MSN Premium Protection -
Microsoft says its MSN Premium portal, priced at US$9.95 a month, offers virus protection, a pop-up filter, parental controls, e-mail support, and other services. MSN Plus is a scaled down version at $5.95 monthly and much of the content on MSN’s pages will, apparently, remain free for the time being.
"Under the old dial-up model, MSN’s content was merely the add-on to the service people really wanted: a way to surf the Internet," says NewsFactor Network here.
Not at all coincidentally, it’s designed for users with high-speed services from ISPs such as Microsoft partners Comcast or Verizon.
"Is there room for more than those firms?" – IDC analyst Jonathan Gaw is quoted as asking rhetorically, referring to MSN, Yahoo and AOL.
"No, they can build out their services much more efficiently than anyone else can," he told NewsFactor. Other firms – like NetZero or EarthLink – do not have the massive numbers of subscribers needed to spread the costs of development."
