Century Link also gives worse service than Comcast. When CL took over my phone company it only took me two months to get so sick of them that I switched to Comcast for phone too. Which saved money compared to CL but also provided better sound quality better service and more reliable voice selection. Yeah and old fashioned phone system works all the time, even when electricity is out - until someone who takes it over who won't do maintenance and then it goes out for 48 hours every time it rains. Which in Olympia WA means we were without phone service more often that we had it. In a few years Comcast may be left as the best service around, not because they are good ,but because everyone else ends up being so much worse.
What? I'm not allowed to hit people? Wesley: Not people capable of genocide. Angel: Those are exactly the types of people I should be allowed to hit!
'Just Rewards (2)'
Buffistechnology 3: "Press Some Buttons, See What Happens."
Got a question about technology? Ask it here. Discussion of hardware, software, TiVos, multi-region DVDs, Windows, Macs, LINUX, hand-helds, iPods, anything tech related. Better than any helpdesk!
Typo Boy - Aug 13, 2012 12:59:06 pm PDT #20690 of 25501
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.
flea - Aug 13, 2012 1:48:03 pm PDT #20691 of 25501
information libertarian
Why do these companies get away with being so crap? I thought capitalist competition was supposed to mean excellence, right? Do they have local monopolies, or is there some kind of poor-service conspiracy, like price-fixing but for bad customer service?
Typo Boy - Aug 13, 2012 1:51:52 pm PDT #20692 of 25501
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.
Well in my area comast or century link are the only two choices. In a city you have more choices. But yeah competions is mostly a joke. And really markets are a lousy way to get infrastructure, cause competion will be limited even in the best cases. There is a reaons for the concept "public good".
meara - Aug 13, 2012 2:28:24 pm PDT #20693 of 25501
They have local monopolies, often. In my neighborhood, our options for internet and cable are:
1) CenturyLink for phone and DSL, with DirecTV as cable (if you can have a satellite) 2) "Wave Broadband" for cable, cable internet, and VoIP phone
Comcast is available in other parts of the city, but there's a city agreement that our neighborhood gets "Wave" (formerly Broadstripe) and the rest get Comcast. I would LOVE to have Comcast back.
le nubian - Aug 13, 2012 2:31:52 pm PDT #20694 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."
yeah, there is functionally no competition in most areas. For example, I would love to have Verizon FIOS, but no cookie as it isn't in this area.
So if I want high speed Internet, it is TW. Verizon is proud of its DSL, but it isn't fast enough for the Internet traffic we need at times.
omnis_audis - Aug 13, 2012 2:41:29 pm PDT #20695 of 25501
omnis, pursue. That's an order from a shy woman who can use M-16. - Shir
Why do these companies get away with being so crap? I thought capitalist competition was supposed to mean excellence, right? Do they have local monopolies, or is there some kind of poor-service conspiracy, like price-fixing but for bad customer service?Very much so. IIRC from Communications class in college, a company says "it will cost $x to install the infrastucture to provide cable service to your community. In order to break even on that project, we need xx% of the population to be subscribers. In order to obtain that, we need a monopoly." So, you will find larger cities will segment the city, so the north side get TW and the south side gets Comcast. Then Dish came along, and changed things. So the cable companies went to congress and got a law passed saying that the satellite companies can't provide local over-the-air programming. And there was some crazy law that if a residence had cable within the past (I forget time period) they couldn't get dish, or pay a fee, or some such. I think that has been over turned. But it greatly slowed the development of the dish subscribers. Fiber changes things, as it's data, that can do video. Just like cable is video that can do data. And there was legislation restricting what various companies are allowed to offer, in order to maintain the monopoly.
All that is gross over simplification. And I confess, may be slightly inaccurate, as I am recalling info taught in college 15-20 years ago. But, it gives you an idea of how the bullshit got started.
Vortex - Aug 13, 2012 3:25:51 pm PDT #20696 of 25501
"Cry havoc and let slip the boobs of war!" -- Miracleman
Took my iPad into the store this weekend, the camera wasn't working. They gave me a new one. Relatively painless, but they don't have screen protectors in the store, so I have to buy a new one. Kinda shitty that I'm out $30. And I will bet that this happens to everyone who has to get an iPad replacement.
Gudanov - Aug 13, 2012 5:00:34 pm PDT #20697 of 25501
Coding and Sleeping
Now that I'm pretty much only using Linux at work, I'm finding that I'm digging Gnome 3. It's cool they've done something that's not really like Windows or OS/X.
Zenkitty - Aug 13, 2012 6:10:45 pm PDT #20698 of 25501
Every now and then, I think I might actually be a little odd.
I have CenturyLink for my phone, and they're fine as long as I don't have any problems... but they are expensive. I'm thinking of switching to Vonage. I'm leery of trusting my phone service to Comcast.
§ ita § - Aug 13, 2012 7:11:32 pm PDT #20699 of 25501
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.
Has anyone here used Graboid. I followed a couple...interesting links (no, not like that. Stop it.) that asked me to install it. Their web page is less than informational.
The web seems to be saying use it, don't use them...their own web site's testimonials are some of the weakest sauce that ever got sauced...I don't even know.