Broadband News

A new UK internet access report from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has found that children with access to the internet at home could make the difference between a student achieving a grade A at GCSE and a grade D.

The trend seems to continue into students’ later academic life, after it was found that degree-level educated adults were more likely to have internet access at home than adults without any formal qualifications at all.

82 per cent of pupils with GCSE qualifications graded A to C had the support of the web at home whilst a considerable 74 per cent of those with grades D to G did not have access to either broadband or dial-up.

Becta, the organisation that advises the government on educational IT, has spent six years researching this topic and is under no doubt that there are strong correlations between educational achievement and access to technology – especially broadband, both at home and at school.

Stephen Crowne, chief executive of Becta, said in a statement: “The evidence is clear; when schools use technology effectively, it can have a direct impact on pupil attainment and results.”

Source: Silicon.com

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Residents and businesses based in Welsh village of Penrhyndeudraeth, Gwynedd are expressing their anger at their persistent loss of their broadband service. They are currently experiencing a broadband blackout that has lasted for 10 days.

Locals are calling for their local telephone exchange to be upgraded after experiencing the third large-scale broadband problem this year alone. The issue has been a particular sore point for businesses, particularly as a change in Internet Service Provider hasn’t helped the situation.

One company confirmed that they have to spend hours each day telephoning and faxing clients rather then sending a quick email. Another travel company claimed it had lost around £10,000 on missed internet booking so far.

BT has acknowledged the problem and has said that they are investigating the situation and all customers have been advised to contact their individual service providers for help.

Source: Daily Post

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According to reports on a website called Absolute Gadget, BT is planning to turn the London area of Shoreditch into a free wireless broadband Hotzone by October this year – potentially supplying free broadband to 1,000 residents and businesses who have a Fon based router (a service that allows Internet connected customers to share their broadband access with other residents).

Although further details are a little scarce on the ground a spokeswoman confirmed: “Shoreditchwifi.com is working on the behalf of BT and Fon to give away free wireless routers called La Fonera+, that plug in to your ISP (internet box) at home or at work and are Free for anybody who lives or working in Shoreditch until the product launches UK wide at the end of October.”

Source: ISPreview

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Consumer title Which? has released a ‘Don’t Buy’ and ‘Best Buys’ list in which Orange broadband suffered a serious blow during an important campaign month.

Orange slumped at second to last place of the well-established magazine’s ‘Don’t Buy’ list, drafted up from 18,000 survey results collected in May this year. A spokesman for Which? said: “Orange’s broadband service scores poorly across the board and it received one of the worst overall satisfaction score of all ISPs.’

Orange has received a bad spell of press lately following the rebranding from Wanadoo parent company France Telecom in June 2006, including a negative report on the BBC’s Watchdog program.

Subscription figures for fixed-broadband customers fell 31,000 between January and March causing the company to instigate a new broadband deal set to come into play next month. For this the provider’s 2MB service will be returned as a free offer with Orange’s £35-per-month mobile contracts in Orange retail stores.

Speaking on this year’s business strategy and negative press, an Orange spokesperson said: “We stopped marketing our home broadband service aggressively late last year so we could focus on improving the basics, so it is frustrating to see reports like this come out.”

“Internally, Orange has programmes in place which are tackling the quality of the customer experience now and in the future, and we are already genuinely seeing significant improvements to our home broadband customer experience and the quality of our service.

“So we’re confident we will continue to move the quality of what we offer our customers in the right direction.”

Source: Mobile Today

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A survey conducted by BT and carried out among early adopters of the internet-capable Broadband Anywhere BT ToGo smartphone has found that consumers are relying more and more on broadband-enabled devices to help research bargains when they’re out shopping.

In the last three months it was found that 45 per cent of all high street consumers have browsed for goods or services whilst away from their home computer. One in three checked prices of goods or searched for a review of a product or service using mobile broadband and based their purchasing decision on their online research. BT also found that one in five consumers had made an actual purchase whilst on the move in the past three month.

Speaking on the new findings, BT Futurologist, Ian Neil said: “Broadband on the move is bringing about a change in consumer behaviour. Consumers can now do the things they would normally do at home when they are out and about. The ease with which they can go online to sites like Pricerunner or TripAdvisor to inform their buying decisions puts added pressure on high-street retailers to offer the best prices and the product ranges that people want.”

He added: “Retailers should take advantage of the fact that customers may now have access to the Internet whilst in-store and, for example, use their wifi connections to deliver expert advice via a store intranet channel.”

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