richard@gryphon.COM (Richard Sexton) (02/16/89)
(David Tamkin theorizes on Portal revenues)
One of us ``SERIOUS DILEMMA FOR THE NET'' conspiracy members
spoke with a muckity muck from Portal, whe said that the revenue
from the ``users'' was inconsequential, that the greater part of
their profits came from setting up large databases for large companies.
--
"Hay hay, mye mye... rock an roll wil nevurr dye..."
richard@gryphon.COM gryphon!richard@elroy.jpl.NASA.GOV
decwrl!gryphon!richard killer!gryphon!richard ames!elroy!gryphon!richardDavid_W_Tamkin@cup.portal.com (02/21/89)
Richard Sexton's <12145@gryphon.COM>: * (David Tamkin theorizes on Portal revenues) * One of us ``SERIOUS DILEMMA FOR THE NET'' conspiracy members * spoke with a muckity muck from Portal, whe said that the revenue * from the ``users'' was inconsequential, that the greater part of * their profits came from setting up large databases for large companies. There are areas on Portal that are inaccessible to regular customers. Attempting to enter them gives the message "Sorry. You do not have permission for this area." Of course I know not what may lie beyond any of those various doors except from the signs hanging on them. But I know that the accounts that use those areas seem to have no presence on Portal at all, not showing up in the progression of account numbers, not tying up the sixteen local Cupertino lines (which are likely to fill up only when Portal's DAF goes down and we PCP'ers try to get on through the San Jose outdialer, fighting with the local callers for the direct ports). It is possible that the customers for those areas have account numbers in different series from the 1.1001.xxxx sequence (the only one I ever see in use), yet there was, as I said before, no question in Phil Sih's mind which class my account belonged in when he took my sign-up information a year ago November, so I have reason to think that the 1.1001.xxxx series are the only accounts issued so far. No account number of any other style has as yet shown up within Portal or in a posting to the net (until November, 1988, account numbers were included in the headers of articles posted to Usenet from Portal; they continue to appear in the headers of articles posted within Portal to its own conferences). Another reason I have to believe that there are no other active series of accounts is that when I first asked for printed information before signing up, Portal sent me a generic package that had more information for the big corporate customers than it had for individual leisure-time users like me. When I phoned again and asked whether that was the right mailing, they assured me that there was only one type of information packet and that there had been no mistake. If they had clues from my call as to which kind of account I was interested in, it certainly didn't affect their information mailing, and when I did sign up, they did not double-check about which class of account I wanted. So I really don't think there are many thousands of accounts generating monthly dues that I didn't take into account before. But what I think is the clincher here is that the accounts used in these restricted areas are not on Portal for its Usenet gateway and the *fees* Portal charges corporations for having private areas on Portal have nothing to do with its Usenet gateway. Even if Portal grosses eight figures, only six of that has anything to do with accounts that can get to Usenet, and of the revenue generated by those accounts far, far less than 100% is allocable to the Usenet gateway, and certainly far less than 100% of the revenue ends up as profit! Karl Kleinpaste's article to which I first responded tossed out the notion that Portal takes in eight figures a year without making it at all clear that very little of that would be from having a Usenet gateway. If the gap between my guesses and the numbers he and Richard Sexton remember is explained by fees from corporate customers for maintaining private areas, then it has nothing to do with Usenet, and people shouldn't get the idea that Portal is making over ten million dollars a year from Usenet. David_W_Tamkin@cup.portal.com ...!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!David_W_Tamkin Portal's management and other customers can't count to eleven with shoes on. February 21, 1989 (still February 20 where Portal is) 16 Adar Rishon 5749