It’s one thing if a company earns a dominant market share in a region because consumers have voted with their wallets and decided that Company X is the best around and it’s the only one they want. It’s another when, in the case of the cable industry, that monopoly isn’t earned, but is instead the result of outdated regulations that force a certain company on consumers based on ZIP code. The introduction of higher-speed fiber-optic networks like Google Fiber and AT&T’s new experiment in Austin may shatter the concrete feet of a cable colossus like Comcast. [More]
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Man Pleads Guilty In Scheme That Scammed $2.4 Million In Free Comcast Service
By 10.2.13
Last year, police in Pennsylvania busted a ring of scammers — including some former Comcast employees — who had talked nearly 6,000 people into paying upwards of $200 to permanently have their Comcast cable bills reduced. Now the man described as being “second in command” of the ring has entered a guilty plea. [More]
FCC Tells Comcast To Put Bloomberg With The Rest Of The News Stations
By 9.27.13
There’s a practice known as “neighborhooding” in cable programming, in which cable/satellite providers tend to group similarly themed channels together. That’s why MTV and Vh1 were often right next to each other (because, believe it or not, they used to both air music videos!) and why the dedicated networks for the NFL, MLB, NHL, and NBA are usually within a few slots of each other (and usually within free-throw distance of ESPN). But sometimes a channel gets left out in the cold, apart from its similarly programmed stations. [More]
Ad Watchdog Voices Concerns About Claims Made In Comcast, T-Mobile Commercials
By 9.17.13
It’s not just consumers that watch TV commercials and exclaim, “I question the factual basis of the claims made by the company featured in this advertisement!” Sometimes, it’s competing businesses — especially those who feel they’ve been smeared in the ad — that take exception to what’s being said. In just the last two days, CenturyLink and AT&T each won minor, non-binding victories in disputes against Comcast and T-Mobile, respectively. [More]
Proposed Law Aims To Curb TV Blackouts, Let You Choose To Pay For Broadcast Channels
By 9.9.13
In the wake of the month-long blackout that affected 3 million CBS viewers in several major cities and Showtime subscribers nationwide, Congresswoman Anna Eshoo of California has drafted legislation that would give the Federal Communications Commission the authority to prevent blackouts, and give consumers the right to decide whether or not they want to pay for watching broadcast networks on cable. [More]
Comcast: We Are Not Relocating NBC To Philadelphia
By 9.9.13
In the last few years, a lot of people (including yours truly) have fled New York City and headed 100 miles down the road to Philadelphia. At the same time, Philly-based cable colossus Comcast was buying NBC, apparently sparking rumors that it would take the broadcaster out of its longtime home at Rockefeller Center in Manhattan and insert it into the mammoth, gleaming USB drive that is the Comcast tower. But it just ain’t so, say the boys from Kabletown. [More]
Comcast Service Center Gets Same Shoddy Installation Work That Customers Receive
By 9.5.13
Over the years we’ve heard too-numerous stories from Comcast customers about shoddy work performed by installation techs, though we had always assumed that these techs would dare not do such a slapdash job inside a Comcast office. We were apparently mistaken. [More]
Worst Company Champs Comcast & EA Team Up To Let You Play Games Through Set-Top Box
By 8.28.13
Two of the most-reviled companies in America — cable colossus Comcast and gaming Goliath Electronic Arts — appear to be working together, presumably to figure out a way to nickel-and-dime customers and then provide them horrible customer service, via a new gaming system that serves up “console-quality” games through Comcast’s set-top boxes. [More]
Comcast Tests Talking TV Listings For Visually Impaired Customers
By 8.28.13
In an effort to appeal to visually impaired consumers — and possibly get ahead of looming regulatory requirements — Comcast has been testing a version of its channel guide that actually speaks the titles of shows and movies available for watching. [More]
Comcast Gives Customer Bad Info, Slaps Him With $2,700 Fee
By 8.22.13
When you’re moving and your current cable provider tells you your new address is serviced by someone else, that should be the end of the story. But not for one Chicago-area man who was facing thousands of dollars in early termination fees because Comcast gave him incorrect information. [More]
Comcast Lawsuit Shows Why Mandatory Binding Arbitration Is Just Plain Evil
By 8.22.13
I know, I know… lots of you hear a phrase like “mandatory binding arbitration” and your eyes gloss over and your mind drifts off like it did when your high school history teacher tried to teach you about the Monroe Doctrine or the Teapot Dome scandal. And that’s exactly how companies like Comcast — and AT&T, Time Warner Cable, American Express, Sony, Microsoft, eBay, and many, many others want you to react. But here’s a decent example of why you should give a hoot about having your rights taken away by a few words in a contract you can’t possibly alter. [More]
Comcast Claims Copyright On Publicly Available Letter, Threatens To Sue Site For Publishing It
By 8.21.13
It’s no secret that Comcast is not the most loved company, but only a few days ago some folks were happy with Comcast after a court document showed it had provided information indicating that lawyers for porn producers had planted material on a file-sharing site. Now Comcast is claiming that its copyright has been violated by the news site that published the publicly available document. [More]
Comcast Letter Indicates Porn Troll Lawyers Planted Material On Pirate Bay
By 8.19.13
Not even a year ago, lawyer John Steele was touting himself as the “original copyright troll,” talking up his efforts to fight online porn pirates. Now his law firm is on the other end of legal boot, accused of planting copyrighted content online with the sole purpose of tracking — and threatening to sue — the people who shared those files. [More]
Comcast Tests Data Overage Fees In Additional Markets
By 8.9.13
In May 2012, Comcast announced it would eventually do away with its policy of throttling data speeds for home Internet users who routinely went over 250GB a month, and that it would instead start charging overage fees for customers who passed the 300GB threshold. The boys from Kabletown had been testing that model out in Nashville for quite some time, and now that test is expanding to at least three other markets. [More]
Comcast Wants To Turn Copyright Pirates Into Legitimate Content Buyers
By 8.6.13
Like a kindly neighborhood store owner who catches a shoplifter in the act and, rather than calling the cops, offers the wannabe thief the opportunity to buy what he was trying to steal, Comcast is reportedly working on copyright alert system that would identify content being illegally shared and say to the downloader, “Hey buddy, you know you can buy that season of Game of Thrones, don’t ya?” [More]
Comcast Now Testing Prepaid Cable Service, But With No Sports Channels Or HD
By 8.2.13
Earlier this year, Comcast started testing prepaid Internet service for consumers in the Philadelphia area. Now the nation’s cable provider is trying out a prepaid (non-HD) TV service that offers a few dozen channels (but no ESPNs, Nickelodeon, or MTV) and costs anywhere from $15/week to $45/month. [More]
Comcast Thinks $5 Discount Is All Customers Need To Give Up 95% Of Monthly Data Allotment
By 8.1.13
More than a year after Time Warner Cable somehow began suckering people into severely limiting their broadband usage to only 5GB/month — the equivalent of a few HD Netflix movies — for a mere $5 drop in monthly rates, Comcast has decided it wants in on this sucker’s bet too. [More]
It Takes 1,600 Words, 1 Hour, And 2 Chat Support Reps For Comcast To Tell Man He Can’t Get Service
By 7.31.13
Like it or not (and we know that some of you don’t), the use of online chat for customer support isn’t going away. It allows a CSR to work with multiple customers at once, copy/paste ready-made scripts, overcomes some of the language and accent barriers involved with internationally outsourced call centers, and can often easily be saved as a permanent record of the conversation. But if it’s going to be the future of customer service, online chat needs to get its head out of its rectum. [More]
