Metronet (Internet provider)
Metronet Communication Services GmbH & Co. KG was an Internet provider based in Cologne , which in the mid-1990s offered affordable Internet access for home users outside of companies. The access software ( dialer , browser ) still necessary at the time was advertised and distributed on CD-ROM from August 1996 by the Vobis branches belonging to the Metro Group for a nominal fee of DM 3 .
A basic fee of 9.99 DM (for analog connections, 19.99 DM for ISDN) per month was required. This represented a kind of flat rate for Internet access. However, telephone costs were incurred for the connection to the next dial-in node. The dial-in ran via one of around 50 dial-in nodes in Germany, which were initially accessible via the respective landline numbers. Depending on the distance between the place of residence and the dial-in node, local or long-distance calls (telephone) were charged for the connection. In the then still monopolistic telephone market, this was often associated with high connection costs. A nationwide uniform 0180 call number simplified dialing later. This number was then already preconfigured in the dial-up program.
However, you had to bring a lot of time for surfing, because metronet initially had to struggle with the insufficient number of dial-in lines. Especially in the evenings (from 9 p.m. the moonlight tariff of Deutsche Telekom was in effect, which enabled local calls for less than DM 2 per hour). It may take half an hour or more to connect. Once connected, many users complained of low data throughput . Since the service was cheaper than AOL , Compuserve and T-Online , this was accepted by many users.
Another significant limitation was that Metronet did not allow direct access to the Internet. Communication was only possible via web proxy and other servers or services (mail, news , IRC) provided by Metronet .
Metronet went over to Primus-Online and was later taken over by debitel and continued under the name debitel.net until December 1, 2010 .