I have seen quite a few opinions for and against NetZero here. Now I would like to present a big new reason NOT to sign up with this service: The new flood of advertisements you would need to up with plugging their new pay service--NZ Platinum.

This new pay Internet service by NetZero costs $9.95 a month. They are pushing it on their free service users so hard it's become shameless and disgusting. Advertisers usually do go the extra mile at times--look at those who advertise for say, the Super Bowl. But there is nothing or cute about this awful change of heart for NetZero.

For starters, you logon to NetZero. You are usually greeted by a video from Mark Goldston, NetZero's Chairman and CEO, with a spiel about NZ Platinum. No banner ads, he says. But what he doesn't say is that there still is a Toolbar taking up memory on top of your screen.

Next, you are forced to the Zeroport's home page. The Zeroport is where your banner bar and other options are stored on your screen. On the home page, festooned at the top, is another blazing ad for NZ Platinum. Once you escape this and actually get on the Internet (which is slower than slow thanks to that banner ad hogging up speed and memory), you think you have escaped the assault. Wrong!!!!

Every five minutes or less a pop-up ad comes up over your browser. It always touts NZ Platinum!!! Only $9.95 a month and get six months for the price of five!!!! So you close it.

After you've slowly crawled your way around the Web for awhile, you click on your options cascade and you see an option called "Hide Banner". You think hey, what an option!!! You click on it, and the ad for NZ Platinum blows up on your screen.

Good God, folks--for a company that touts itself as Defenders of the Free World, NetZero shamelessly does everything short of sucking your credit card out of your wallet to get its free users to switch to a fee Internet service. One that still has pop-up ads (by their own admission) and a user bar taking up memory and space (not as much, though due to the removal of banners on NZ Platinum). They lead people to believe that they are free, and then do everything in their power to get you to pay for their service. It's the old bait-and-switch, Internet style.

The days of free ISP's are coming to an end. One by one, they have bit the dust. NetZero is the largest player by far left, but by leaving the Free Internet Defenseless, they too are indicating that they want out of that market. I just wish they would come out and straight up say it rather than use trick tactics to sign up paid subscribers.

Recommended: No