Many readers of this site have expressed their kind thanks and appreciation of the information in these pages. It is this very kind of encouragement that keeps me working on this site on my spare time. So thanks go to all the people who have sent me these nice e-mails.

Other web sites have articles and news announcements on the same subject as this page, but are not as comprehensive. You may want to check them out yourself.

•  As of late 2004, High Speed Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL) are available to consumers. If you read Arabic, you can check what others have experienced. Here are the prices and quality of providers, and here are details on how to subscribe, and communication costs.

The official list of 39 companies can be found at this page at the ISU. They also have a file (in Arabic Rich Text format containing a list of companies licenced to be ISPs in Saudi Arabia, with their telephone numbers. A fuller list with contact names, telephone and fax numbers, and addresses is also available at the Trade Port November 1998 article which lists 41 companies.

Hello, I am Sarah Khalid Baheyeldin, and I used to live in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and go to Manarat School. Now I live in Ontario, Canada.

	This is me a few years ago, in 1995.
	This a photo of me in March 2000. When during Eid Al Adha days, we went to a farm west of Alexandria (In Borg El Arab, belonging to my father's uncle.

When I grow up and be rich, I would like to have a large house with a farm, so I can have a pet pony in it.

The very useful web site NUA Internet Surveys has various articles from around the web on:

• The Internet in the Middle East
• How Many Online?
• Graphs and Charts
• NUA Analysis

1. Yahoo Internet Life Magazine

Top Level Measures of Telephone and Internet Penetration

Detailed Statistics of Selected Countries

The following are some useful statistics that were gatheredfrom various sources, and addressing mainly the Middle EastArabic Speaking countries. Some comparison is provided forNorth American and Europe as well.

World Most Wired Nations

Cyber cafes have seen explosive growth in Saudi Arabia over the last year.

It is practically impossible to list all the cafes operating in the Kingdom, but at least the few of them listed below should give the traveller or the occasional user what they need.

Update: The per-minute access charges are now reduced to 3 SR per hour. That is a 33% reduction over the previous rate. Update: On May 14, Reuters reported (according to this ZDNet article) that prices will be reduced, perhaps by June 2000! Some providers have already cut the prices down (e.g. TriNet has cut its unlimited monthly subscription from 420 SR to 200 SR.