ISPs tell FCC that mistreated users would switch to one of their many other options.
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ISPs say their “excellent customer service” is why users don’t switch providers
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I guess they will add Starlink to your list. Maybe that is their argument. (still isn't a good argument of course)
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Right... even in the Midwest this statement is BS. The options, for a long time, was shitty service 1 or shitty service 2. With shitty service 1, you pay more, have it go down for maintenance with no warning during critical calls, and have data caps even cell services would call stingy. With shitty service 2, you get all of those same features, but now the internet may just not work for a day at random and service that literally mocks you just for wanting a damaged line fixed. Good luck wanting your service prorated for the lost time!
Nah, the instant Imon was available, i think half the town i live in switched immediately. It was funny watching mediabomb scrambling to lure people back. "Hey... how about we charge you what you pay now for two years (then raise the price)?" "You gonna get rid of caps, actually give me my speed, and let me know when you need to take the system down?" "Uhhhh.... didn't i mention you can bundle a land line for $100 more? Cable channels you dont watch for another $200?" door slam
Competition is a beautiful thing. Mediacom and their local buddy fought hard to keep Imon out. Too bad many of us were begging them to move in, saying, literally, we would be happy to foot the bill to have whole new infrastructure just for them to be put in. They did, and they are flourishing here.
Nah, the instant Imon was available, i think half the town i live in switched immediately. It was funny watching mediabomb scrambling to lure people back. "Hey... how about we charge you what you pay now for two years (then raise the price)?" "You gonna get rid of caps, actually give me my speed, and let me know when you need to take the system down?" "Uhhhh.... didn't i mention you can bundle a land line for $100 more? Cable channels you dont watch for another $200?" door slam
Competition is a beautiful thing. Mediacom and their local buddy fought hard to keep Imon out. Too bad many of us were begging them to move in, saying, literally, we would be happy to foot the bill to have whole new infrastructure just for them to be put in. They did, and they are flourishing here.
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That happened where I live too. There was a very public pole toppled by the side of the road, and the ISP sent out internal communication that actually it's fine that pole is hanging off a mountain, because the wires still work. They're just partially on the ground now.
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Maybe they'll get serious about building out a network once they're forced to sell Chrome and need another way to mine customers for their data.
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I live in the UK, and we're too big to have a decent broadband infrastructure just from market forces. The only reason there's any decent broadband in most rural areas is because of government infrastructure investment. And we're still not really managing to finish the job.
The USA has a much lower overall population density, there's no way you get a decent communications infrastructure without it being built as public infrastructure, no company would go near it if they have to run fibre for fifty miles to get to a town with 100 people in it.
But just wait, the FCC under Trump will be quite happy to let Starlink pick up all those rural users.
The USA has a much lower overall population density, there's no way you get a decent communications infrastructure without it being built as public infrastructure, no company would go near it if they have to run fibre for fifty miles to get to a town with 100 people in it.
But just wait, the FCC under Trump will be quite happy to let Starlink pick up all those rural users.
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Bullshit! I have 3 fiber providers in my area, but as a tenant in an appartment building, there is an agreement between the owner of the building and the ISP granting them monopoly on fiber. I've been trying to organize tenants to pressure the company to get out of that agreement, but it has a huge penalty and ends in 7 years. 
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For the UK experience:
Thought it was worth shopping around since we are out of our 24 month contract for broadband.
Used a comparison site, found the offer I wanted in about ten minutes (£15 a month less, double the speed).
Went to the ISPs site, accetped the offer, gave my details, they linked it with my existing broadband contract.
Picked a date for change over, all sorted. The new ISP arranges everything with the old ISP. Glorious.
Granted, it wasn't always this easy, and it looks like a new system for quick changing providers was only fully rolled out Septermber this year (similar to how they rolled it out for utilities a while back). But still. It is clearly not an insurmoutnable challenge to make things easy for the consumer.
I can only feel bad for our American cousins (you know, on top of the pre-existing feeling bad of late...)
Thought it was worth shopping around since we are out of our 24 month contract for broadband.
