As Nemr puts it, the song is a harrowing tale of love, loss, tragedy, and rebirth!
The guitar man is Jay Wud by the way, you can check his Facebook page here, and of course Nemr’s page here.
Tag Archives | internet
Free night traffic decree posted in official gazette
The decree stating that internet night traffic from 12AM to 7AM should be free has be published in the official gazette last Thursday. But it looks like it is currently exclusive to Ogero subscribers only as I’m subscribed to IDM and still get the following message each time I log in to my account:
Note that your telephone line is NOT Unlimited nights enabled since your line did not pass the feasibility test done to support such service enhancement.
We would like to assure you that we intend to offer this service for all our subscribers and will be working on enabling your line with Unlimited night traffic , and whenever such change will take place we will inform you accordingly.
Almost all IDM subscriber in Beirut get double the speed and unlimited traffic at night, while others outside Beirut get the message above. If a subscriber’s phone line cannot handle more than 1mbps, why can’t they just enable the unlimited night traffic alone for them while keeping their speed as it is?!
Anyway, you may click here to read the full text of decree as shared by minister Nicolas Sehnaoui on twitter. I hope it doesn’t take too long until all ISPs abide by it!
Free internet quota at night for everyone?
Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui announced on twitter yesterday that unlimited internet quota from 12AM to 7AM has been approved by the government and will be activated as soon as the decision is published in the official gazette.
Some ISPs already have the unlimited night traffic offered to some of there users depending to which telephone exchange office they’re connected. My parents subscription with IDM in Beirut for example gets double the speed and unlimited traffic at night, while my IDM subscription in Aramoun doesn’t because they claim it didn’t pass some “feasibility test” that was performed.
Anyway, I hope it doesn’t take too much time before we get that feature activated for everyone!
Cedarcom wants to suspend 3G in Lebanon
Do you remember back in March how the guys at Cedarcom pretended to be fighting for a faster internet in Lebanon and gathered more than 40,000 fans around them?
The same guys are now working hard to take us back to state zero by suing the Ministry of Telecommunications for launching 3G! And it might be just a coincidence that the new service can go much faster than their Mobi, which they themselves have admitted it cannot go beyond 1Mbps, at a cheaper price. You can read more about the issue in The Daily Star and Al-Mustaqbal.
Now can someone tell me what were the real goals of their campaign for a faster internet?
Here’s to launching the 3G service in Lebanon!
Last day I got a phone call from a gentleman in MTC Touch telling me that I will be granted the 3G service for a 1 month free trial period, and so right now I’m among the lucky people who got to participate in the pilot testing of this service in Lebanon. An yes I’m so excited about it!!
The service got activated at around 1PM today on my phone and didn’t require any special configuration to run. I randomly started loading websites and found the connection to be pretty fast compared to home ADSL and the crappy GPRS. Below are two tests done using speedtest.net after I shared the connection with my laptop.
As you can see, download is @ 1.7Mbps which is superb compared to the current internet speeds, while upload is varying between 0.11 and 0.22Mbps. Ping is of course higher that it is supposed to be, and I hope it’ll improve soon. Note that I was in Beirut central district at the time of this test, and I guess speed might vary depending on your location.
3G subscriptions will be available for both postpaid and prepaid lines, and data transfer will be limited to 4GB/month. It isn’t clear tough how much will the operators charge for it.
I’ll hopefully be posting more updates on the connection quality and speed throughout this trial period.
Internet prices going down next month
Internet prices are finally going down by the end of next month after the cabinet approved the new price list yesterday!
The good news for consumers: Today a 1 Mbps connection, the second-fastest available, costs 115,000 LL ($76.67) per month. Under the new regime, 1 Mbps will be the slowest connection sold by Ogero, the state-run telecom company, and will cost 24,000 LL ($16) per month. (Both price figures exclude the 10% value added tax.)
