I’ve long sang the praises of Speakeasy (Why I Love Speakeasy), and loved that I actually had a choice when it came to selecting DSL, which I needed because I’m pretty picky about such things. I need static IPs and I need support to help me diagnose line issues, NOT OS issues. From them to my DSL modem, that’s all I need help with; please don’t ask me to reboot again! Speakeasy provided me with that excellent service, but today it comes down that Best Buy has bought Speakeasy. Forums over at Broadband Reports echo my sediment with universally negative comments after their posting the news. It sums things up perfectly, and spells out why I’m very pessimistic about this being a good thing for Speakeasy, or their customers (aka me). “Speakeasy this morning has announced that the broadband provider has been acquired by electronics retail giant Best Buy for $97 million. Founded in 1994, Speakeasy started in Seattle as an Internet cafe, and made a name for themselves as a customer-focused and community-friendly broadband provider. [...] “Best Buy, like Speakeasy, is known for its high level of customer service,” insists Speakeasy CEO Bruce Chatterley in an e-mail to customers. That statement probably terrifies Speakeasy users aware of the recent scuff-up over a secret internal Best Buy website used to scam customers out of advertised deals. Best Buy so far is insisting that little will change. Post-acquisition, the company will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Best Buy. “We have a high regard for Speakeasy’s employees, their culture, and their valued relationships with customers and vendors,” says Best Buy CFO Darren Jackson. “They have a strong customer service-oriented approach, which is an excellent fit with Best Buy’s culture and direction.” So there you go, I was unable to get a small ISP that actually had good customer service when I lived in Texas, we were always outside of the lines for Speakeasy. During that time we had SBC (which bought out Prodigy when I worked there!), since we had no choice, which was OK as long as we didn’t have any problems. Customer service was the normal, not my problem let me transfer you to the hold queue until you got some kid who read a statement of non-support once I mentioned we ran Linux, FreeBSD and OS X at the house in response to his, “Ok, what version of Windows do you run?”. When you call Speakeasy you get someone on the phone immediately, and that person would help you the whole time. Also, they understood that they provide data transfer from THEM TO MY DSL MODEM, and after that it was just TCP/IP from there; OS be damned. We’ll see what happens, but at this time I’m thinking harder about colo’ing the server and getting some cheap cable modem if (when?) things go south with Speakeasy. To the Speakeasy CEO: Please don’t let us down.