Used a comparison site, found the offer I wanted in about ten minutes (£15 a month less, double the speed).
Went to the ISPs site, accetped the offer, gave my details, they linked it with my existing broadband contract.
Picked a date for change over, all sorted. The new ISP arranges everything with the old ISP. Glorious.
Granted, it wasn't always this easy, and it looks like a new system for quick changing providers was only fully rolled out Septermber this year (similar to how they rolled it out for utilities a while back). But still. It is clearly not an insurmoutnable challenge to make things easy for the consumer.
I can only feel bad for our American cousins (you know, on top of the pre-existing feeling bad of late...)
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2 is 2 more than many of the areas we started having these discussions about 20 years ago. Fucking bought and paid and obstructionist Congress monsters.
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competition is slowly making its way to my area. there is fiber in my front yard.
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I hate my ISP.
Unfortunately they are are the only high speed service available in my area. Hopefully there will be competition shortly and I'll be swtching the second I am able to.
Unfortunately they are are the only high speed service available in my area. Hopefully there will be competition shortly and I'll be swtching the second I am able to.
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The only way this is true, is if you happen to have consistent enough service that you do t think about it. Once the service goes down and you need to contact them to fix something, the nightmare begins.
FiOS was working fine for years, and at a good price. Then it started flaking out. Speeds jumped around wildly. I shared my speed test logs proving the wild jumps in speeds, but it still took them an hour on the phone to admit the problem was real, and that they needed to do something about it.
FiOS was working fine for years, and at a good price. Then it started flaking out. Speeds jumped around wildly. I shared my speed test logs proving the wild jumps in speeds, but it still took them an hour on the phone to admit the problem was real, and that they needed to do something about it.
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My options for hi speed internet in my area are Charter Spectrum. There's ATT if I wanted that sweet 1999 internet experience or Dish if I want that sweet 2001 internet experience
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Tell me about it. When COVID hit I had the old 50Mbps package (I never upgraded from the original 10Mbpss package, they force upgraded me for free!). Somehow 2 kids could do online school, my wife remote teach her students and I could work without any interruption. When everyone went back to school in the Fall everything ground to a halt. Of course they recommended the gigabit speed to resolve my issue...
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Adherence to reality has never been the strong suit of the telco industry, and in today's fact-averse environment, we can only expect this to further deteriorate.
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Can confirm. Been two years since I switched to Google Fiber. Total of two outages, and both were planned maintenance. But said planned maintenance was sent as a notification ahead of time, no surprise "wait, net's out? Can't reach my work servers? What?" out of nowhere for seemingly no reason like with Spectrum. And all of this stability is through a couple of pretty critical weather events that knocked down other services. When my house had to switch to internal battery due to power being out post-hurricane for about 2 days, 'net stayed on.
And the one time I had to call support, it was a sub-5-minute wait, and the issue was resolved on the first call.
As much as I don't like Google for other reasons, their fiber offering has been top-notch.
It still irks me to no end that my choices are Google Fiber, Spectrum, or Dial-up, and nothing else, though.
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My choices are Comcast or Starlink. I chose the shit sandwich over the giant douche.
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Pardon the distasteful comparison, but an ISP saying ‘excellent service is why consumers don’t switch service’ is like saying someone who assaults people doesn’t get reported to the cops because the victims like being abused. You get the idea. Now…coffee.
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And the DMV's customer service is so good I always use them to renew my license and registration. 
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Like most people, I have TWO choices in my area. Mildly bad, and worse. Maybe 3 if I count ATT which doesn't offer competitive speeds here. Only reason i haven't switched, lately, is one of the ISP's has a terrible record. Outages every month, sometimes for days. Heck, they just got one of the 2-3 to run lines to the rest of the county. So, most of my county has one actual choice. Maybe if they sold us what they were smoking, we'd all see how great they claim to be....
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I've worked for multiple ISPs, one of them was even good(-ish), but this is so hilariously full of shit I can't believe those ghouls actually said it.
