Bob Jones, chairman of UK Internet company Equiinet, has condemned BT for announcing that its ADSL beta trial will feature slower access speeds at a higher price. The monster telco informed triallists last week that the move was part of BT's plans to introduce the service nationwide next year. In a prepared statement, Jones said: "BT should be ashamed of itself. The government is pushing our businesses to embrace ecommerce, which will rely upon better Internet access. But by watering down its ADSL offering BT is narrowing the roads and is in danger of slowing Internet traffic back to a crawl. "BT is already months late in rolling out ADSL and the technology exists to support the service: our customers are trialling it and like it. If BT isn't interested in ADSL, it should get out of the way and let other operators handle it." This is not the first time Jones has stepped up to chin BT on behalf of UK Net users. Back in June, he accused BT of holding the country to ransom. He was responding to comments made by BT that it would not want to invest heavily in broadband services "unless the authorities reject demands from BT's rivals for immediate and full access to the new system". ®