Oh Hell. Remember the glory days of Demon Internet? Well, now would be a good time to pick a new email address
- Reference: 1586946306
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/04/15/namesco_demon_subdomain/
- Source link:
Vodafone [1]confirmed last year that ye olde UK ISP Demon Internet was for the chop, and it looks like it is now the end of the road for demon.co.uk.
In an email seen by The Register from internet services outfit Namesco, notice is given that while the Demon sub-domain had been available to customers thanks to a licence awarded to the company, "the arrangement was always temporary and the license period has now come to an end."
In a nutshell, services attached to the domain will shortly stop working. Just the small stuff, like incoming email traffic.
The cut-off is due on 29 May and users must swiftly pick a new domain name and tell their pals that it has changed. This would include services that might require an email for password resets and the like.
Namesco's take is: "It is important that you make this change as soon as possible and communicate your new email address to important people ahead of time."
We suppose letting an email bounce is easier than having to tell someone that they are somewhat less than important to you. Soz.
Still, Namesco is offering affected punters a .co.uk, .uk or .com domain for free for a year, or an alternative sub-domain that it controls itself. Wisely, it advises that customers opt for their own personal domain, which would avoid this sort of faffing in future. Just ask those [2]orphaned by Tesco or [3]Which?
The Register contacted Namesco to find out why the notice was so short and why the licence could not be extended, but were directed to Vodafone, [4]which picked up the Demon brand back in 2012 as part of its Cable & Wireless acquisition.
Vodafone told us: "We notified customers of our decision to close the free Demon broadband email service in 2016. However, in order to give them more time to move to an alternative service, they were given the option of becoming a Namesco customer and therefore retain their current Demon email address on a temporary basis."
It added: "Namesco has been responsible for migrating customers over to alternative sub-domain names for some time."
One reader told us his email address went back more than two decades, to the era of dial-up, making unpicking his network tricky. Another bemoaned the hammering of yet another nail in the coffin of Blighty's ISP past.
Another reader reported receiving a call from an outfit purporting to represent Vodafone and offering to migrate his account. Provided he handed over his account details. Nice to see the miscreants clambering aboard the scamwagon.
Vodafone told us "Vodafone has not carried out any outbound campaign in relation to the use of the sub-domain names since it was taken over by Namesco."
It added: "Anyone with concerns should contact them directly to discuss in more detail."
Demon Internet itself first appeared back in 1992, flinging dial-up services at customers, and was snapped up by Scottish Telecom in 1997. While not the first UK ISP, it did much to popularise the internet in Britain.
Sadly, time appears to be up for those email addresses that hark back to that simpler, slower age. ®
Sponsored: [5]Choosing A Low-Code Vendor
[1] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/01/11/vodafone_to_shutter_demon_internet/
[2] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/04/04/tesco_kills_off_free_email_service/
[3] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/04/03/which_to_shutter_ageing_email_service/
[4] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/04/23/vodafone_buys_cww/
[5] https://go.theregister.co.uk/tl/1936/-8579/choosing-a-low-code-vendor?td=wptl1936
Re: Sad to see it go
brains.demon.co.uk former TAM account here - but senility has driven my beloved IP from the memory tubes - I think the mercury leaked away into our third cell phone company ...
However a memory of the free website still exists a couple of decades later: https://web.archive.org/web/19990203165101/http://www.brains.demon.co.uk/
Re: Sad to see it go
Quote: "However a memory of the free website still exists a couple of decades later: https://web.archive.org/web/19990203165101/http://www.brains.demon.co.uk/"
That's awesome, I just had a look through your Computing Sites list, and managed to find myself! You gave me 3 out of 5 lol :-D
Unfortunately none of the pics seemed to have been saved on my site, so it looks a bit of a mess! (Never even crossed my mind to go looking for my old site on web archive!): [1]https://web.archive.org/web/19970416013258/http://www.boothy.demon.co.uk/
Classic late 90s handcrafted HTML!
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/19970416013258/http://www.boothy.demon.co.uk/
Re: Sad to see it go
Yep, my demon account (~1997 to ~2005) was dial-up
wibble-wibble-wibble th-unk th-unk!
In my case, I was using Slackware linux.
I was using Slackware linux.
But only in the past tense? Shocking! :-)
Re: Sad to see it go
+1
My sign-up letter was signed by Giles Todd.
The past really is a different country...
They're still going???
I remember the original switchover - we were warned then that there was a limit to how long the emails would last.
I ported myself to a nice little .org domain two years ago because I swear that there was an announcement that the emails were closing. I also moved to a new provider shortly afterwards, so it might also have been triggered by the closing of the Demon service itself. But I ported the emails over first to make sure there were no issues.
Either way, there was a drastic improvement in service and utility in both email and internet. It is almost as good as the original Demon setup, before Thus and Vodaphone got their hands on it.
"Another bemoaned the hammering of yet another nail in the coffin of Blighty's ISP past"
Why is Blighty's ISP past worth bemoaning ?
I'm all for respecting the past, but we're talking about an email address here, from a time when your email practically had to be hosted because having your own domain and managing your own email was a much greater hassle.
Today, you can have a domain in five minutes, with ten mailbox addresses for free, administered with a spam filter, backups and a 24/7 guarantee for a pittance.
Really not worth moaning about.
It was 'Tenner-a month' on CIX.
Happy Days
I used Demon from the early to mid 90, (on an Amiga! Years before I ever got a Wintel box) I can remember them providing a web page, personal FTP site, proper email, newsgroups (except binaries ;-) ), IRC etc etc. What I'd class as a Real ISP!
Modern ISPs just basically provide a connection to the Internet, not really any actual services!
I even made some real world friends through Demon support IRC channels (demon.ip.support.amiga, disa for short), as Amiga users, we basically needed to support each other. We even arranged the occasional real world meet up for a few beers!
I remember having to pick between POP and VPOPs to dial in, the VPOP was a local number, so a cheap call (for the time), but was quite slow, the POP was in the closest city to me (Leeds in my case back then), and was much faster, but cost more as it was a couple of telephone zones away.
I only switched away from Demon late 90s as NTL rolled out 'super fast broadband' in my area (a whole 64kbs, but was 24/7 and no dial-up costs), and it was basically the same price per month as Demon at the time, (as long as you also took the cable TV service, which I planed on doing anyway).
Realising my email address would change with the ISP, I switched to using Hotmail (before MS took over), and never used an ISP provided email address again (eventually getting my own domain, and resigning the hotmail address to a dumping ground for web site logins etc, which I keep far away from my 'real' email addresses).
I used to use them in the early noughties - single channel ISDN + FRIACO gave me a "permanent" connection to the internet for a flat rate each month. Only moved away from them when we finally got ADSL on our exchange.
I was with Demon from the start. Must have been about 25 years
... and then Vodaphone came along and invited me to partake of a compulsary upgrade from 32 static Demon IP addresses to *1* Vodafone static IP address.
... and their salespeople kept calling me about ten times to ask me why I didn't want to upgrade.
So I had a great deal of fun migrating all my servers over to Virgin before the Demon deadline cut me off.
The first "real", low-cost ISP for the UK
Like others, Demon Internet was my gateway from Bulletin Boards to the Internet. Firstly on the Amiga and then on my first PC.
Oddly, I've just thrown out the receipt and info for "Turnpike" which was the DOS-based email/news client that Demon recommended and was quite good for the era. I still have some of the email and news from that time in an archive folder set on my current email service. Has been transferred several times. Occasionally useful to look far back in time.
Thankfully, I realised early on that relying on ISP domains was going to be a problem and so registered my own domain.
Sad to see it go
My first internet connection, used for many years. RIP.