Live from Beijing to Bangkok: Internet policy change

[qldtraveller]

Please accept my apologies as I was interested more in why people pay the money for the internet on all the cruise lines we have sailed with. I was not attempting to stir up trouble just being curious.

 

Also we have a family member in her 90's and another set of parents who are also having health issues. As such they have anything up to contact or have someone contact at Lear 8 different nos. in Oceania, travel company, TA company, our dept. of Foreign Affairs, embassy numbers for each port. Our neighbours also have all these emergency numbers as well as free texting service to our global mobile which has a global SIM card in it as our elderly family members are IT literate.

 

We also carry every address of our country's embassies in every port we visit including email and telephone numbers so we are able to contact them or Oceania can.

 

Again my apologies for causing any heartache but my curiosity is still active.

 

Regards

[Mura]

I doubt apologies are necessary! We've all had relatives with whom we need to maintain contact, even if we are in the middle of an ocean.

 

And I am confident you didn't cause any "heartache" with your comments!

 

Good luck to you,

 

Mura

[cbb]

I'm glad that J&S are there for FUN and not for UNCTION (unless it is for sunburn)

[potterhill]

We had unlimited internet on this very cruise last year. I paid for it and we shared it as we were told we had to or pay double. It was great and will purchase on again on any future cruise.

 

Mo

 

 

Sent using the Cruise Critic forums app

[LHT28]

We're going to miss you on the May cruise.

 

Won't mention names.

 

we will miss you too :D

[LHT28]

Quick question while you are talking internet...I can't find anywhere in our booklet that we get an email at sea address. Seems to me, on our previous cruise, we had one something like *******marinaatsea.com????

Thanks

 

Too many people abused the free emails so they dropped the service

[YoHoHo]

I can't imagine how they could abuse it; forward messages for others on land w/o internet access?

 

The service went from free to $2 each way to $4 to send, free to receive.

 

It was a great service and all I need & want. Originally not even a need to spend the 10 minutes log in just to see IF there was mail. I don't think it was cancelled so much as abused but as unknown. Also w/o the alternatives were either buy an expensive per minute on a painfully slow service or a phone call.

 

The cruise mail service was dropped not long after the change to their current ISP. Their login interface on the cabin supplied laptops did not even have the link to login the cruise mail - had to ask to learn the URL.

 

Last cruise I gave our emergency contacts the pay-for-long distance number to reach us on ship. Ironically moved back to a ship-to-shore phone as technology moved ahead.

 

That old email service customized for each pax set O apart but alas no more.

 

I appreciate the opportunity to whinge once again on this. Soon it will be lost in history not to be mentioned by name again.

Edited March 14, 2014 by YoHoHo

[JimandStan]

appreciate the opportunity to whinge once again on this. Soon it will be lost in history not to be mentioned by name again.

 

Well said, Sir!

[terry&mike]

gldtraveller, I was not bothered by your post, and understood it to be genuine curiosity.

Although I am certainly not a person of importance, I do own my own business with an employee of one - myself, and my clients needs are important to both themselves and to me. Although this gives me great leeway in allowing me to travel on several trips a year, it does have the downside of meaning that I need to check my emails for about 30 minutes twice a day (and in the case of an issue, a bit more often, and even the rare phone call).

DH likes to check in on what's going on at his company, and briefly surf his favorite news sites, for a few minutes twice a day also.

We always ensure that wherever we are staying - vacation rentals, hotels, cruises - wifi is available for purchase, or free.

I doubt that sharing one wifi account will impact us much, as one of us could take care of business while the other one was getting ready, napping, reading, and vice versa.

[pacheco18]

That was precisely my point

 

Assuming someone has a business to run and needs to be in touch frequently, elderly family members or kids to check up on, there are 24 hours daily of unlimited internet with the package. I just don't understand the problem of sharing one access code for two people, even for the most needy internet users.

[Wendy The Wanderer]

Are we the only ones who use the internet for things other than email? We're winding down a month-long trip to SE Asia, and in the morning and evening we're both reading the news and googling the history, geography, culture of the places we visit to beat the band! And we're usually doing this independently, on our own devices.

 

And the response from Oceania:

They will sell you two Unlimited Internet Packages but you still will only be able to use one at a time.

 

Hope no one spends the $$ for an unusable internet package.

 

That sounds totally nuts, doesn't it?

[pacheco18]

Are we the only ones who use the internet for things other than email? We're winding down a month-long trip to SE Asia, and in the morning and evening we're both reading the news and googling the history, geography, culture of the places we visit to beat the band! And we're usually doing this independently, on our own devices.

 

Maybe not, but we usually do all our research before we leave. I might occasionally look up something as it comes up, but that still would not cause me to spend hours on line or need a separate device from that of husband. We catch up on the news as well, but that usually doesn't take much time and I am trying to get away from it all anyway.

[orchestrapal]

Are we the only ones who use the internet for things other than email? We're winding down a month-long trip to SE Asia, and in the morning and evening we're both reading the news and googling the history, geography, culture of the places we visit to beat the band! And we're usually doing this independently, on our own devices.

