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All I could do to prove it was a mistake is all that anyone who is falsely accused of doing something wrong can do to prove their innocence, which is to tell the truth.

Unfortunately, you're being too logical. Everything you say would work really well if you were allowed to somehow challenge the accuracy of the accusation. But, you aren't.

And, here's where it gets really fun. I was under the impression (as I think we all were) that you could ask for a review on any "alert". Not so with Verizon:

Our Copyright Alert Program allows you to seek review by an independent reviewer, the American Arbitration Association (AAA), of the alerts you have received. The opportunity to seek review is available once you have received a fifth or sixth copyright alert from us.

-- http://www22.verizon.com/Support/Residential/internet/highspeed/general+support/top+questions/questionsone/123247.htm

This means that if something flags your account (maybe the DHCP logs are wrong, maybe somebody is spoofing other IPs to the tracker just to get other people in trouble, etc.), you won't even be able to ask for a review until it's already at the point that they will be intercepting your browser requests to "educate" you.

Remember this is done by the ISP and so will carry more authority than third-party torrent tracking.

No, it's not. It's being done using the same third party tracking:

CCI’s content partners join peer-to-peer networks in order to locate the music, movies or TV shows they own.

-- http://www.copyrightinformation.org/resources-faq/copyright-alert-system-faqs/

For several years, copyright owners have been using certain automated techniques to identify Internet users who they believe are engaged in possible infringing activity via P2P networks. When a copyright owner identifies an instance of possible infringement, it sends the user's ISP a notice that contains the name of the copyrighted work, the date and time of the alleged infringement and the Internet Protocol (IP) address of the computer that is alleged to be sharing copyrighted content. The ISP matches the IP address sent by the copyright owner to the specific customer to whom that IP address was assigned at that time, and then forwards the information provided by the content owner to that user without identifying the user to the copyright owner(s).

-- http://www22.verizon.com/Support/Residential/internet/highspeed/general+support/top+questions/questionsone/123247.htm

The evidence will include your account, IP, their DHCP logs showing you were in control of the IP at that time, and statistics on how much uploading and downloading of the torrent you performed.

No, it won't:

The Alerts, include the date, time, time zone and title of the copyrighted content

I see a career opportunity...
http://www22.verizon.com/jobs/

AT&T and Verizon already do a lot of this.
I know Verizon had an opt out page I had to go to recently to end some of it.

http://www22.verizon.com/about/privacy/

You will note that the document about how much they share your data is called privacy. Talk about double plus ungood.

Do you have broadband?

They all come with a free security suite.

http://xfinity.comcast.net/constantguard/Products/CGPS/norton/
http://www.cox.com/css
www.att.com/esupport/article.jsp?sid=KB402441
http://www.rr.com/security
http://www22.verizon.com/home/utilities/security-backup

Good question. I logged into my Verizon account and went to the privacy page. It offered a link to the privacy policy and a link to a page for Location-Based Services (LBS) Privacy Settings. I visited the settings page first, and it said there was nothing to set. What I skimmed said something about Verizon Navigator, which I don't use because it is a paid service, and Google Maps is so good. (Does this mean they take your money and spy on you at the same time? I know Google spies on me, but it doesn't cost me a nickel for the privilege.) Then I visited the privacy policy page and found this:

Information Shared Outside the Verizon Family of Companies:

Except as explained in this Privacy Policy, in privacy policies for specific services, or in agreements with our customers, Verizon does not sell, license or share information that individually identifies our customers, people using our networks, or website visitors with others outside the Verizon family of companies for non-Verizon purposes without the consent of the person whose information will be shared.

It sounds a little like breach of contract to me if they sell my information. But, of course, there is an arbitration clause, so the chances of a class action are pretty minimal.

OTOH, Declan McCullagh often cries wolf, and sometimes he stretches things out of proportion.

They will work with law enforcement to prosecute, provided that the subscriber is willing to do so:

http://www22.verizon.com/Support/Residential/phone/homephone/general+support/support+tools/general/95622.htm

I'm not making apologies for Verizon for charging for unlisted status, just offering this info in response to mitreya's question involving harassment.

To clarify, I (a) think that there should be no fee for an unlisted number and (b) agree that the various phone companies charge for this because they can and not because there's any big administrative overhead for doing so.

When it comes to criminal harassment though I have to say that legal complaint and prosecution is an intelligent way to make it stop. It won't work all the time (nor will an "Order of Protection", in cases of physical harassment), but at least it's a direct method that threatens the harassing party with real penalties.