Packages will range from 1 Mbps with a 4 GB download and upload cap (it’s not split; you get 4GB for each) to around 8 Mpbs with a 30 GB cap. Imad Tarabay, CEO of the Internet provider Cedarcom, told NOW Lebanon that as soon as the new packages are implemented, customers with packages below 1 Mbps now will automatically receive the lowest-level new package from their providers (assuming Ogero releases bandwidth to the private sector). Customers can then decide if they want to switch packages or not.
We’re still way behind what people get in nearby countries but it’s still a good step forward, I just hope there will be enough capacity to accommodate the demand when everyone is automatically switched to 1Mbps next month, and I wish they would reconsider amending those bandwidth cap because one would consume them so fast with the speeds they’re promising.
Lebanon getting free WiFi in public parks
I know it’s hard to belive, but the news is true! The ministry of telecommunications is teaming up with the Association of Banks and Sodetel to bring free WiFi to 11 public parks in Lebanon (mainly in Beirut) during working hours.
- Herch Beyrouth on a surface of 30.000 m2, knowing that its total area is 330,0000m2
- Sanayeh- René Mouawad (22,000 m2)
- Sioufi (20,000 m2)
- Ramleh Bayda (10,000 m2)
- Manchiyeh- Tripoli (10,000 m2)
- Bourj Abi Haidar (7,000 m2)
- Talet el Khayat – Moufti Hassan Khaled (5,000 m2)
- Abou Chahla (5,000 m2)
- Yassouhiyé (4,400 m2)
- Saint Nicolas (2,200 m2)
- Basta Tahta (2,200 m2)
Sioufi will be the first park to have the free WiFi starting today when ministers Nahas and Sehnaoui launch the service.
It’s a great initiative indeed. But given the current internet speed in Lebanon, I highly doubt the service will be really usable by the people. I mean we’re barely able to make use of the internet at home, let alone a shared public bandwidth!
Looking for a needle in a haystack
A guy who participated in the Lebanese Laïque Pride march for a secular state on March 15 2011 started one of a kind blog calling for help, and it’s nothing related to the cause of the demo he attended, he’s actually searching for a person.
He found himself extremely attracted to one of the girls in that march, and it was his second time to notice her after last year’s march, so he took that as a sign and decided trying to approach her one way or another, and he got really close to his aim until she disappeared!
That’s why he’s now calling for the help of the internet people in Lebanon in an attempt to find her. And in a country where everyone knows everyone, I guess there’s a good probability for that man to find her!
You can read all about his story and the updates he will be posting on his blog Finding Dulcinea, and below is the description of the girl he’s trying to reach:
- She has chestnut color hair, natural color not dyed. (Couleur Châtaigne)
- Blue eyes
- On that day, she was wearing a black tight biking pants and a white jacket. She was carrying on her back a red sports bag, I think it was an Adidas (not sure)
- She had 2 silver rings on her left hand; one of them had a purple stone. (I didn’t notice a wedding band – Geez that would be a bummer if she turns out to be married – but hey let’s keep it positive for now)
- All I know is that she works in the protected area of Solidere where the parliament is. So that area stretches from Costa/Blom bank on the upper level facing the Grand Theatro building all the way down to the area past parliament building/Abed Clock area.
- I am speculating that she must have left her bike in the office that day and was returning to get her bike and leave the sign at her desk.
I can’t but wish him all the luck!
Guess who succeeded to upload a video to YouTube!
It probably took them a LOT of time, but the people behind OntorNet have succeeded to upload the first video of a long series to come.
I personally expect the series to be soon mentioned on some local news station.
Cedarcom and their “Lebanese Want Fast Internet” campaign
There’s no smoke without fire.
And Samer Karam’s story today on Blogging Beirut comes to increase our doubts about the real intentions behind Cedarcom’s “Lebanese Want Fast Internet” page on Facebook that so far succeeded to gather more than 27,000 supporters.
What drives an ISP to suddenly make such page and call for fast internet to become a “right” for every Lebanese citizen? And since when Lebanese telecom companies care about customers? Or do they suddenly felt they should be more socially responsible?
Anyway, if you want to rally behind really transparent people demanding for better internet in Lebanon, make sure to join Ontornet page and Flip The Switch group on Facebook.