I am really angry

[samwichse]

Since I got back to school from summer break, AOL Instant messanger has been operating so slowly for me that it was useless as a for any type of conversation (delays greater than 1:00 usually).

I tried using IRC instead, to get away from a (I thought then) buggy service. But every IRC channel I tried was just as slow. Pinging repeatedly yieled average times of about 45 seconds (but it varied wildly). The record was 3 mins, 22 seconds.

Everyone on campus was having this problem. Well, I just talked to the "high and mighty" computing center people and they said they had set all text chat to what is apparently less than idle priority when it comes to bandwidth. They said they had blocked it and music sharing (like kazaa and DC) together.

Now, is it just me or is this extremely stupid? The music sharing I can see, it takes up masses of bandwidth and isn't legal in most cases anyway. But text chat!?! I mean, it takes up practically nothing (my 28.8 modem at home is instantaneous, even when I'm trying to load webpages, which takes something like 2 minutes). And tons of people here use it to leave messages with each other and keep in touch with their friends from other schools (without having to pay gobs of money in phone bills).

For the first time ever, I think it is my duty to spread the word that something is actually not AOL's fault. About everyone's room I've been in had something (MSN Messanger, AIM, mIRC, Yahoo Messanger) like this in use.

In economics, there is a concept called "opportunity costs." The opportunity costs of these programs is very small for the benifits they supply.

How would one go about measuring the bandwidth used in idle of one of these programs (just maintaining the connection) and at chat? And could these numbers be multiplied to get a pretty reliable indication of their use, or is there a confounding factor?

Oh yeah, the computing lady made the mistake of saying that internet service and email (POP3) get the highest priority. Now how could one fool the router/firewall/whatever?

Sam

P.S. I am particularly angry because this is the only way my best friend and I have to keep in touch.

[jkrohn]

Hmmm, have you tried AIM express?

Not sure about what ports it uses, but I doubt that they are filtering 80 for "text packets"

Jkrohn

[Redwolf]

Talk to their superiors (the dean for one). Get a petition going here. Maybe even march agianst themin a non-violent protest (hey, you'll get CNN coverage ).

[samwichse]

Note, I just also tried ICQ, and no dice.

I'm downloading the Linux Java VM now so I can try AIM express.

[NeoStarO1]

I would agree with RedWolf here, get a petition going and better yet, and I know this will sound weird to you, but has an extremely valid point. If you have a deaf community at the college. Round up all the deaf people because they HIGHLY depend on these little free programs to communicate with family and friends and have them march to the dean of students or president or the head IT adminstrator and create an uproar. The deaf would be able to better asserts their need for complete communicating access and everyone else can also benifit because of reduce cost of phone bills by using instant messenging.

Most colleges don't have a tty pay phone advailable for deaf persons.

So round up all your friends and all deaf persons on campus and get a non-violent protest going.

[samwichse]

AIM express must connect the same was as the regular version does.

And unfortunately, I don't know of a single deaf person at this school (it's very small, 1300 students). And not very accessible either. It's small enough that if someone is in a wheelchair, they just move the class to the ground floor.

EDIT: I've already talked to some secretary to the dean of students (the whole place is run by secretaries).

I also talked to the RCCs (the paid student computer techs), and they're pissed, because they thought it was all just acting weird too.

Student assembly is next.

Sam

[NeoStarO1]

samwichse, sounds like you and other students are taking good steps to see if this situation can be remedied. You can also argue the point that college tution and living expenses are high enough as it is witout the added burden of long distance calls to family and friends adn that for wise budget and financial management its only wise to cut expenses whereever possible. the phone bill being a great place to cut expenses with the use of online instant messenging. I think if its presented right that they will see the logicalness of this.

They can still access instant messenging rights and still ban music file sharing without any problems.

keep us posted in how this goes.

[UUoodseifer]

Use trillian man, it rocks.......

Trillian

[Redwolf]

That's not going to help him. Although it does rock

[samwichse]

Trust me, it's not just the AIM client.

I'm curious how they can filter all in one fell swoop like that. Surely AIM, ICQ, IRC, and MSN Messanger can't work that similarly???