Pay by the minute for connection time? You're
getting screwed.
1) In most parts of the U.S., business phone service is NOT available flat
rate. A business phone line (as opposed to residential) is charged per
minute. Not all businesses are willing to lie to the phone company and
try to claim that there is somebody living there in order to get an
"unlimited" residential service.
2) There still exist some remote areas of the U.S. that don't even have a
local dialup, even for AOHell!
3) there exist other countries besides U.S.; and policies and internet
availability can vary.
Besides, at modem speeds, who WANTS to retrieve a 100K message that only
has a paragraph of new content?