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I don't think this is actually true. Not that the ISPs and cable providers don't have a lock-in monopoly; I just do not think most people are aware of how egregious it is. Not only doesn't it occur to them that the monopoly exists, even if they do notice it in their case they have no idea that it's the same way across the country. Or that the ISPs are benefiting from legal shenanigans made in favor of the cable providers.
There's a lot of ignorance on the topic amongst the laymen which is why the cable providers get away with so much.
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Nono, that was just a typo. It was 50Kbps, but one side effect of COVID is too make broadband networks magically faster
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I moved at the end of September. The only choices were Mediacom or Metronet. No way I was putting up with any kind of data cap nonsense. I went with Metronet and the experience has been great so far. The installer showed up, ran the line into the house where I wanted it. I also requested a static IP to avoid CGNAT. Customer service provided me with the info, I configured my firewall and it's been great!
I usually try to avoid customer service and solve my own issues. I had CenturyLink DSL a long time ago and only called their customer support twice during that time. Was really annoying to have to get through the 1st level tech following the script and get to someone that had a clue.
I usually try to avoid customer service and solve my own issues. I had CenturyLink DSL a long time ago and only called their customer support twice during that time. Was really annoying to have to get through the 1st level tech following the script and get to someone that had a clue.
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I HATE CENTURYLINK!!
What they did to my clients in 2023 by essentially turning off email client access to centurytel.net addresses was horrible, and the people who were most affected were the ones least able to cope with the change. 20 year users of a service, and they got screwed.
CENTURYLINK CAN DIE IN A FIRE, and Ptera Fiber is doing a good job of seeing that happen where I live. Davis Communications (cable internet) should be doing better, too.
What they did to my clients in 2023 by essentially turning off email client access to centurytel.net addresses was horrible, and the people who were most affected were the ones least able to cope with the change. 20 year users of a service, and they got screwed.
CENTURYLINK CAN DIE IN A FIRE, and Ptera Fiber is doing a good job of seeing that happen where I live. Davis Communications (cable internet) should be doing better, too.
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Sounds like it is time to get customers to brigade ISP customer support sites and the FCC complaints page.
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So glad the ISP's in my country are required to share fibre access (after a year's mandatory sub with the ISP that laid the fiber, to recover costs). I paid $350 for the installation; had to dig 25m of ditch through the wild lawn outside, but worth it. Basically a public ethernet jack, and they were kind enough to add an extra RJ45-to-RJ45 point from the router upstairs, then outside with proper cable, to the downstairs living room.
Could switch providers now but Telenor has excellent IPv6 support, offer a full duplex 1 Gbps (not all do, weirdly enough) and the prices are pretty similar anyways.
e: also IPTV for the old one downstairs
Could switch providers now but Telenor has excellent IPv6 support, offer a full duplex 1 Gbps (not all do, weirdly enough) and the prices are pretty similar anyways.
e: also IPTV for the old one downstairs
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there is no choice
evil won
its lessor if 2 evils
100% of the money you earn goes to evil
cant even use cash cuz 9 outta 10 times I use it at a place Im forced to shop walmart sams that make 1+Billion per day dont even have change, so I either gotta just round up & let devils keep it or use the devils card
so since I only go in for a few items & they cant even be bothered to hire a cashier to accept my patronage but have no problem paying 30+ people to stare at customers, point them towards where cashiers should be, block isles shopping for fat lazy people getting water & cat litter delivered to their 2K a month hamster cage on the 5th floor
just fill up a cart with meat, get your milk you were forced to walk a mile for cuz humans stupid lets create a maze in our store so we can try & manipulate the dumb customers that we dont need anymore since we anti co petivly put everyone out of biz
check out the $3 milk leave cart filled with $200+of spoiling product
ooops changed my mind
im sure theyll find some human from a country that pays $2 a day to illegally put the spoiling product back for sale & its diareah time for whoever gets that meat
see if u want to turn hunting & gathering into a game us dumb patrons can play too
spitting in customers facings & degrading the brick & motor experience to push people to apps & online is so clever they hate humans so much they think people actually choose to shop there and work there
deli workers that cant even read the menu?
