I've been a Witopia customer for over two years now and wanted to offer some comments, especially now that I'm looking into going to another provider.
The truth is, there have been so few issues with Witopia over these past two years:
1) has one of the highest number of servers (50-plus) across more countries (30-plus, I think) than most other VPN providers;
2) downtime for me has been non-existent;
3) customer support has been very good; not perfect, but very good;
4) pricing is among the lowest of any VPN provider I've found;
5) uses OpenVPN;
6) ease of installation;
7) technical support, via their chat system, is almost instantaneous, competent and friendly;
8) free web proxy service for customers (allows me to access web-based content on any computer without having to install their OpenVPN software. Additionally, I can connect game consoles and other network-capable equipment (HDTV, Blu-Ray player, etc.) without exposing my real IP address);
9) their own DNS servers;
So why would I consider leaving when they have so much to offer? Good question. I really have NO complaints. I do, however, wonder:
1) How is it that this company can offer so much for so little money? I might call it the "McDonald's Syndrome," that is to say, instead of asking why the food is so expensive at the ABC Restaurant, ask why McDonald's is so inexpensive? So, I ask myself how is it that this company can offer almost everything I want in a VPN provider but yet do it for so little money? I guess it's the "if it sounds too good to be true than it probably is" dilemma. Maybe I'm just a bit too jaded, but, it's just something I've thought about.
Now, would I be less suspicious about Witopia if they charged, say, $149.99 year? As weird as it sounds, I just might;
2) I'm concerned about my VPN provider being within the jurisdiction of either the United States or the E.U. Not only that, Witopia's headquarters are in Reston, VA. I look at that close physical proximity to all those nasty three-letter government agencies and I wonder....
Again, would I be less suspicious about Witopia if they were located in, say, Green Bay, WI? Yeah, I suppose I would. But I'd really like it if they were in Iran or China, I guess. At least some place where they could just thumb their nose at US or EU authorities should they come calling;
3) I wish they allowed for anonymous payment methods;
4) P2P is not allowed, even on non-U.S. servers (which certainly raises the "Why?" question, unless they have some connection to ??? I don't know, I'm just sayin'....).
In closing, I want to reiterate that I really love using Witopia; it's been an incredible experience and if it wasn't for these four nagging issues I wouldn't be looking and, instead, I would be recommending Witopia to anyone and everyone without any hesitation.
These are just some thoughts I've had and it seemed that sharing them with those doing some shopping might be helpful to them. I hope that's the case.
WiTopia – VPN consumer review – 13050
