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Xtra Limited (trading as Xtra), a subdivision of Telecom New Zealand, is New Zealand's largest Internet service provider. Xtra, also known as Yahoo!Xtra offers various internet services including ADSL and dial-up connections within New Zealand and has been doing so since its inception in the mid 1990's. Image File history File links Xtralogo. ...
Telecom New Zealand NZX: TEL ASX: TEL NYSE: NZT is a Wellington-based telephone company run as a publicly-traded private company since 1990. ...
“ISP†redirects here. ...
Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) is a form of DSL, a data communications technology that enables faster data transmission over copper telephone lines than a conventional voiceband modem can provide. ...
Dial-up access is a form of Internet access via telephone line. ...
Background From the time of Xtra's inception, Xtra has been providing dial-up internet throughout New Zealand. In 1999 Telecom created New Zealand's only ADSL service. Telecom later allowed other ISP's to access its ADSL networks (under increasing government and public pressure). Today, it is widely accepted that Telecom has provided and still is providing unfair and monopolistic terms of trade regarding its wholesale ADSL services[1].
Xtra's "Go Large" plan was introduced as New Zealand's first completely unlimited ADSL service in 2006, however there has been much public criticism and disappointment at the appalling instability and general slowness of the newly introduced plan.[2] The Go Large Plan was advertised with unlimited data usage and maximum speed. What was not clearly stated on advertisements, however, was that there was a fair use policy and traffic management that restricted users to a download limit between 4pm and 12am. If one were to continually exceed this limit, they would be placed in a "download pool", or contacted with offers to switch to another plan [3][4].
The largest ISP As a subdivision of Telecom New Zealand, Xtra has retained some monopoly of its parent company. To many people, this monopoly is widely regarded as an unfair advantage over other ISPs. Many lobbyists, including Slingshot's CEO Annette Presley have persuaded New Zealand's Communications Ministry to force the unbundling of Telecom's local loop, so as to fairer trading terms and lessen Xtra's ISP monopoly. The LLU (Local loop unbundling) has not yet been completed, however some initial tests have been completed. Unbundled access is expected to arrive about mid 2008. This article is about the economic term. ...
Slingshot is a New Zealand owned telecommunications company. ...
Local loop unbundling (LLU) is the regulatory process of allowing multiple telecommunications operators use of connections from the telephone exchanges central office to the customers premises. ...
ORBS During 2001 Xtra and Actrix (New Zealand Internet Service Providers) won a High Court injunction to get themselves off the Open Relay Behavior-modification System (ORBS) anti-spam blacklist operated by Alan Brown. ORBS had been a blacklist of IP addresses relating to open mail relays, which can be abused by spammers to send unsolicited bulk e-mail. Hundreds of organisations subscribed to the list, including Bigfoot.com and at least one other large free mail provider. They rejected e-mail from any IP address listed in ORBS. In July 2001, New Zealander Alan Brown closed down his Open Relay Behavior-Modification System (ORBS) after two local companies won legal injunctions against him for listing them. ...
An open mail relay is an SMTP (email) server configured in such a way that it allows anyone on the Internet to relay (i. ...
The court action led (indirectly) to the end of one of the oldest DNSBL services[1][2]. A DNS Blacklist, or DNSBL (definition below), is a means by which an Internet site may publish a list of IP addresses that some people may want to avoid and in a format which can be easily queried by computer programs on the Internet. ...
Xtra Broadband Refund As of 22 February 2007, Telecom has decided to refund all of it's Go Large customers (approximately 60,000) starting from $130 per customer. This has been caused by the overwhelming complaints and criticisms Telecom Xtra has received due to their lack of action, over hyped promises and under-delivering of the Go Large plan. Customers who have been on the Go Large plan since 8 December 2006 until present, are entitled to $130-$160 credit refund. The refund may cost Telecom Xtra up to 7.5 - 8.5 million NZ dollars.
The credit refund is to be processed in customers' bills in March and April.
Some have speculated Xtra refunds their customers using bill credit rather than cash as a measure to prevent customers from switching to other ISPs, if the customers intended to use the money for that purpose.
Also, in addition to refunding customers, Telecom Xtra may also have to refund other smaller NZ ISPs as a result of manipulation and overpricing of wholesale prices set by Telecom for other ISPs to purchase. This refund may set Telecom Xtra back by a further 800,000 NZ dollars. This proposal is being considered by the Commerce Commission of New Zealand.
XtraMSN/Yahoo! Xtra XtraMSN was one of the trading names of Telecom New Zealand's ISP Xtra, and was used as the branding for its default home page for customers. The present name came from a deal between Xtra and MSN, a merger of Xtra's homepage xtra.co.nz with Microsoft New Zealand's msn.co.nz. XtraMSN is one of the trading names of Telecom New Zealands ISP Xtra, used as the branding for its default home page for customers. ...
For other uses, see MSN (disambiguation). ...
Several other MSN services besides the portal were cobranded with Xtra in the XtraMSN brand (e.g. Hotmail). Several versions of capitalising XtraMSN have been used by Telecom and Microsoft New Zealand in their promotional literature. Hotmail is a free webmail e-mail service, which is accessible via a web browser. ...
Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ...
In 2007 Xtra changed to Yahoo in Microsoft's place[5]. Their main portal is now yahooxtra.co.nz. During the change over Telecom experienced much backlash over a change in email set up. Part of the agreement between Yahoo and Xtra provided that Xtras email addresses be moved over to Yahoo servers in Australia. This required settings changes in order for customers to access their YahooXtra "Bubble" email accounts. This required uses to change basic settings such as mail server, but also more advanced settings such as port numbers and authentication. Yahoo redirects here. ...
Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ...
External links
References - ^ ORBS' death: Alan Brown replies
- ^ Court forces ORBS to remove Xtra e-mail from blacklist
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