Khaled rambles technology, tea/coffee, consumer rights and other interest from Saudi Arabia

Feedburner down for STC Afaq DSL subscribers

Feedburner, one of the leading RSS feed providers is experiencing some problems with Saudi Arabia users. Almost all of the podcasts on the Internet are using feedburner's services. But now when you try to load a feed you will get the following error "Http/1.1 Service Unavailable". This error usually happens when a server is down.

I have verified that the feeds are working on a Mobily connection so this problem is specific to STC Afaq DSL shamel. STC's telephone support have no idea what I am talking about as well.

It should be noted that although Saudi Arabia have multiple DSL providers all of them go through STC's landline and you still need to pay STC a subscription fee in addition to what you pay to the ISP.

Update: I have just verified from a friend living in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia who is also an STC subscriber that he is getting the same error "Http/1.1 Service Unavailable"!
Update 2: although this problem happens with STC customers (DSL and Jawalnet) reconnecting (changing your IP address) fixes it. Apparently one of the STC servers is messed up, not all of them.

STC offering the lowest Internet rates

In another telecommunication innovation, STC announced they offer the lowest rates ... on dial-up! From 3SR per hour to 2.5SR per hour. In small print "this offer is valid for a limited period only" which is only 2 months!