Report on two items: CompuServe's Existence and Pricing withRSA

[BRIAN ALLISON <BALLISON@usagroup.com>]

Prior to tomorrow's Electronic Exchange call, I would like to provide some
information I have obtained from Teemu Kolehmainen at
CompuServe/AOL and from Brian Spector of RSA.

I spoke with Teemu on three issues as it relates to CompuServe old mail. 
The questions I asked are as follows:

Q.  How long we can expect old mail to remain available?
A.  As has been CompuServe's answer in the past, Teemu said there is
no date for retiring old mail.

Q. How many other customers are still using old mail?
A. Teemu said this information is confidential, but he did say that there
are tens of thousands still using old mail.  When I asked if the Airline
Industry was one of those customers, he said he could not divulge that
information.

Q. How much lead-time we can we expect before they withdraw it?
A.  He said CompuServe will give 18 months notice before terminating old
mail.

I also talked with Brian Spector concerning the pricing of the RSA
software and development toolkit.  I will bullet the point s of discussion.

- RSA wants to offer a non-royalty contract with rights to distribute for
$25.00 per user seat. This assume a minimum group purchase of 1,000
copies.  The toolkit will be $290.00.  Toolkits already distributed will not
be charged.
- RSA is a very small company and therefore cannot get into the
business of offering multiple or varied contracts.  RSA wants one
contract (basically its boilerplate contract) with NO addendums.  I
mentioned that the sub-committee had already been down this road and
that we decided it could not be done.  I questioned of one entity bought
the software could it "sell" it to other entities at cost.  He said yes.  This
will definitely have to be talked about at the sub-committee level.
- Support is 17% of the purchase price per year.  This is the company's
premiere support contract.  Brian is faxing me information on what this
entails. I asked if one company purchases the software and then
distributes to multiple organizations, how is support handles.  he said he
will allow one contact per organization that the software is given (sold)
to.