TonyT

bicker

In specific areas, at this time. The plan is to upgrade services available all over the country, eventually, but for now, many of us need to wait.

Companies always work to fulfill their fiduciary responsibility to their owners, but this specific change is also for subscribers... If you must have someone to blame, blame ME because I want Travel Channel in HD, and I want DOCSIS 3.0, and the only way for companies to offer more channels in HD and super-fast Internet is by getting rid of the analog service (which, incidentally, satellite companies and alternative providers like FiOS and U-Verse don't provide now -- that's really the most indefensible aspect of the criticisms of the cable companies doing this: The competitors already operate this way... why aren't people condemning the companies that have never provided analog in-the-clear?)

Actually it is very easy to prove because all cable companies have to provide disclosures regarding box rentals to the FCC.

As it is, this does not affect basic cable at all. At least with Comcast, basic cable will not be changed (at least until 2012). This will only affect expanded basic cable.

They are making room for new services that I want. I'm willing to pay them more for what I want than you are willing to pay them for analog expanded basic. I win. Wanna make something of it?

Actually that is not the only option. You can come into the 21st century and buy a CableCARD-capable host devices (televisions and DVRs), and then you won't need set top boxes. If you insist on using antiquated equipment, then you have to pay the price... and (and this is again the most important part) you already have to do this with all the other companies.

If you have a digital package, you are entitled to 1 STB + 2 DTA, included in your fee.
If you don't have a digital package, you are entitled to 3 DTA, included in your fee.

I have to mention this a third time: Comcast is simply making their service more like their competitors' and they are doing so because many of us, their customers, want them to offer us different services from the services that you perhaps want them to offer.

Orrymain

I'm gonna take slight issue with the response, sort of. Comcast has been working on HD for two years at the cost of providing good ongoing to service to anyone without HD or digital. For years now, their rationale for a) not adding new channels and b) eliminating many channels has been that they need the bandwidth for HD. As a non-HD user, I have been incensed about this for at least two years now. No new channels and losing many, all because they need bandwidth for the HD brigade. What about me? What about the others with basic digital? They are catering to one part of the market and have been for a long time. Comcast made a conscious decision over two years ago to drive their customers to digital and now to HD. They have consistently been removing basic free channels and upping them to higher levels of their digital packaging. You either upgrade, or you cancel. Manipulation? You betcha!

bicker

Hmm.... so far I don't see any issue. That's exactly what they've been doing -- much more slowly than their direct competitors have been.

Again, no issue. They are catering to the sector of the market that offers them the greatest reward in return.

If I'm selling my house, and six buyers make me an offer, I'm not going to take the first one; I'm generally going to take the offer that offers me the most money.

Again, let me re-emphasize that Comcast is doing this more slowly than all of their direct competitors. So while what you're saying is true, and will lead to a problem for you, all the other companies have already (figuratively) dropped you in the trash. Doesn't that make Comcast the best from your standpoint? Instead of condemning them (as I should, because they're putting your needs ahead of mine by going down this path so slowly compared to their competitors), shouldn't you be condemning their competitors far more so than you're condemning them?

This is actually untrue. The have both moved channels to higher levels of service, and they have moved channels to lower levels of service. They have consistently moved channels from analog to digital (for the reasons mentioned above -- and still much more solely than all of their competitors have), but just this week we received notification of four or five channels being moved from Digital Classic down to Digital Starter, and a few more channels moved from Digital Starter to the special "Expanded Basic with Digital STB" service (no longer offered to new customers, but still patronized by existing customers who have had that service level for a while).

TonyT

hah, Yes because it's not what I want.

Thanks for answering that, but I'm a bit confused by what a DTA is. I thought that was a Digital To Analog box?

Just wanted to respond a couple of your statements to Orry. That would be a fair analogy if there were as many sellers of homes as there are buyers.

bicker

Hehe... y'know we joke, but this is really what it comes down to: You want X; I want Y; the system doesn't have capacity for X+Y; so in deciding X | Y, the computation is:


Specifically, a QAM to analog box.