cashiers that cant figure out the register?
shits pure comedy
nah its all force
but congrats not having any human to accept my patronage
it only leads to them losing money everytime im forced to get calories
they so smart they figured out humans need food & shelter such wise business people
evil won
its lessor if 2 evils
100% of the money you earn goes to evil
cant even use cash cuz 9 outta 10 times I use it at a place Im forced to shop walmart sams that make 1+Billion per day dont even have change, so I either gotta just round up & let devils keep it or use the devils card
so since I only go in for a few items & they cant even be bothered to hire a cashier to accept my patronage but have no problem paying 30+ people to stare at customers, point them towards where cashiers should be, block isles shopping for fat lazy people getting water & cat litter delivered to their 2K a month hamster cage on the 5th floor
just fill up a cart with meat, get your milk you were forced to walk a mile for cuz humans stupid lets create a maze in our store so we can try & manipulate the dumb customers that we dont need anymore since we anti co petivly put everyone out of biz
check out the $3 milk leave cart filled with $200+of spoiling product
ooops changed my mind
im sure theyll find some human from a country that pays $2 a day to illegally put the spoiling product back for sale & its diareah time for whoever gets that meat
see if u want to turn hunting & gathering into a game us dumb patrons can play too
spitting in customers facings & degrading the brick & motor experience to push people to apps & online is so clever they hate humans so much they think people actually choose to shop there and work there
deli workers that cant even read the menu?
cashiers that cant figure out the register?
shits pure comedy
nah its all force
but congrats not having any human to accept my patronage
it only leads to them losing money everytime im forced to get calories
they so smart they figured out humans need food & shelter such wise business people
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If they have professional IT staff, is there any chance of a wired Ethernet connection? It seems to me that a wired connection would remove one layer of instability.
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Now we will get 4 more years of ISP not caring. I once tried to call comcrap because the cable broke and was in the street and they did nothing. the cops came because it was causing traffic problems on the street. their answer was to cut the cable, because even though a Comcast truck was just down the street, they would not do anything. So no internet for a week. it took 30 minutes to string a new cable. That ended my time at comcast. t-mobile wireless works. its not fast and at night it gets slower, but its not gone down and the price is a rip off but its cheaper than comcrap. Still in the daytime, I get 250mbits/sec down and near 45 to 50 up. What really pissing is we got 2 fiber co's att and iqfiber, but they only pull to selected neighborhoods, aka where the rich live. frigging sad.
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Wait, wait, wait, everyone!! ARE YOU TELLING ME that corps and people include statements in court and federal agency filings that are COMPLETE LIES, and that there are NO CONSEQUENCES for lying? Color me shocked!
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The number is 3, according to theory.
In real life, it’s hard work making sure the theoretical assumptions hold, so you can have very large numbers of entrants in the marketplace and still not have a free market.
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What I like most is my bill is $70/month, every month. Its pricey, but I KNOW what my bill is. My last ISP would change the price nearly every single year, at complete random.
Also, the included cloud storage is nice. Makes the price not feel as bad.
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Up until 3 months ago we had the option of Comcast and ancient DSL. We now have the option of Comcast, ATT Fiber, & Ezee a regional Fiber provider. Our first act was dropping Comcast and switched to our regional provider.
I talked with Comcast to cancel my account of 20+ years and was told we were good and would get our cancelation within a week. A week and a half goes by with nothing so I call them again. I go through the whole thing again and was informed by the 2nd rep that the 1st person put the cancelation in but "did not process it". So they processed the order and added a additional $10 credit for the trouble. Both calls were at 30 mins of time which should have been a few clicks of my mouse.
I talked with Comcast to cancel my account of 20+ years and was told we were good and would get our cancelation within a week. A week and a half goes by with nothing so I call them again. I go through the whole thing again and was informed by the 2nd rep that the 1st person put the cancelation in but "did not process it". So they processed the order and added a additional $10 credit for the trouble. Both calls were at 30 mins of time which should have been a few clicks of my mouse.
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