Saw a commercial from FiOS 2 nights ago about this. They had someone turning on the lights, setting the temperature, feeding their dog and some other stuff using their smartphone.

http://www22.verizon.com/residentialhelp/homecontrol/home+monitoring+and+control/use/monitoring+devices/129871.htm

Some sources:

  * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv6_deployment
  * http://www.circleid.com/posts/20090609_verizon_mandates_ipv6_support_for_next_gen_cell_phones/
  * https://www22.verizon.com/opendev/Forum/LTE_Document_Archives.aspx
  * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv4_address_exhaustion#Regional_exhaustion

Use this activation service instead. :)

No. They provide limited internet access packaged as "Residential." Read the fine print. I don't think its a secret that they block port 25, in fact I want to say all the ISP's put out big announcements when they started doing so. Also, by signing that contract you agreed to not run any servers.

Taken from the TOS at: Verizon Internet Access Terms of Service

"Restrictions on Use. The Service is a consumer grade service and is not designed for or intended to be used for any commercial purpose. You may not resell, re-provision or rent the Service, (either for a fee or without charge) or allow third parties to use the Service via wired, wireless or other means. For example, you may not provide Internet access to third parties through a wired or wireless connection or use the Service to facilitate public Internet access (such as through a Wi-Fi hotspot), use it for high volume purposes, or engage in similar activities that constitute such use (commercial or non-commercial). If you subscribe to a Broadband Service, you may connect multiple computers/devices within a single home to your modem and/or router to access the Service, but only through a single Verizon-issued IP address. You also may not exceed the bandwidth usage limitations that Verizon may establish from time to time for the Service, or use the Service to host any type of server. Violation of this section may result in bandwidth restrictions on your Service or suspension or termination of your Service."

Do I agree with you that we should be able to do this stuff? Yeah. I run my own services (tversity, vent, etc.)..just not a mail server. hehe

I get it morons spam, but how about opening it for users on request when we want to have mailservers?

Internet service with blocked ports is not really internet service.

And I get it that 0.03% of users are like you and want to run a mailserver at home. Unfortunately, 60% of users have spam-spewing malware infesting their machine and blocking port 25 on all the big ISP networks is a huge step forward to reduce botnet/zombie spam.

Does Verizon not have an SMTP gateway you can use? I know when on a Comcast connection I can simply open up smtp.comcast.net and it will relay mail for me. A quick look shows they probably do, though you might have to do smarthost and authentication. Pretty easy.

Besides, any competent spam filter will increase the spam rating for mail sent directly from a network like Verizon and Comcast anyway. You're better off using a legitimate server (Verizon, Gmail, your hosting provider, whatever) to send those messages.

that since they're BUSINESS lines, they'd be static IPs.

    Actually, that's an incorrect assumption.

Actually its not an incorrect assumption, its a reasonable normal assumption:
from a comcast web page, note the last item in the feature list:
Comcast Business Class Internet \n Blaze new trails with big business features.

Whatever the size of your company, it needs to respond quickly to the needs of customers, communicate reliably with suppliers, and find smarter ways to increase employee productivity. That's why Comcast Business Class Internet offers:

Downloads up to 50Mbps, uploads up to 10Mbps
Internet speeds up to 64x faster than T1
Flexible Web hosting options
Norton Business Suite security and virus protection
Free Microsoft Communication tools
** Static IP addresses **

http://business.comcast.com/internet/index.aspx

but then, of course, they are engaging in a not so subtle misrepresentation. following the link to the next page you find out you have to pay extra for a static IP.

As for verizoned - well they're still selling like they are the phone company: "Hot Dead Chickens! gett your Hot Dead Chickens! "
http://smallbusiness.verizon.com/products/internet/hsi/plans.aspx?tfn=s2&CMP=KNC-SMB_D_P1_CS_Z_Z_U_Z165
note the AD is targeting small businesses like a hair dresser, and then uses terminology like 3/7 mbps/kbps to describe what they are selling.
Here the static line is an extra fee option.

Frankly, calling any service "business class internet service" that doesn't include a static IP as the standard base is false advertising as its useless for a business identity, a web server, and email on the internet without a static IP. But hey: "We don't care. We don't have to. We're the Phone Company."

comcrap and verizoned - both fraudulent by nature. In a truly free market neither would exist, but wired/fibered telecomm will never be a free market and neither of those companies is at all interested in competing in a free market. See "regulatory capture".

