.net magazine II (4 December 1998) The article in issue 53, by Susan Wright, is excellent; it is one of the best that has been written on the whole subject, and we urge people reading this to get hold of a copy if they haven't done so already. It would be hopelessly tedious to go through the article word by word, so a couple of comments only are in order. We think a BT spokesperson (David Orr) is going to regret what was blown up into huge print: I would contest that the price of phone calls is a major barrier to Internet access because it ain't. The real barrier to the Net is the cost of the hardware, the cost of the PC. That argument is rubbish. Literally; one of the CUT committee members got his PC (a Compaq, no less!) off a skip and is doing well with it. There is no need to believe the propaganda that you require a £1500 PC, or even a new PC, to get started. But the most significant passage in the whole article is: 'BT never says never', said a BT spokesperson, whereas another [said] 'Let's see what happens'. No-one we spoke to categorically ruled out the possibility of unmetered calls happening sometime in the future. That is a sea-change. A year ago people were saying 'never'; in fact, someone with a colourful turn of phrase used 'not until hell freezes over'.