Verizon Announces $70 Fios Gigabit Service (Well, Almost Gigabit)

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After having FIOS for 10 years, I ditched Frontier and Verizon Wireless when Verizon sold out to Frontier. The service was very stable and all the speed I wanted/needed, but for some reason the saw fit to screw over millions of customers.

Happily with Charter Spectrum now. Not even the mailers offering me $400 to go back temps me.
 
I currently have FiOS at 50 Mbps for this advertised gigabit price. When I looked up my address their website claimed it would be $220 a month for 500 Mbps. Gigabit is $500 a month. This press release is a bunch of BS.
 


Sadly, fios pricing is highly localized and based on the specific competition in the area. Basically if you have a competitive alternative that offers no data caps, then you will get better options and lower prices, but if you have no competition that can properly compete (slow cable or 4G), then you are likely getting stuck with insane markups on the service.

It is bad to a point where your neighbors can be on the same beamsplitter that you are on, and because the cable provider is servicing that side of the block but not yours, verizon will offer then faster speeds at a lower price than you will get.
 
So my local provider (in Denmark) would like to sell me 300/300 Mbits for 51$ per month, or 500/500 Mbits for 66$ per month. What the hell is wrong with the capitalism in the US, it was supposed to bring cheaper prices all around.
 
Even though Verizon got huge tax breaks to provide fiber to their customers in my state, all I can get is 3 Mbs DSL for $35/month. Verizon is no longer rolling out fiber in my state, so this is all I'll ever get from them.
 
I think im happy with my 1gb for less than 20us$ a month 😉 Not to mention its extremely stable and have very good backbone towards the internet (reach 980ish up/down)
 


im close to your situation. verizon has "HIGH SPEED" dsl thats like 1.5-3. I called CS and asked them what year it was that they were claiming that is high speed. they didnt think that was funny...
 


Denmark is a small country, much easier to roll out internet throughout. The united states is vast with most area's having lower population density. Prices will reflect that. The infrastructure doesn't build itself, it costs alot of money, mostly to appease land owners to dig up their lawns.

Google tried to offer affordable internet, but ran into too many road blocks to continue construction, as well as the massive cost to build infrastructure in suburban and rural areas. They ditched that effort a few months ago. Now google wants to instead design a really good long range wifi internet system. It should offer competition to rural areas, the latency will be too high for gaming, but should be fine for everything else. This makes alot more sense, with far less infrastructure to build. Just bring fiber to the local town center, set up a huge tower and it'll serve a 50 mile radius with broadband.



 


Growing up during the days of 56k modems, 3mbps would have been considered super high speed internet. That was only the late 90's, early 2000's. The problem is, you don't actually have broadband in your area so you're at the limit of phone technology. DSL runs over phone lines, the technology maxes out at 3mbps if you're close enough to the telco switch. There's nothing they can do to increase that. Switch to comcast if you can get it, or look for a local WISP provider.

 
"Google tried to offer affordable internet, but ran into too many road blocks to continue construction"

Yes, they ran into AT&T and Verizon refusing to adhere to the laws regarding access to the poles. As someone living in Austin, it is incredibly annoying to learn that AT&T was being so obstructionist.
 


Charter isn't very good where I'm at. They recently bought out Brighthouse, which I had, then cut my internet speeds and are now charging an extra $25/month for it.
 
This is complete vaporware, I live in the DC metro area where we have Verizon FIOS on every block and I am a current FIOS 150Mbps customer. This offer doesn't exist anywhere out here, instead they charge us a "discounted" fee of $79.99 per month for 150Mbps, goes even higher for 300/500. It's "discounted" because after one or two years the price goes up to the "normal" price of $119.99 per month.
 


At least you have FiOS. Best we have is Cox and their Gigablast is not even in every area (Phoenix). Tempe only got it because they were being offered Google Fiber and so Cox rushed in and installed Gigablast.

But even Chandler, one of Intels largest fronts, doesn't have it or anything close to it.

Hell even Dickinson ND has gigabit fiber due to the oil boom up there.
 
"So my local provider (in Denmark) would like to sell me 300/300 Mbits for 51$ per month, or 500/500 Mbits for 66$ per month. What the hell is wrong with the capitalism in the US, it was supposed to bring cheaper prices all around."

The issue is the US Government is not allowing true capitalism with ISPs. They have built in areas of coverage. So the ISPs have government sanctioned monopolies just like our Health Insurance Providors.
 
Capitalism if alive and well here in the good ol' USA. Capitalism basically states that companies will sell their products for he highest price they can get away with and consumers will pay the highest price they are willing to based on their preferences. Capitalism has nothing to do with fair business practices or government intervention, both of which greatly effect the consumer.