See this for Verizon: http://www22.verizon.com/residentialhelp/highspeed/general+support/top+questions/questionsone/124274.htm

Will outbound port 25 blocking apply to all Verizon broadband customers?

Outbound port 25 blocking will be applied to FIOS and High Speed Internet services that use dynamic IP addresses. If you subscribe to a static IP address service, you will not be affected.

Sounds like you have only to change to static IP service to get around this. If you have static IPs, then call Verizon. Obviously there's something wrong. If you don't have static IPs, well, you're doing it wrong to begin with. Many well run mail systems won't accept a IP known to be dynamic.

The problem is that voice over broadband doesn't come with the same kind of 99.999% uptime you have with POTS.

POTS doesn't deliver 99.999% availability. For example, Verizon promises only 99.9% availability. The goal is to have the switching equipment be 99.999% available, so that the carrier can make the (much lower) per-line dialtone availability goals.

In practice it remains a noble but unachievable goal. Show me a CO that has had 316 seconds or less of customer-affecting downtime in the past 10 years and I'll show you an Anonymous user that actually uses seven proxies.

It's not just social networking sites that have this problem. Verizon's web site makes it really hard to log in with SSL. If you enter the URL https://www.verizon.com/ yourself, it redirects you to the non-SSL page. My favorite trick is to enter dummy username and password values, and click "Log in". Usually, the "login failed, please try again" page uses SSL. Not Verizon's. I eventually found some combination that got me an SSL connection before entering my info, but I don't remember what it was.

I think this is a result of their newly reimplemented web site. They sent out an email, saying that customer's web accounts had all been changed, and urging us to click on a link in the email to enter new ones. You know, just like all the phishing attacks. But this one is real: Verizon's web site even has a message saying that those email messages were legit. Most companies repeatedly warn their customers that they should never trust emails that claim to be from the company and ask for your login information (and rightly so). Not Verizon. I hope they fix this before too many of their customers have their info stolen.

You can order service with a symmetric upload/download. However, for most people usage patterns will still be highly tilted towards download (unless you are torrent seeding, hosting websites, or the like I assume). For instance this page http://www22.verizon.com/residential/fiosinternet/plans/plans.htm#plans shows download 25/upload 25 as 1 option (at least as I'm reading it).

If Vitaly Borker was calling Ms. Rodriguez repeatedly, especially after 10pm, he was violating New York State laws against telephone harassment.

I had somebody calling me repeatedly late at night. I traced his phone number, complained to the local police station, and two detectives came to his house (several times until he answered the door) and arrested him. He finally left New York City, and stopped bothering me, so I didn't prosecute.

You can get more information about handling these calls at The Verizon Unlawful Call Center http://www22.verizon.com/residentialhelp/phone/general+support/support+tools/general/95622.htm

Examples of unlawful calls:

        * Threat to Life (yours or someone else's)
        * Bomb Threats
        * Bodily Harm
        * Excessive Obscene or Harassing Calls (The definition of excessive varies by state but generally means more than two to five calls.)
        * Kidnapping

Verizon regularly works with Law Enforcement agencies to resolve unlawful call complaints. The Law Enforcement agency investigates all calls involving bodily harm, bomb threats and kidnapping.

Unwanted Calls are usually not against the law and typically include:

        * Fax calls
        * Hang-up calls
        * Computer calls
        * Solicitation calls
        * Telemarketing calls
        * Debt collection calls
        * Obscene or Harassing Calls*

*If calls of this nature are deemed excessive, and you are willing to prosecute, we will handle as an unlawful call.

Verizon also does FIOS and DSL.

So they would be blocking those people in particular.

http://www22.verizon.com/residential/internet/

    On the gift phone, we called it in and had the account transferred over after about 2 weeks (like, after I gave it as the present). If I call in, they won't talk to me about the account, since I'm not on it. My only account with them was terminated about 3 years ago. It's some screwup between normal billing and collections. But, normal billing becomes collections after 48 hours of not paying. It already showed up on my credit report once, and I disputed it to get it off. I'm no longer the account holder. It hasn't shown back up yet.

And seriously with your 2 examples of "roaming charges" how old are these examples? I don't think any US carrier has had roaming charges other than international in the last 10 years!!

