Cruzio Newsletter - Number 76, June 17, 2004
1. Cruzio Mail System Improved; Virus Protection Increased
2. New Billing System
3. Free DSL Brown Bag Thurs, June 24th
4. Zombies
5. Women in Business Event
6. Buddy Bucks
7. No Late Fees if You Donate Food
8. About This Newsletter
9. How to Reach Cruzio (dial-in or tech support)
1. Cruzio Mail System Improved; Virus Protection Increased
Cruzio's busy engineering staff has again improved Cruzio's
service and expanded our features without cost or disturbance
to customers.
This time, we've performed an upgrade to our main email system
which not only delivers better speed and performance -- both
sending and receiving email -- but also added new, powerful
virus protections. We're now stopping most viruses before they
even reach members' mailboxes. We're blocking over 21,000 known
viruses, at last count. The list of viruses we block is updated
every 2 hours, so we catch new viruses very quickly.
Since it's been a success, we are now working on expanding
this service for our domain and extra mailbox customers.
Many thanks to Chief Systems Engineer Mark for his hard work in
pursuit of excellent customer service.
2. New Billing System
We ran into some unexpected glitches with our new billing system.
The new system is faster and spiffier. It will allow us to sell
a greater variety of services with more flexibility for our customers.
Those are admirable qualities in a billing system.
Someday, we will lean back in our office chairs and enjoy this
excellent system. But as for the first few weeks of implementation,
we have been busy. Although we ran a test system for many months,
some errors can't be discovered until you go "live."
You may have seen some of the glitches created unexpectedly by
the new system. We have been watching very carefully, and making
corrections whenever needed. The charges and invoices have been,
on the whole, correct. However, this first month you may have
experienced:
- Credit cards declined
(Many of our customers' addresses needed updating)
- Tax charged -- incorrectly -- on services
(These have been corrected)
- More invoices, statements and warnings than usual
(We are adjusting the frequency of automatic
processes)
- Unusual due dates or late dates on bills
(A glitch that's fixed for next month)
Please take any unusual information on your bills with a grain of
salt. Unless you've made a change on your end, the amount due this
month and the date it's due should be just the same as always. Cruzio
is combing through accounts and fixing any mistakes quickly.
Thanks very much to our Sales and Finance staffs -- that means
James, Chris C., Jessi, Michael, Mario, Brian, Tapati and Nikkie --
who have put in a lot of extra hours and energy to work through
all the changes. We have suspended late fees this month for any
account which has a billing error, and we are being extra careful
about suspending or cancelling service.
Thanks for your patience and understanding. Next month's bills should
be much more routine!
3. Free DSL Brown Bag Thurs, June 24th
Do you need extra Internet speed -- up to twice regular DSL or cable?
Are you ready for DSL 3.0? Join us:
Thursday, June 24th, noon-1:30 pm
Cruzio storefront, 903 Pacific Ave.
Come to Cruzio's DSL 3.0 Brown Bag on June 24th to learn how
you can get zippy speeds at your home or office with DSL 3.0!
Cruzio staff will discuss whether it's right for you, if you
qualify, and how it stacks up against dialup and cable modems.
Join Cruzio's astute staffers Mike from Technical Support
and Chris from Sales to get all of your questions answered
about this new blazing-fast connection. Cost is...free!
Lunch is available for $7.
To register, please visit
http://www.cruzio.com/brownbags
Note that DSL 3.0 is only available to those within 9,500 feet
of the phone company's equipment; if you'd like to know before
you come to the Brown Bag, Cruzio is able to check whether
your location qualifies. Just fill out the qualification form at
http://www.cruzio.com/services/highspeed_access/qualify.html
4. Zombies
Spam isn't just sent from "spam houses" overseas. According to
network management firm Sandvine, most spam is now coming from
computers infected with viruses: zombie computers.
Zombies don't crash after being infected by a virus. They function
nearly as they always did, only busier, as they send out countless
virus probes or spams to the Internet.
Cruzio keeps an eye out for zombies within our own customer
base. When we see a computer sending out virus probes, we contact
the owner immediately and help them deal with the problem. So we
are pretty confident that few Cruzio customers are responsible for
virus activity. We keep looking, though -- it's important that we
spare both our local network and the Internet at large from the
threat of viruses and the scourge of spam.
