Dialing into the Internet while on the road - ISPs share points of presence, or local phone numbers, in peering arrangement that eases Internet access for travelers - Internet/Web/Online Service Information - Column

Communications News, Sept, 1997 by Daniel Dern

If Internet access -- checking and sending e-mail, using the Web -- is essential to your job, and you need to access your account and the `Net when you're not at your office, you know how difficult and expensive it can be.

This is especially true if you're in a country other than the one in which your ISP or your company is located. International phone calls can be expensive -- easily $100/hour or more -- and your connection may be slow, noisy, or prone to disconnection.

Adapters and conversion equipment are available from firms like TeleAdapt (www.teleadapt.com) and Road Warrior (www.warrior.com) to go between most countries' standards, and to deal with hotel phones, digital PBXs, payphones, etc.

Many leading ISPs have Pops (points of presence, or local phone numbers) for use by dial-up customers across a multi-state region, or scattered across most of the country. AOL, AT&T WorldNet, Mindspring, and NetCom come to mind. Most ISPs (including most local connections) also have 800 numbers for remote access -- in general the charge runs about $4/hour to use these.

Some, like CompuServe, have a fair number of POPs around the world. And some ISPs have worked out arrangements so their customers can use access networks that belong to another ISP.

For example, my primary ISP (Software Tool & Die's The World) can be accessed through any MSN (Microsoft Network, run by UUNet) POP for a quite-reasonable additional $2/hour charge. That's far less than long-distance costs, especially from a hotel room.

Similarly, many people who travel internationally keep their CompuServe accounts just for use of the international POPs. But not all ISPs offer POPs in the right places. And many ISPs don't offer dial-in. That's fine for people on the company network, but problematic for people on. the road, or working from home.

What makes the most sense, from the customer point of view, is for ISPs to establish "peering" relationships for POP-sharing with as many fellow ISPs as possible, similar to the way banks have established ATM (automatic teller machine) sharing consortia like CIRRUS.

With peering, companies don't have to figure out who to work with or how to do it, and billing goes through the same ISP or at most one additional party. Individual users don't waste time and money organizing their own solutions, and everyone gets access to a wider geographical range of POPs.

The market now has access services for "roaming" Internet users. EUnet was one of the first, with its EUnet Traveller service (http://traveller.eu.net) currently offering more than 400 dial-up and ISDN POPs in Europe and North America.

Two more global major access-sharing consolidators are the I-pass Alliance (http://www.ipass.com) and the Global Reach Internet Connection (GRIC, http://www.gric.com or http://www. aimquest.com). They provide the organizational structure to let you access POPs from other ISPs that are closer and presumably less costly to call.

I-Pass offers access to more than 1,000 POPs from participating ISPs in 160 countries. Your ISP decides whether or not to pass along any additional cost to users. (Some do, some don't.)

What if your ISP, your company, or your company's ISP doesn't want to make an arrangement with I-pass, GRIC, or others (or hasn't done it yet)? If you're traveling primarily in North America and Europe, there's EUnet Traveller or an account with an ISP like CompuServe.

One answer is Homegate Corp. (http:// www.homegate.net), which works with ISPs and (with I-pass) resells POP access directly to individuals. The end user is the customer -- your ISP or company doesn't need to belong to Homegate or any roaming alliance.

HomeGate has two pricing plans: North America, and Global. The first costs $5 a month plus 10 cents a minute for connect time within the U.S. and Canada, and 50 cents a minute elsewhere.

The Global plan is $15 a month, and cuts the non-North-America costs to 20 cents a minute. This plan makes sense if you plan to spend more than half a hour a month dialing in from outside North America.

Another organization offering some form of Internet traveler access is NetUnion (www.netunion.com). If your primary concern is getting e-mail, check out one of the wireless e-mail services like RadioMail.

Depending on where you go and how time-critical net access is, you may want to look into the wireless Internet services.

Some of the roaming services have their own software for dialing, login, and authentication. You still use your normal applications like Netscape, Eudora, etc. Be sure that the service supports your notebook OS!

Even with less-expensive remote access, you'll still want to keep your online time brief and efficient, so make sure you have a fast modem (and a spare!).

Daniel Dern (ddern@world.std.com, http://www.dern.com) is a writer, speaker, and analyst covering the Internet.