Sprint roaming information

Verizon roaming information

  Some of the providers have local or regional plans still at a discount rate. I'm better off with prepaid $60/mo unlimited on a Blackberry that I can tether with a decent throughput. I frequently run up 2000 to 3000 minutes a month, depending on what I'm doing. There's nothing like standing around in or around a datacenter listening to the provider saying "Hmm, it should work ... I don't know why it won't work ... Lets try this ...". I've burnt up 1000 minutes in 4 days doing that. Some of them prefer to keep me on the line, rather than just calling me when it's fixed.

Also in your 2nd example, moving to a new location that has no coverage is a reason to terminate your contract with no ETF with most carriers, why didnt you take advantage instead paying the bill for a phone you didn't even use?

    I had kept the phone service for when I was traveling. The normal cost was reasonable. I'd just need to charge up the phone the day before, and be on my way. It just happened that during that period I hadn't traveled at all (working from home and all), so since no one could call it, I figured it was silly to even charge it.

Verizon has [DSL] plans from $20 to $40 per month.

Verizon's list of home Internet plans states that the $20/mo plan includes a $10/mo discount available only to Verizon POTS subscribers, which makes it less attractive to people who use VOIP or a postpaid cell phone. But the faster plans are price-competitive with cable, at least when purchased on a 2-year contract. Thank you for the suggestion.

Here's AT&T's handset approval and certification process as an example, and here is Verizon's. Nearly all carriers around the globe have them - some are very rigorous and demanding, while others are not much more than checking your CTIA and [your country's version of the FCC] radio performance certifications.

Regarding your specific example of T-Mobile USA - their certification process is known to be really easy, which makes things less onerous for handset developers but also doesn't catch sometimes serious bugs and issues like the Nexus One 3G problems. AT&T and Verizon have much more rigorous device certification processes (more of a PITA but better QA), and Sprint is somewhere in between.

You acknowledge and agree that, except with respect to the Router,
at all times ownership of the Equipment shall remain with us and that
this Agreement allows you to use Equipment only in connection with
your receipt and use of the Service. We may, at our option, supply new
or reconditioned Equipment to you. We will repair and maintain the
Equipment owned by us, as well as the Router, at our expense,

FIOS TV TOS

I don't know what the situation is today, but in the past this functionality was definitely not available to Verizon Wireless users. VZ disabled direct connections to the USB port so the only way to transfer pictures to and from the phone was via a data connection over its network or via an SD card if the phone has that capability. In general you had to email or text the photos to yourself and pay any consequent data charges.

I'd venture to guess that it's still the case that most cellphone users never use their USB cables to transfer anything. They take pictures on their phones and use them as local wallpapers or hold them up so their friends can see them on the screen. The market for ringtones and sales of music tracks for phones is estimated to exceed $10B in the next few years. I have a technologically sophisticated teen-aged daughter who could move stuff to any from her phone over USB the same way she does with her Sansa player. Most of her friends wouldn't have the slightest idea how to accomplish any of that.

I only buy unlocked phones to avoid these problems.

pfft, $15 / month over the phone line, very basic 1.5 Mbit ADSL.

Is that Canadian dollars or Australian dollars? The article is about the United States market, and U.S. providers don't appear to make such an offer. Where I live, the phone company is Verizon, and the ADSL offer is $29.99/mo for 1 Mbps for customers without Verizon home phone service (source).

Microsoft Global Compliance Handbook from wikileaks - http://file.wikileaks.org/file/microsoft-spy.pdf Any agency can issue a subpoeana and Microsoft will comply for an account over 180days old. Under that a court order is required. Verizon has basically the same policies without any account age restriction http://www22.verizon.com/about/privacy/policy/#info

From TFA:

The company has long had a maximum transfer limit on monthly data plans.

He's talking about the wireless business, which has always had limits (I think 5GB/month).

VZW is close to The Super Devil on the evil meter.
Verizon FiOS though, isn't quite as evil.

So, unless I'm missing something, this is a non-story.
"VZW says it's going to continue enforcing transfer limits...news at 11"

There's a difference. You're dealing with the Wireless division... Compare these two pages for what I'm talking about (Both were 1 click away from the home page):

FIOS Internet Plans: http://www22.verizon.com/Residential/FiOSInternet/Plans/Plans.htm

Mobile Broadband: http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/mobilebroadband/?page=plans

Mobile explicitly states that not only is there a cap, but what it is. Fios makes no mention of even the existence of such a cap, yet alone what it is. And that's where I see the implication of "unlimited"...