If we contact you about an infected computer, please help us
clean it up. We try to get to these quickly and we appreciate
your help.
How to recognize a zombie:
- rotting keys fall from keyboard
- foetid smell of undead hard disk hangs in air
- monitor can't be killed with a regular bullet
- computer won't stop eating brains
Oops! Those the horror movie computer zombie symptoms. Just joking.
In real life, you can recognize a computer zombie by:
- Using current anti-virus software regularly
(for an excellent page discussing anti-virus choices, try
http://email.about.com/cs/netiquettetips/qt/et101502.htm )
This is the best way to detect viruses, hands down.
- Computer seems very active, even when all applications
are closed.
- Computer seems much slower and busier than usual.
- Cruzio calls and says our virus detection software has
detected a computer on your dialup or DSL connection
which might be infected.
To avoid viruses altogether, check the advice on our Web site.
We are always updating it when there's a new virus threat:
http://www.cruzio.com/support/security/
5. Women in Business Event
Join Cruzio at the Santa Cruz Chamber Women In Business Networking
Extravaganza featuring speaker Kathleen Ronald of SPEAKtacular.
July 15, 2004, 4:00pm - 8pm
University Center at UC Santa Cruz
The cost is $40 for members, $55 for non-members. For more information
call 831.457.3715.
6. Buddy Bucks
You earn Buddy Bucks when you recommend Cruzio to a friend,
family member, colleague, or even someone you barely know. If the
new customer gives us your email address, registration number, or
full name when signing up, Cruzio will give you $10 credit on
your account. No limit to the amount you can earn.
Remember, Cruzio dialup is now available nationwide -- does your
cousin in Minneapolis bemoan the lack of a decent Internet Provider?
Does your ex-fiancee in New Orleans wish for a connection like yours?
Sign 'em up.
7. No Late Fees if You Donate Food
Late on a Cruzio payment? Bring in 3 cans for the hungry, and
Cruzio will waive the late fee on your account. The food goes
to the Second Harvest Food Bin; we try to keep donations
happening all year. Learn more about Second Harvest at
http://www.thefoodbank.org
8. About This Newsletter
Cruzio doesn't like to waste bandwidth with extra email, but we sometimes
have events and announcements that users need to know about. This seems
like the most efficient way to let people know what's happening. Hope
it's helpful. Please email support@cruzio.com with any comments or questions.
By the way, we would love to have a regular, predictable schedule
for this newsletter...but we simply do not send it unless there is real
news enclosed. Thus the haphazard datelines.
9. How to Reach Cruzio (dial-in or tech support)
To reach the Cruzio Information Center, for online technical and
sales information:
http://www.cruzio.com/support
To dial in to Cruzio, set your software to dial one of the numbers
below (note: we've expanded and joined modem pools, so you may be
using another number. If so, don't worry, it still works just fine).
Dialup: 459-9408
Nationwide Dialup: Look up local number on our Web page:
http://www.flexpop.net/hub.php3?c=Locations&p=Numsearch
or call Cruzio toll free, 1.800.303.3302
To call Cruzio:
459-6301............Use this number to check Cruzio's system status,
pay your Cruzio bill, find out more about our hours and location,
or to reach someone in customer service and technical support.
To send email to Cruzio, use one of these addresses:
support@cruzio.com ......for technical support
office@cruzio.com .......for billing and ordering information
903 Pacific Avenue, Suite 101, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Cruzio's hours:
Sales hours: 10am-6pm, Monday through Friday; 10 am - 2 pm Saturday
Technical support: 10-6 pm, Monday through Friday, 10am - 2pm Saturday
System monitoring, including customer-alerted emergencies, 24 hours
per day, 365 days per year (leap years, 366 days)
Thanks very much from Cruzio:
Chris, Peggy, Julianne, Kathy, Mark, Georgette, Tapati,
Alec, Stephen, Paul, Gershom, Jessi, Michael, another Chris,
Maria, James, Juana, Krissie, Nikkie, Mike, Mario, Don, Bruce,
Jason, Gabriella, Edgar, and Brian; Nick and Eric (our
fabulous interns); Jake, Annika, and Carly (the kids)
Annika, age 9, is a Santa Cruzan:
Mom: "What did you do at the beach today?"
Annika: "We dug a swimming pool in the sand and filled it
with water. Then we saw there were sand crabs in the water,
so we made it be a marine sanctuary."
