Broadband in Pakistan.

Posted By admin On August 7, 2007 @ 3:02 pm In Articles, PC | 1 Comment

31I got a sneaky message on my mobile from my DSL provider. “Dear Max.com customer, your 512K dedicated connection has been upgraded to 1MB for free!” For free? In Pk-Land? What’s the catch? I am a Standard Chartered customer so I know more then anyone else about hidden charges. But it seems that broadband did get cheaper. Usually customers don’t get all the savings passed on but in this case with the decision of PTCL to cut all prices by 25% everyone is forced to follow suit.

I do remember reading deregulation policy details when I was younger and had more time on my hands and was obviously disturbed, so I think as a Significant Market Player (SMP) they are not allowed to do that. But hey! Let the Chief Justice take Suo Moto notice and fix it at will.We dear reader are going to rejoice.

You see I beg to disagree with the typical Pakistani gamer who struts around thinking he is the luckier then Brad Pitt (Yes this site has an Angelina Jolie fetish…. Bite us) to be born into one of the top piracy nations where he can get any game for USD 1. There has been only one time when due to a rush of adrenalin my hands shook so hard I couldn’t type on the keyboard. It was my first Player vs Player encounter. I was an Archer in an MMORPG game I was beta testing with my Guild. Three of us a Pk-Lander, an Ozzie and a Kiwi ran across two much stronger Koreans. I barely survived with 6 HP. It was and is the highlight of my gaming life in pure joy. Broadband makes massively multiplayer games with a satisfying gameplay experience possible. And once you play against humans normal AI just doesn’t cut it. The difference is as stark as playing a game in 32 bit pixels and playing one in 1080p resolution.

God also bless our Arab brothers from Abudhabi who decided to launch a company called Wateen (Full disclaimer: The company I work for sold them some stuff) which will be bringing the joy of the largest global Wimax installation to us. Imagine wireless high data access for the internet and online gaming. No more cable and more competition to bring the broadband price even further down. Oh yummy!I keep remembering the example of Thailand where lower internet costs caused the launch of Ragnarok Online to become a phenomenon. It gathered 500,000 users with three months! When I look at over a million urban children with access to internet in Pk-Land – Even a little speed will go a long way for them. Online gaming will change the way we play and pay for our games and it will give our rudderless youth under sensationalist bombardment from shallow news channels and exposed to increasing social dysfunction a true center of gravity that has strong social elements. Lets face it. Gaming’s the only education we got and thanks to PTCL’s first unlawful monopolistic step that education is within our grasp. Go PTCL Go!Oh by the way R.E.S.P.E.C.T to Maxcom’s Customer Service. When their guy figured out that broadband was not working because my line was dead and there was a “pairing” problem in the telephone exchange he fixed everything just so the broadband could work. I love you guys man.

- Habib “Noori Nath” Khan