New York Is Right to Kick Out Spectrum, and I'm Terrified

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Status
Not open for further replies.
Must be a regional thing. I've been with Spectrum since they bought TimeWarner Cable here in Ohio, & I've had zero issues with the service: no outages, no slowdowns, no caps...& zero rate hikes. If anything, they actually improved my service, as they upgraded their minimum speed from 60Mbps to 100Mbps with no change in the monthly rate.

Maybe it's because I only have Internet, though -- no VoIP or cable TV bundled with it, so introductory rate, nothing like that.
 
You are a thrall of the state. This is a story about the government trampling on private property rights, but you use the phrase "By all rights," indicating your belief that no such rights exist. "Giant corporations" are evil and, if they're going to exist at all in your estimation, they will only do so at the pleasure of the government and according to whatever arbitrary demands it makes. You want more ISP's and faster internet, but you don't care at all about the people who provide it for you, which includes the investors whose rights you are so cavalier with. But continue on this path and see where it leads. You don't want DSL, and you don't want to pay for Verizon's FIOS router - but you will end up paying, one way or another, and you will not have anyone to blame but yourself and your like-minded neighbors.
 
Charter not living up to its promises is one thing, but that can be handled with fines or heavy oversight. Kicking them out of the state is entirely another and kills the free market. The government is basically saying that they decide who is free to do business, and that isn't capitalism or a free market economy at all. This is market dictatorship. Cable companies need to be held accountable for their practices, they need to be forced to treat the consumers better. There is a lot wrong with the way that cable companies deal within the US, but kicking them out of areas is actually worse for the consumers. If anything they need to be forced to compete. This crazy oligopoly they have is insanely anti-consumer, but no one is doing anything about that. Now, they are taking that oligopoly and encouraging even less competition.

This is as far from a good thing as you can get and we should all be very worried when the state decides it has this much power.
 
Now, I'm not familiar with the specifics, but say New York State has antitrust laws enacted by their legislature which is duly elected by the people then is is not constitutionally at the government's pleasure but the people's pleasure. If the people of New York State agreed to let Comcast pass antitrust scrutiny by promising something in return, then New York State rightly should levy a penalty against Comcast for failing to meet that promise, effectively a breech of contract. I don't know if ejecting them from New York is the appropriate measure, but that's a different matter altogether.
 
since most new yorkers don't have a choice in ISPs it would be nice if they created a cable co-op where the customers get to vote on the direction of the company. The more you pay the more shares you get in the company. so if you just have internet you get one vote; tv internet and phone 3.
 
You do not need to purchase a router from verizon fios, the only time you need their router, is if you also use their TV service , since for some reason, it gets everything directly from the ONT except the on-demand content and guide data, in which case, you connect the verizon router behind the actual good router that you want to use. (just change its local IP to anything other than 192.168.1.1, and then disable its DHCP, then connect it as LAN to LAN.

If you need the remote access functions on the DVR, then you will also need to forward ports 69, 1701, 35000, 63145 to the DVR.
 
When I 1st got cable it was $100 and I have Phone, TV with 2 DVRs, and Internet. Now 20 years later My bill is $110 and all I have is Internet. As they kept raising my prices I found cheaper alternatives. Now there are no other broad band ISPs in my area so when Spectrum raised my prices $20 and dropped my speed I had no options. Funny how ISPs never seem to have overlapping converge. I think in this case NY should setup it's own internet service and fine Spectrum to pay for setting it up.
 
JUSTIN.M.BEAUVAIS: It is heavy handed, but the deal was made as a condition of the merger. Now since the condition was not met, New York is saying "undo the merger, but since you probably won't, then sell this market to another."
A fine would either be too small to make Charter do anything, and/or it would end up impacting the customers by raising rates and delaying upgrades further. Maybe a different company will be more motivated. (Or maybe the new provider will be Comcast, and everyone will end up worse off. But that seems unlikely, if NY was worried about one monopoly, they won't just hand it over to another.)
 

The only quibble I have with your remarks is this, The purchaser agreed to the states demands in the first place and then didn't live up to them. They should never have agreed in the first place. Anti-trusters need to start having companies say no. By doing that, they could politely tell the the anti-trusters where to stick it. "We'll let your internet service whither and die before we agree to your demands". People forget that innovation costs money, yet they treat ISPs as, more or less, publicly regulated utilities.

 
You can use your own router as long as you DO NOT have FiOS TV.
OR if you do have FiOS TV, get a TiVO.
just plug the ethernet jack into the ONT and you're set. Also you gotta call customer support but in my testing, I really like their router.
 


Wow, Comcast is $40 per month for 60mbps internet. 60mbps is actually plenty more than a majority of users need unless you have multiple people in the house streaming 4k video. I have the 300mbps plan for $75 per month with 12mbps upload, but if I needed to I can get gigabit internet for $105 per month with 35mbps upload.

