FCC vs Comcast - Comments Welcome

Lots of sites have written about this, with mixed results. The main point (as far as I’m concerned) is that there cannot be advertising to point out ‘unlimited’ usage of the internet, and then have it come out that your company is in fact limiting usage. P2P blocking, throttling, and download caps all are contrary to ‘unlimited usage’.

I have Verizon DSL and, although in my house, 3Mb/s gets used up fairly quickly, the nice thing is that Verizon is reliable (more so than anyone else), provides ‘unlimited’ use, and provides a news server at no extra charge. That last part is important to me, and many ISPs are severely limiting or dropping NNTP services altogether (NNTP servers used to be a given with every ISP).

My experiences with cable service have not been good, to say the least. When I tried Adelphia, a few years ago, I maxed out the monthly allotment for downloading in less than 2 days, so that ended that experiment. Just recently, when Verizon screwed up and cut our internet service, I investigated Time-Warner. No news server whatsoever, promises of 6Mb/s, but after inquiry into speeds from local users, I found out it was only 6Mb/s for about 2 hours of the day. The rest of the time it was between 1.5 and 2.5Mb/s. Not terrible, but hardly living up to the advertising. Twenty miles away, in the heart of Comcast service area, things are about the same. Also, the only way to get a decent price on service is to have TV and phone bundled from them. Phone might be OK, but digital cable with box fees per television per month doesn’t grab me, so that’s out.

I have, just this morning been contacted by 2 people who want my name on a petition to the FCC, to make a point with Comcast. I returned both with agreement. However, I also noted that, instead of fines, which will simply be passed to the consumers, the FCC should force them to shut down for a number of days. Should any throttling or blocking be found again, their rights as an ISP should be taken away, permanently.

What happened to people getting what they paid for..period! Companies like Comcast should start getting fined heavily when they are discovered to be “throttling” customers speeds or access or otherwise not providing what is being paid for. Basically, they are stealing from customers in my opinion…what else would anyone call it?

peace!

It Would Be Nice If The Cable Customer Had a CHOICE….

between 2 cable companys…….Then They Would Play Nice

Denny……

[...] FCC vs Comcast - Comments Welcome [...]

Considering that Comcast is fighting for last place in customer service of all cable providers, it is no wonder that their technology is suffering and their solution is get more money. I pay the ” triple threat” package (cable, phone and internet). And a little extra for a couple of premium channels. Cost? A meager (?!?) $150/month, give or take. Comcast system has more problems than they want to admit. I worked for an electronics company as an engineering assistant, technician, and product testing engineering consultant, doing work in technical writing , failure analysis on the Space Shuttle, and missile transponders. I think that there should not be any caps, period. If they cannot provide the service, get out of the frying pan, or achieve the goals faster so everyone is happy. Whenever their system crashes we all suffer. No phone, no tv and no internet. Do we get pro-rated for the lost time each month? Nope! Sometimes its as long as 24 hours that we lost tv reception and internet, but managed to have phone service. Their service literally is trash. One tech even broke the connection to my new tv set which they refused to replace. I would recommend that they TRY HARDER to increase their internet speed and leave the consumer alone. In the electronics business, it is suppose to get cheaper as technology gets better. It was only in 2000, when I was interfacing and consulting with the big boys of Intel, Microsoft, IOmega, HP, Lucent, & NEC. We were discussing that within the next 2 years, cell phones will be throw aways, because of the new technology that we were introducing into the market place. And it so it happened as predicted. I was involved in the 2.0 USB cable finalization on testing for the open world market. All I have left to say is Comcast….Wake up before you end up in a class action suit for trying to corner the market with unfounded monopoly control. We the consumers are tired of shelling out the cash for poor service. I wonder if they are in the oil business too? Thanks for letting me spit in their eye!

Ah…this would be related to the reason why I wouldn’t trust Comcast with ANY service ever again. When I got the cable yanked, the cable service was a fricking joke. (Actually, I’m still arguing with them…they say I owe them $60 and as I hadn’t been able to get half to two thirds of the promised stations to even come in due to the massive splitting of the signal that they do, I’m saying they owe me. We’ve been arguing for 7-8 years. ) In my apartment complex, they haven’t updated/upgraded their equipment in the last 15 years. Yep, the actual cables are all above ground, *stapled* to the building (and occasionally through the actual cable) and have at least three layers of paint on them. Frankly, I’d love to see them get slapped with multi-state class action lawsuits. One for every one of their shoddy business practices.
Thanks for letting me vent.