rf@wu1.UUCP (12/07/83)
6 December 1983 1. What is Easylink? Easylink is a Western Union electronic mail system. It incorporates and ultimately will replace the United States Telex and TWX systems. 2. How do you order it? Easylink must be ordered from your local Western Union sales office. To learn where your local office is, call Western Union's national sales department in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey at 201-825-6019. 3. What does it offer? Messages may be sent to the following electronic mail services: Easylink U.S. Telex TWX International Telex Western Union Infocom Telex and TWX users can send messages to Easylink users without knowledge of the Easylink system. The following postal mail services are offered: Mailgram (overnight U.S. delivery) World-Wide Mailgram (overnight delivery to Great Britain) Western Union Computer Letter (U.S. and Canada) U.S. Postal ECOM (Electronic Computer Originated Mail) Telegrams may be sent to anywhere in the world (Telegram and Cablegram service.) Any Easylink user may also use Western Union's FYI on-line news service which offers reports such as weather, stock-market quotes, etc. 4. What hardware do you need? Any ascii asynchronous terminal will do. The available transmission rates are 110, 300, and 1200 bits per second. Bell 103 and 212 class modems are supported. For you Unix users: Unix's 'cu' program works fine. 5. What does it cost? There is a $25/month subscription charge. If you need the transparent Telex interface (and I recommend it) you will be charged an additional $10/month. 16,000 characters sent from a 1200 bps (bit per second) terminal to a 300 or 1200 bps terminal cost $1. 16,000 characters sent to a Telex, TWX, or 110 bps terminal cost $10. The service is (or soon will be) billed by characters transmitted. Access is via one of our local nodes in 12 major cities, via Tymnet (soon), or via our WATS line (15 cents/call.) The full rate table is quite complex since your bill depends on the services you use. The various international and postal services have their own rates. 6. Does it work? I use it; it works quite well. I've yet to lose a message. The U.S. Mailgram service is particularly useful. 7. What can't it do? Support synchronous terminals. Operate in conversational mode. Transmit eight-bit characters. These are all planned improvements. Randolph Fritz Western Union Telegraph