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Cox And Comcast To Dump @Home
randolph reports the drop of yet another shoe in the ongoing @Home tale: "The New York Times reports
that Cox and Comcast are ready to stop providing @Home's internet service, replacing it with some unnamed internet service. The story also comments 'AT&T may let At Home file for bankruptcy before making another investment in the company.'
Registration required, yada yada."
I talked to some Comcast people earlier today about this. They're going to definitely drop @Home, but service won't be ending for their customers. They plan to continue offering high-speed internet access through their own network called "iComcast".
I guess they're pretty serious about as they're already readying content here.
I was contacted recently by a Comcast recruiter (in the Philadelphia area) looking to staff up a new Comcast networking group. She said that they were dropping their relationship with @Home and were going to do it themselves. I don't know about Cox but Comcast is definitely taking the DIY route.
According to a source at Cox, Cox has been thinking of offering consumers a choice of multiple ISPs. Cox doesn't like @Home any more than the rest of us, but they had an exclusive contract, which it seems has now expired, or will soon expire. Cox has already done testing with Earthlink, so it's pretty much guaranteed that Earthlink will be one of the ISPs Cox offers. Whether or not they'll actually offer consumer choice remains to be seen, and I don't know about Comcast or AT&T.
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So, my local Comcast service is going to get weird for a bit, eh? Doesn't really surprise me, considering the level of service At Home provides.
Case in point: Bad cable modem - I tested it. Called At Home, hung up on. Called back, talked to 1st level tech, who hung up on me WHILE giving me the support call no. Called back, got call no., was transferred to second level, who hung up on me. Called back, tried to get directly to second level support, 1st level tech reluctantly sent me to 2nd level, who said hello and hung up on me. Turned out it was a switching problem, and I finally got a direct number (instead of the local office number-transfer) and called back. At Home (in Toronto; I'm in Tallahassee, FL) finally decided to route a repairman to bring me a new modem...an appointment 3 weeks later. Called my local Comcast office the next day, said, "I want to swap out my cable modem." Next day? Done. No worries.
The question: Why couldn't At Home do the exact same thing?
What'dya mean there's no BLINK tag!?
You can read the story here, no registration required, courtesy of the Washington Post.
THats what they get for dropping all the VCD/Divx newsgroups!!!
as usual, replace the 'www' with a 'archive' to bypass the useless sign in form.
or click here to have the article with a minimum of fuss.
...when I called Comcast sales to ask about @Work. They said, under @Home, all they could offer me in my area was a managed (and overpriced) connection for multiple workstations, no servers allowed, and bandwidth caps still in place. When I expressed some disappointment and incredulity at (a) the service, and (b) the price, they said it was all they could do under @Home, but if I waited, they would have alot wider range of services at better prices available "when we're offering our own service." Hmmm...
And this before I sat and thought about @Home's financial troubles...
Karma: Excellent, but still won't get you laid.
However, there haven't been any infrastructure improvements that anyone's seen, bandwidth is now pretty harshly capped, especially on the upstream, and mail service gets flaky for some people on a regular basis.
I have a co-worker who hasn't had a RR connection for a month! They keep sending techs out, they've replaced everything in her house and it still flakes out an hour after the tech leaves! More than once they've been told "we'll send our top person out here to look at it" and that never happens. RR refuses to check anything beyond the walls of their house, but now that everything's been replaced with known good equipment, it's fairly obvious the problem isn't there.
Meanwhile, they're dropping the price of a second IP from $10/month to $5/month - so if you had already bought one, you won't see any price change in your bill. I think they know a very large number of people are running NAT boxes & routers and want to push them away from it.
The partnership won't dissolve until June 2002, so do have time to get another ISP. Or, they could choose to make another deal with @Home between now and then.
At least this is what was sent to me.
Date: 24 Aug 2001 01:55:07 -0000
From: "Cox Communications San Diego"
Subject: A message from Cox regarding Excite @Home
You may have recently seen reports in the media on the financial condition of Excite @Home, our partner in delivering high-speed Internet service to the San Diego area. We understand that this recent media coverage might cause concern about the future of your service. Please know that we are committed to providing you with reliable high speed Internet service now and in the future.
Excite @Home has not notified us that their situation will render them unable to perform their obligations under our existing business arrangement, nor has it made any announcement that it intends to discontinue service. We remain committed to our existing partnership with Excite @Home, and Excite @Home has reiterated its own commitment to providing outstanding service and support to its 3.7 million subscribers.
Cox?s high speed Internet service is an integral part of our product offerings, and we are dedicated to maintaining uninterrupted high speed Internet service. As always, we will continue to keep you informed on any upcoming changes with your Cox @Home service. Thank you.
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