the university's border router failed yesterday evening (while i was working on ctan). as a result (www|ftp|rsync).tex.ac.uk (and cam.ctan.org) were unavailable to everyone, not just me.
the network management people say:
The cause is still under investigation but we believe that the service is functioning normally.
sorry for any inconvenience.
Robin Fairbairns
For the CTAN team