Virgin bids to put 'non-nerds' online

Virgin's Internet service will be given away to its subscribers for the first three months as part of efforts to take a dominant share of a highly competitive market.

The service, to be launched next month as part of a joint venture with International Cabletel, the US cable firm, will attempt to lure users who have so far shunned the offer of online communication from the large numbers of Internet services currently in the market, according to Virgin Communications chairman Robert Devereaux.

"Somebody needs to explain why the Internet is worthwhile," he said. "And so far no one seems to be doing a particularly good job at it. We think we're in a position to do a great deal better."

Virgin Net users will not pay a subscription for the first three months, but will pay for the local telephone call required to hook their computers into the service. Subsequently they will be charged pounds 10 a month for unlimited use, or pounds 6 a month for a limited number of hours online.

Mr Devereaux claimed that the Virgin Net service will be particularly user-friendly, allowing subscribers to book airline and cinema tickets and listen to top 40 CDs before buying them via a credit card.

Subscribers will also be able to access British-oriented news and information, and surf the World Wide Web using a web browser licensed from Netscape. Educational software currently under development for primary and secondary school age children will encourage schools to use the service as part of lessons and is expected to form part of the service early next year.

Most of the estimated pounds 20m start-up costs have so far been borne by International Cabletel, while Virgin, which owns 51 per cent of the venture, will have responsibility for managing and marketing the service when it goes live on 30 November.

"We're not just interested in providing vanilla Internet access. It will evolve out of that into a range of online services," Mr Devereaux said.

The launch will come at a time of great uncertainty for online businesses and the Internet, which has suffered from overloading and security breaches. It has thus far proven unable to provide adequate home shopping services to users.

Last month a report from Verdict, a consumer research firm, was critical of the services offered by the Internet. "The fundamental problem is that the majority of people like shopping. They prefer to see, touch, try out or try on the goods they are thinking of buying," the report concluded.

Mr Devereaux said he believed that faster transmission speeds offered by Virgin Net and improved customer service would begin to tempt "non- nerds" on to the Internet for the first time.