Lower-cost broadband - at a price

Eircom continues its tinkering at the margins to drive broadband adoption with a new version of its high-speed service launched today. Priced at €25 a month (though a promotional rate of €20 applies for the first six months), Eircom Broadband Time (ooh, snappy name, the marketing guys worked overtime on that one!) gives you 20 hours a month of the standard broadband service. After that, each tick of the minute hand will cost four cent.

Though 'Time' is superficially attractive for moderately active users, Eircom would have been far better off following the model in other countries where low-end products are based on a download allowance rather the number of minutes online. Remember, you will be charged for idle time spent, say, reading web pages or e-mails unless you take the impractical step of disconnecting every time you want to pause a while.

The bods at Ireland Offline get it right when they point out that metered internet access belongs in the dark ages.

"Eircom are introducing entirely artificial pricing mechanisms with this product. Unlike a phone call, it costs eircom nothing for a broadband connection to be permanently connected," said IO's Aidan Whyte.

The likes of BT are dependent on Eircom's network for its broadband, so it will fall to other operators such as Irish Broadband to provide a realistic low-end service.