That sounds totally nuts, doesn't it?

 

Not nuts at all. We do the same and even more importantly make final payments on our forthcoming Oceania cruises as they come due. We don't mind, however, going on the internet at separate times. Not a problem.

[Mura]

As I've said, my husband doesn't "internet" at all so for us it's not a problem. But it does sound nuts to me that they would SELL you two separate internet packages but you can only use one at a time.

 

Now, if you only have one device, that's one thing. Otherwise, it makes no sense at all -- to me.

 

Mura

[LHT28]

Are we the only ones who use the internet for things other than email? We're winding down a month-long trip to SE Asia, and in the morning and evening we're both reading the news and googling the history, geography, culture of the places we visit to beat the band! And we're usually doing this independently, on our own devices.

 

 

 

 

Most people do their research before they leave home

but sometimes may want to check an address or admission price while on the route as for the news ...I do not bother with the news reports when away just whatever I see in daily news paper onboard is enough for me

Nothing that we cannot do with one device, one account

 

YMMD

[Brittany C]

Hi all,

 

I'm with the Cruise Critic Editorial team. Just wanted to make a note that we reached out to Oceania about this shift from a per-person Internet package to one per cabin, and were notified that there is in fact no policy change, it has always been one package per cabin, but the line now seems to be enforcing it more strictly.

 

Happy Sailing,

 

~Brittany Chrusciel, Editorial Assistant

[pinotlover]

I've often wonder what the ship's capacity for internet is.:confused: I guessing everything is being bounced off a series of satellites somewhere. I know that in some locations, one could get messages back and forth by carrier pigeon faster than the ship's system, while other locales things work smoother.

 

I do know that mornings are often a terrible time to attempt to use the on board internet. I don't go on vacation to surf the internet, and I'm one of those that does my research before I leave home, so my needs for the service aren't great. However, I just wonder how many passengers the onboard service can accomodate at any time with reasonable speeds.

 

Another issue is why people onboard want to destroy bandwith, for all, by downloading large camera files to the cloud. :mad: We bring along a finger drive and put them all there and then move them to the cloud after we get home if we so desire to do so.

[orchestrapal]

Hi all,

 

I'm with the Cruise Critic Editorial team. Just wanted to make a note that we reached out to Oceania about this shift from a per-person Internet package to one per cabin, and were notified that there is in fact no policy change, it has always been one package per cabin, but the line now seems to be enforcing it more strictly.

 

Happy Sailing,

 

~Brittany Chrusciel, Editorial Assistant

 

Thanks for clearing that up for all.

[LHT28]

Hi all,

 

I'm with the Cruise Critic Editorial team. Just wanted to make a note that we reached out to Oceania about this shift from a per-person Internet package to one per cabin, and were notified that there is in fact no policy change, it has always been one package per cabin, but the line now seems to be enforcing it more strictly.

 

Happy Sailing,

 

~Brittany Chrusciel, Editorial Assistant

 

Thanks

[LHT28]

Another issue is why people onboard want to destroy bandwith, for all, by downloading large camera files to the cloud. :mad: We bring along a finger drive and put them all there and then move them to the cloud after we get home if we so desire to do so.

 

I am technology challenged so no idea of what a cloud is other than those fluffy things in the sky:D

 

We usually take some extra SD cards & just upload our photos on the the net book or wait until we are home & put them on our desktop

I have the photos set as my screen saver ....so sometimes I just watch the photos go by & it brings back the memories of those places we have been

 

I am old so small thing amuse me :)

Edited March 14, 2014 by LHT28

[treasure4two]

When we were on, it was very slow, because some days, 80-100 people were on line at the same time and it was sooooooo slow. We were allowed to both have our own sign on accounts and maybe the amount of problems could have prompted the new rule change. We had the Unlimited Internet and we could of handled only one of us being on at one time, but made things easier.

What we were doing and whom we were contacting is our own business, so the ugly comments questioning our need to both use the Internet while on vacation were not necessary and unkind.

[sitraveler]

It wasn't a policy change, just a different interpretation of the policy. We, too, had 2 log ins for a "free internet" cruise early this year.

Until fairly recently, free internet was not offered.

Once O started the daily charge, in addition to minutes plans, it became far easier to use all the internet you wanted. We have friends who saved enough

with the daily plan to pay for an O cruise

[pinotlover]

Ron and Donna Jean;

 

I could basically care less what you do on the internet. However, the portal is only so large on a ship. I believe the system should reject massive file uploads and downloads from any users. Checking emails and reading the hometown paper is one thing. Sitting down and trying to upload the 100 pictures you took the day before and send them to Grandma is ridiculous, imo. It hogs available bankwidth and brings the system for everyone down to a crawl. This is especially the case when you have a dozen or so passengers all trying to do the same thing at the same time.:mad:

[pacheco18]

Uh oh

 

The internet police will be on board (along with the dress code police).

 

Chill out. It's just the internet. It's not life and death.

[Balloon Man]

Free internet for all ... up to a reasonable limit for messages - say 1MB per day. If you want to send image files then you pay $x extra per MB. Simple solution: those who use the system most pay most.