Internet services have been disrupted in large parts of the Middle East and India following damage to two undersea cables in the Mediterranean. Apparently call centres in India can't call anybody because their internet instructions are all out of whack! So we could have a week free from persistent phone calls from people speaking in perfect 1940's Standard English. "Sorry, what was that again?".That's the good news. It also means that bloggers from the Middle East are mainly offline. That puts the likes of Osama Bin Laden in the isolation cave, which is good, but prevents the truth tellers from getting online, which is bad.
The bad news also is that trade and commerce will be badly affected. Not what we want in these global credit crunch days. Egypt's Telecommunications Ministry said it would probably take several days for internet services to return to normal following the disruption on Wednesday. Emergency teams were trying to find alternative communication routes, including satellites. The ministry's Rafaat Hindy said, "Despite this being an international cable affecting many Gulf and Arab countries, we are closest to it and so we have a lot of responsibility."
"We are working as fast as we can." He should come and see the guys at Network Rail!
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