I don't think anyone expects that they can transfer 5 TBs a month over a shared line. If you expect to transfer that much data I don't see why you expect to pay the same as the average user who is likely closer to 1 GB.

I expect to be able to transfer that much, because I purchased a 15mbps connection, not a 200gb/month connection. If they advertised them by total transfer, or priced it based on total transfer, I'd be content with paying the difference. But my whole point is that they don't. They advertise 15mbps. Period. End of story. http://www22.verizon.com/Residential/FiOSInternet/Plans/Plans.htm Actually, now that I look at it, even in the fine print do they not disclose any kind of cap on transfer. They just say that they don't guarantee the rate. Nothing about "You are allowed to transfer x GB / month" or "Subject to usage caps" or even "Heavy users will be castrated and fed to the pigs"... Only:

Connection speeds are between your location and Verizon central office serving your location. Actual download and upload speeds will vary based on numerous factors, such as condition of wiring at your location, computer configuration, Internet and network congestion, and speed of website servers you access, among other factors. Available in select areas. Speed and uninterrupted use of service not guaranteed.

It's repeated a few times on that page, but there's nothing that I can see that even remotely implies that you can't expect to use whatever bandwidth you can get to the fullest it provides you. Now sure, they could implement selective filtering based on that (the higher transfer people get rate limited)...

I hate this argument, even though it is technically correct. Yes, Google pays Mozilla somewhere around $50 million a year to make Google the default search engine. It also specifically doesn't list Bing, but does include Yahoo. Of course, you can easily add Bing if you want to, although I'm sure a lot of users don't bother.

Microsoft, on the other hand, uses their existing business relationships to force users to only use Bing. Verizon went and updated Verizon Blackberries to only allow searches on Bing. Some Verizon guy advises that you go directly to google.com to search, otherwise enjoy your Bing searches. I can't find anything that details what sort of money changed hands, but I can't imagine Verizon made this change for the LOLz.

And that, to me, is a huge difference. On the one hand, you have Google, who openly supports an open-source web browser that has always pushed open standards and higher performance into the browser market. On the other hand you have Microsoft making back-room deals with another giant company to force all of its users onto Bing. To directly equate these two types of actions seems dishonest to me.

4chan is a bunch of bitches compared to Verizon.

Verizon: Nothing to see here. Please move along.

At no time was 4Chan itself blocked. Ongoing network security team monitoring has now determined there is no longer an immediate threat. Connectivity to those sites is being restored later today.

Link stolen from up the thread, so no informative mods for me.

"Recently, Verizon Wireless security and external experts detected attacks from an IP address associated with the 4Chan family of web sites that was disruptive to our customers and our network. To protect both, we eliminated connectivity to the IP address. At no time was 4Chan itself blocked. Ongoing network security team monitoring has now determined there is no longer an immediate threat. Connectivity to those sites is being restored later today."

Looks like Verizon responded pretty fast via twitter: @Verizon Verizon PolicyBlog Post: 4Chan Not "Blocked" -- Protecting Our Customers & Our Network http://policyblog.verizon.com/BlogPost/697/ProtectingOurCustomersandOurNetwork.aspx

http://www22.verizon.com/areacodes/
Look 479 up. As I've mentioned, whoever is at that number in Arkansas is now under investigation for interstate wire fraud. You went too far, it's a Federal matter now. You know it's a felony, right? Your IP address has been logged. Slashdot will give us the logs, they will have to.

You should follow your own advice: http://www22.verizon.com/areacodes/
Look it up, ya moron. 479, as you said. Arkansas.

You are in serious trouble. I'm just saying.

E-Mail them! Contact them! Here: https://www22.verizon.com/Content/ContactUs/EmailUs/emailus.htm

Yes, and where do you live? If you live in a place like LA or NYC (which have higher cost of living and as a result pay way more), then even at $50 / month you're still paying WAY less of your income for internet than people living in the rest of the country paying $25 / month.

Nope. Virginia.

Verizon Android Phones Are Officially Coming.

There exists a pretty strong misunderstanding that Verizon "locks down" their phones. They did, yes. But in the past year, they've stopped disabling GPS on their phones (including the Omnia, Storm and Tour), said that all future Blackberries will have Wifi, and launched their Open Development Initiative to get data devices (among other things) on their network.

Oh, and their next generation network (which is launching 2+ years before AT&T's) is LTE, based off the GSM standard.

But I don't blame you, they've definitely had restrictive tendencies in the past.