Because we as consumers have limited suppliers of utilities, whether that be electricity, water, power, or land based ISP's, pricing for these services is greatly dependent on multiple factors. Government oversight and regulation is the greatest factor. The control over older utilities, like water and power, is huge. Southern Cal Edison can't raise their rates at will because they have to follow guidelines put in place by regulations. Internet providers do not have those same guidelines. The only factor "governing" them is competition. So in places with no competition, the pricing is outrageous and the quality of service is severely lacking.

The cellular market is the only utility I can think of where the consumer is "winning". Mind you, I use "winning" very lightly. You still have cell coverage as the limiting factor, but in most urban areas the cellular customer will have a equal quality service from the major carriers. If you don't like Verizon's pricing, then hop on over to Tmobile or Sprint. Cellular is the closest utility that demonstrates "Capitalism" because it has the largest number of competitors, least government regulation and the lowest infrastructure cost.

As for Denmark, I would venture that the government has a huge say in how ISP's conduct business. I think you have the wrong idea about Capitalism. It doesn't guarantee the lowest price and best service for the customer. Only competition does that. So in industries with little competition, whether that be from government oversight or prohibitive capital expenditures, the consumer is going to pay more.
 


Yeah but the cost is obscene and they gouge you badly after a year or two. What happens out here is everyone switch's between Verizon and Cox every year or two because ALL those advertised prices are only for the first year or two, then the real price kicks in which is usually $40~60 user more a month.
 
As much as I disagreed with the Obama administration on most policies, I completely agreed with the FCC under him to title ISP's as utilities. The Internet is no longer a "fad" that only caters to the occasional computer geek. Most companies and businesses RELY and DEPEND on affordable, reliable Internet access for every day operation. Just as much as they rely on electricity, water, or sewage. The ISP's are out of control and somebody needs to reign them in. The only way that works, IMHO, would be to follow something similar to how natural gas is distributed. Where I'm at in OH, my gas company is Columbia Gas. They are the ones who are responsible for getting the gas from the provider, for which I can choose the cheapest provider, to my house. They are only responsible for the infrastructure, not the actual gas. I believe the same could apply to ISP's. Spectrum would be a distributer, but providers could tap into Spectrum's infrastructure to provide Internet access or Media content. I could be wrong, and correct me if I am, but I believe that is how some internet access is provided in Europe. That is why Google failed in its bid to provide internet access with its services. ATT and TW (at the time) gave them the big ole' middle finger because they owned the infrastructure in those areas.
 


That's why I never bundle and only get internet. I stream what I want to watch anyways. I pay $100/month for the best Cox has which is still weaker than a mid tier FiOS connection since it is still going through copper cable instead of fiber.
 


Corporations work together against the people. Corporations also affect our laws and make BS possible using lobbyists. Political tools and lobbyists are why banks were allowed to package toxic mortgage loans and sell them to investors.

Example: The last 3 places I've lived had 1 option for cable tv and broadband internet.
Why?
Local utility companies work with cities to wire a city with cable and internet and in exchange that company is allowed to have a local monopoly. (Which is against the law but collectively America looks the other way. I'm guessing the cable companies have some kind of law they lobbied for to allow them to hold local monopolies and charge whatever BS prices they deem fit.)

Thankfully, Comcast finally has competition in my neighborhood. This also means my prices went down when the other company stepped in. (The competition wired our neighborhood with fiber optic lines.) Right now I have the best deal comcast has ever offered me. (...because they are a bunch of greedy ***holes.)
 
I don't think the "big expense for distance" argument holds water. I live in Canada - a country with slightly more size than the US, with less than a tenth of the population. Our infrastructure is still cheaper than yours.

For example, I live in a town of only 35,000. Despite that, I have a Gigabit internet company for $80CAD (~$60USD), multiple companies running fibre optic at less than Gb speeds for cheap (I'm at 100Mb/s without cap and with basic TV for $50CAD, or about $35USD).

I think the infrastructure excuse is just a justification for your companies to screw you.
 
Can someone educate me on network speed? The theoretical max speed of the 802.11ac standard is 1000MB/sec. But you will never really get that. Most of the time, you'll get maybe half that if you're lucky and sitting an inch away from the router.

What then is the point of overpaying so that your network is 1000MB/sec if all your wireless devices will function at half that? I only have my desktop hard wired by CAT5 cable to the router.
 
Also, my cable modem is an outdated Actiontec MI424-WR that I only use for routing (not wireless transmission). It's probably bottle necking the 75MB/sec FIOS speed I'm supposed to be getting from Verizon right?
 
Your population in Canada is highly concentrated along the U.S. border and isn't spread across most of the Northern territories. It's a lot easier to cover concentrated areas than all of the rural areas that are spread all over the entire U.S.
 


Yes, this would primarily be for wired connections. However, 802.11ad (60GHz wifi) is already available on some devices, which supports speeds well beyond 1Gbit/s.
 
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