 
DSL is as good as cable. The speeds are comparable and usually DSL offer better bandwidth limits.

You guys are nowhere like Canada. Here there is only one cable provider by region because they own the network. All the other offers are third party having contracts with the main network owner. That means most of the price don't vary more than 10% at max. It is a damn monopoly. Everybody charge around 65$ canadian for a mere 25 MB/s speed... you are lucky to have unlimited bandwidth at that price.
 
They (New York) should have made the conditions of failure to meet the requirements of the merger a part of the original contract. Now I think the best case, feasible or not, New York takes over that infrastructure and unbundles those users connected. Allowing many new providers to jump in on what would probably be the largest unbundled cable network in the US. The FCC is probably going to jump in here and cry foul but they gave up their rights to monitor/control those networks. Now it falls to the FTC. I think there is a greater chance that the FTC sides with New York, since Charter is in violation of their contract.

To comment on other free market statements. It's not a free market when you have a captive audience and little to no competition.
 


DSL only has 1mbps upload. That's far too slow for my needs. I need to send files to a remote location, I have it set to happen at 12am every night, and it's usually done around 4-5am every morning, using my 12mbps upload speed. At 1mbps, it would take 12 times as long, and would take several days to complete, that simply doesn't work for me.

Also, uploading photos to websites like shutterfly just to buy photos would be a huge pain!!!! Also, if you upload any videos to youtube, you would wait for an eternity.

 

In my experience 3rd party providers in Canada are significantly cheaper than the big ISPs. I'm paying $33/month for 25/2.5 Mbps down/up.

Comparing prices between my ISP and Shaw, 75/7.5 Mbps down/up (unlimited usage) would cost me $50/month first 6 months, $55 after. Going with Shaw (500 GB usage), it would be $55/month for the 3 months, $90 after (going with the monthly option rather than the 2 year contract).

Situation was similar in the previous Canadian city I lived in. I think the prices for the big ISPs typically include modem/router rental, but even factoring in that cost you're way ahead going with a 3rd party provider as long as you look at the long term rather than just short term costs.
 
For the Spectrum apologists, why should Spectrum get to violate agreements made with the state of New York and remain in business? The whole point is that New York said the merger has to benefit a specific number and type of people, or they will essentially reject the merger. Spectrum failed to deliver, so New York is holding up their end of the bargain.

As for hurting choice, I believe that ultimately this will most likely not change anything. Spectrum will probably spin-off a new subsidiary to handle the New York market that is legally separate from Spectrum. People will probably not have to change a thing, but the letterhead at the top of their bills will probably just have a new name/logo.
 
I don't get why anyone would be on Charter's side. They agreed to the terms of the merger and didn't mean the conditions. What is the point of any rule, law, or statute if someone is able to ignore and do whatever they want. These requirements were to benefit the people of the state. Rural people are rarely served if at all because companies won't invest unless pushed. The got the push and fell asleep. No one forced Charter, they agreed to the terms.
 


Speaking as a radical free market/limited government fellow. I agree with you, and I think most people with beliefs like mine would, just I would have suggested that Charter never agree to the pre-conditions and told the state of New York to pound sand.
 
You need to correct something: 154000 customer to be added by end of *2019* - They were not required to have them all up TODAY. They've done 86000 so far but have not met each years milestone. This is purely political and digraceful
 


They actually are claiming to have met the deadlines after an initial fine for missing the first one:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/07/ny-threatens-to-kick-charter-out-of-the-state-after-broadband-failures/

Charter agreed to a fine and a revised buildout schedule last year after missing a deadline to pass 36,250 homes and businesses within one year of the merger approval. The company says it has met subsequent deadlines, but the PSC says it hasn't.

Specifically, a PSC audit found that 14,000 homes and businesses claimed by Charter as new construction were ineligible. For example, Charter's "new" broadband deployments in New York City included addresses that the company was already required to serve as part of the franchise agreements, the commission said in March.
Click to expand...

And it appears Charter has now at least tacitly admitted they were double-dipping on their new customer figures (by counting new customers in areas they were already serving, outside the merger agreement) because they walked back that 86000 figure this week:

https://www.timesunion.com/business/article/Rhodes-says-Charter-is-gaslighting-its-customers-13096933.php

Charter spokesman Andrew Russell once again defended the company and its Spectrum service from criticism from the PSC and Rhodes, who have claimed that many of the additional lines that it built in the state are duplicates or are in areas of the state not covered under the agreement.

"The fact is that Spectrum has built out our broadband network to more than 61,000 unserved or underserved homes since the merger," Russell said. "We find it baffling that the PSC thinks that some New Yorkers count and others don't, given their belief that access to broadband is essential for economic development and social equity."
Click to expand...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom