[ale] Better ISP?

[Cornelis van Dijk]

Hello alers,
I recently realized that I am stuck in the Dark Ages with my dial up
at Earthlink. Sometimes it takes five minutes to just get access to my
email, sometimes it does not work at all. Is this a common problem
nowadays? (I was busy for a few years with an autobiography "Panta
Rei", www.virtualbookworm.com;  watch out, this book  slows down your
watch if you get too close to it.)

Apart from upgrading my PC's I would like to get a better, at least
faster connection. Do I need something like DSL? I have no idea what
else is out there.  I pay about $22.- for the dial up (about a year's
worth of royalties!). I have experimented with other ISP's before but
they have a tendency to go broke in a hurry. Is the "speedfactory"
still around? If so, are they any good?  Every now and then AT&T sends
me some salesmen, but when I ask them whether AT&T supports Linux, I
get this stare. (Is it actually necessary for an ISP to support Linux
in order to use them?)  Some pointers will be appreciated.

I apologize to the high flyers and system administrators for my
trivial questions. I also apologize for the sneak commercial above, a
justification being that the book was assembled with Linux and Latex,
another one that I have seen worse OT's before. Cor