Actually I thought it was pretty easy to find. Verizon has allowed you to "opt out" of their DNS hijacking for a long time:

http://www22.verizon.com/ResidentialHelp/FiOSInternet/Troubleshooting/Network/QuestionsOne/99031.htm

Arrgh... Boggled the link to the service webpage...

Here it is, in unbroken form

Oh, no... This is truly a Verizon gem.

Here's the Link
And here's the VerizonWiFi link for the service... :-)

Verizon Wi-Fi is not available for PDAs, phones, desktop PCs or Macs.

The software's only available for Windows and only intended for "laptops" right at the moment- they're not using Boingo's usual software, it's something special for Verizon.

AT&T does the same for their broadband customers. Free wifi at McDonald's, Starbucks and many other places. The biggest difference is that you do not need any specially dumb software to connect.

Verizon on the other hand require particularly dumb software that works only on limited set of OSes and according to this: http://forums.verizon.com/t5/Verizon-at-Home-Blog/Verizon-Brings-Free-Wi-Fi-to-Millions-of-Broadband-Customers/ba-p/59727;jsessionid=51BB9F7245B9EA45C39F3F2F9A5DB41D#A76

sits in the background and continuously scans for a Verizon wifi hotspot. Who comes up with these brain-dead ideas to slow down customers' computers?

BTW, I am a Verizon FIOS customer and I tried to place a comment on their blog entry, linked above. I could not do that, even after I logged in using my Verizon credentials. They kept asking me to login. But I am already logged in, you dumbasses. Sometimes I wonder how is it that Verizon can stay in business. These people are utterly clueless. And dont get me started on their "customer portal". A bunch of monkey can put together a better user interface than that. I sometimes have to use it to pay bills/update credit card on file etc. And I cringe at the thought of ever having to use it.

24mbps ADSL downloads for £22

Or 33USD.

Or about half ($60 for 20down/5up) what someone in the US would pay. I'm not sure why you said "for once". The US has had abysmal bandwidth pricing since ISDN.

There are two that I believe deserve kudos:

http://newscenter.verizon.com/press-releases/verizon/2003/page.jsp?itemID=29713865

AT&T as well since they are following the rule of law and requiring a court order before suspending a user account. Not only is this good business but it makes sense. Something our laws rarely get right it seems.

If Comcast is ever complicit with the RIAA in any way that violates the DMCA I for one will be more than happy to jump ship to get FIOS.

"Comcast said in a statement. "This is the same process we've had in place for years--nothing has changed. While we have always supported copyright holders in their efforts to reduce piracy under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and continue to do so, we have no plans to test a so-called 'three-strikes-and-you're-out' policy." "

and

"Comcast was careful to state that it isn't considering terminating customers' service."

we're talking about Comcast/Verizon here. Same people who used to throttle legitimate P2P traffic

When has Verizon throttled any traffic?

I'm curious on that too.

Plus, comcast wasn't "throttling", they were tossing RST packets around.

I love my FIOS and Verizon has previously been anti-mafiaa tactics

Verizon and ATT offer SIP trunks already, but they don't push them because they're cheaper than TDM ports. Plenty of other VOIP providers like Aretta and Vitelity also offer them. With G729 over IAX2, though, you can get even more calls down a single T1. Is this news just because Skype is doing it?

The Linux "market segment" is mostly businesses, servers, and an extremely small amount of computer geeks. Of those, Verizon needs to worry about the geeks, who know how to run Wine if they want to run Verizon's software.

And the businesses, for both DSL and FIOS. And the Mac users, whose networking acts in many ways more like FreeBSD than like Windows.

The Linux "market segment" is mostly businesses, servers, and an extremely small amount of computer geeks. Of those, Verizon needs to worry about the geeks, who know how to run Wine if they want to run Verizon's software.

And the businesses, for both DSL and FIOS. And the Mac users, whose networking acts in many ways more like FreeBSD than like Windows.

If your TV is so old it doesn't have an RF cable input $5 at Radioshack can give you an adapter to plug the cable connection to the screws for the antenna terminal.

"I'm paying $20 a month and I demand you let me online now!" (From a caller in a small town experiencing a power outage.)

In September 2001, a customer in Manhattan called Earthlink to complain about his DSL service being down, and angrily threatened to cancel his account and switch to another ISP if they didn't fix it within 24 hours. He was politely informed that his Central Office was under water, and that he was more than welcome to cancel his service (an early termination fee would apply).

Yes, this is why his DSL was down.