When my former ISP vanished overnight I spent some time researching. There are three ISP's that handle dial-up in the area. Two require a credit card from their users. One of those has a rep of very bad service, the other is slower than what I ended up with, which I pay quarterly, in advance.

I do not and will not have a Credit Card, had them, and almost went broke keeping up with the irrational service charges, overpriced user fees, not to mention the predatory interest rates.

I've grown increasingly aggravated with the telecoms for ignoring a fair sized segment of the population that isn't 'convenient' to service. (AKA, make as much off the suckers as possible without running afoul of regulators or legal issues.)

And, charging far to much for the few sevices they do offer to those outside of a Metro area.

The merger of ATT & SW Bell made me grit my teeth, I've dealt with ATT before, it wasn't a pleasant experience. I was not surprised to discover they've not changed much in the years since.

Ok, now I'm pissed and feeling a Mumble coming on.