No that's not necessary for the analogy to be fair. There are not as many suppliers of subscription television service as there are subscribers.

Besides, the analogy is not really necessary to see the inherent logic: See the math I posted, above.

Orrymain

The quoting thing is giving me headaches, so I'm gonna do it this way.

On the Comcast is doing it slower and others have already dumped me, etc, nope, not here. Cable competitors are offering a lot of the new channels that I think Comcast should be carrying that they aren't. Comcast continues to focus just on HD here, while their competitors are doing that, too, but with more channels than Comcast.

And we don't even have the Digital Starter package option. It's no longer available here and hasn't been for quite some time. In fact, the lower two tiers of Comcast's packages, the starter and ... oops, can't recall the name this second ... but both have gone away. They are very focused in this market on HD and the superior packages. Unless you go to the absolute basic with no hint of premium, they aren't offering them. Now, this may be a regional issue because I do know that areas in other parts of the state have many more channels than we do and in fact, they had channels like Hallmark, Oxygen, Soapnet, et.al. for one to two years before we got them. So again, I say that in my neck of the woods, it's a losing proposition with the channels. I've checked on this a lot and have actually spoken with several of the higher ups in our region. It's all about HD. They really don't care about the little guy anymore.

Orrymain

Hey Tony -- I didn't make the house analogy. I'm the victim, so I'm not justifying anything that Comcast is doing. I think they've been doing unfair business practices for years, ever since they came back to this area (they were here years ago, sold out, then bought it back - it was much better with the old guys)


Quote:
If I'm selling my house, and six buyers make me an offer, I'm not going to take the first one; I'm generally going to take the offer that offers me the most money.

Just wanted to respond a couple of your statements to Orry. That would be a fair analogy if there were as many sellers of homes as there are buyers.

bicker

Sorry, but you're mistaken. AFAIK, all of Comcast's direct competitors already require what the OP is complaining about. All of them.

Which one of Comcast's direct competitors do you think allows you to receive cable networks in-the-clear without a box? I'll find and post evidence that that is not the case, for you.

We're having a discussion about this on a Verizon forum this week, amazed at the utter crap that Verizon added this week, especially given that Verizon still doesn't offer AMC HD, while Comcast does.

However, that's not even the point. Comcast is clearing off bandwidth so that it can offer new channels. In my area, they offer about 40 HD channels. In Detroit, where they've already completed the OP is complaining about, they just announced that they're adding the next group of channels, bringing their total to 104 HD channels. So this change that we're talking about effectively will add 64 channels.

The whole point is that you cannot have both: You cannot have the analog in the clear and all 104 HD channels and DOCSIS 3.0. It is one or the other.

Comcast recently discontinued an analog service, not Digital Starter. Digital Starter includes HD channels.

No one cares about the little guy. No one.

Again:


The "little guy" means little profits, and investors rapaciously punish companies that provide little profits instead of big profits.

bicker

If you choose to see yourself as a victim, then you are one, but it is something you're doing to yourself.

Operating their business in the best interests of their owners is not an "unfair" business practice. It is actually the only responsible way to operate a business.

It is one thing to say you're unhappy with the products and services you're offered. You are always entitled to be unhappy. It is irresponsible and indefensible to throw around legal terms like "unfair business practices" when all that is happening is that you're dissatisfied. You can just say you're dissatisfied, that you're unhappy. You don't need to try to make your dissatisfaction sound more important than it really is. What you're doing here misleads readers. They wonder if perhaps what you expect is actually what you were promised, when it was not. I'm sure it is great fun taking cheap pot-shots at big companies, or at the government (as some do in the the transition threads and the CECB threads), or at any big institution that frustrates you, but such unfounded attacks do nothing constructive. They just set readers on a never-ending death spiral of dissatisfaction, because it sets them up with a misunderstanding of the reality, crafted not by intelligence but rather by frustration.