and BigLobe 
offer this -- though whether people are aware 
of this and using it may be a different matter. 
But it seems that GOL doesn't offer this (correct 
me if I'm wrong). 

BigLobe offers an extremely good spam killer / 
web mail combo.  You can, for a very small 
monthly fee, even view your spam mailbox 
on the web (to confirm that the automatic 
spam killer hasn't zapped something important). 
You can set certain sender addresses and the 
like to "always deliver" (they won't go thru' 
the spam filter). BigLobe also offers very 
good mailbox allowances.  You will always 
get idiots who email 10MB photos or big videos, 
and with some providers' pathetic "200MB mailbox 
standard," important email is likely to be 
bounced if you are away for a few days. 

The Asahi-net web mail interface -- displaying 
oldest email first -- is truly horrible.  And 
I used to get frequent "web mail unavailable" 
alerts. 

Nifty does not seem to have thrown off its 
original CompuServe/Niftyserve roots. 

I'd better make up a provider comparison table.