Colorado Town May Sue AT&T For Broadband

foQ writes: "Avon, Colorado is suing AT&T over the lack of availability of cable-modem service in the town. I for one have been waiting a couple of years for the 'right around the corner' date they have been talking about. Here isthe story." AT&T appears to be meeting the letter of their agreement to make the local cable system "two-way," but perhaps not the spirit.

Comments

Sue their butts....

[tfurrows]

M-O-N-O-P-O-L-Y

Sure, AT&T isn't supposed to be a monopoly nowadays (or a regulated one at least), but you could have fooled me! Point me in the direction of 3 or more cable internet providers and I'll change my mind...

That being the case, let them be sued for screwing us all over and doing a crappy job of it! There's nothing worse that a monopoly that doesn't know what they're doing.

Cable companies suck

[PD]

Every time one of them call me up and try to sell me a cable modem, I ask them if they have anything that runs as fast as a regular modem, but with a static IP. They think I'm screwey, but I really want to run my own servers and I don't care how fast things go. That way I can block all of Korea from my mail server. I am sick of getting spammed through Asian middle schools.

Thankfully, I just became eligible for DSL at my house, so I'm getting that.

Re:Cable companies suck

[belg4mit]

[http://www.firstlight.net/index.cgi?page=fixedip]

Now all you have to do is see what there policy
about always on is.

Re:Cable companies suck

[terkozer]

Dynamic DNS offers a fairly reliable, free dynamic dns service.

Almost static IP

[crow]

With MediaOne/AT&T, I have an almost static IP number. Every few months, it changes, so I go and update my DNS so that the domain works right. It means a day of downtime for the domain, but for the sort of stuff I'm doing, that's just fine.

Re:Almost static IP

[PD]

But you can't run a server according to the TOS. I'm going with a DSL provider that specifically allows me to run my own servers. I have only 128K up, but that's enough for what I want to do.

Business logic

[crow]

Many communities were given promises of broadband Internet when the franchise contracts came up for renewal. (You know those franchise fees listed on your cable bill? They go to your state or town.) The cable networks fully intend to provide these services, but doing so requires an investment in upgrading older equipment.

Now the problem is debt. Sure, if you look at it from the perspective of a single community, comparing the debt required to upgrade with the profit brought in by the new services makes it an obvious thing to do. Unfortunately, when you look at the total amount of debt that the cable company must assume to upgrade all the communities screaming for Internet access, it makes a huge impact on the company's financial statements. Investors are fine with debt up to a point, but too much makes them nervous, which hurts the stock value. After all, no matter how good the projections are, debt is risk.

So here in MA, AT&T has scaled back its expansion plans and raised rates. While the higher rates are bad for existing customers, they mean that the debt gets paid off sooner, leaving AT&T with more cash to invest in upgrades.

In the mean time, upgrades are continuing, and communities that make the most noise are the most likely to get moved to the top of the schedule.

Re:Business logic

[coyote-san]

So what? Why should any community that negotiated a contract in good faith give a flying fsck about the cable company's business concerns?

The bottom line is that the company got something valuable (the cable TV franchise) in exchange for promises. If it can't honor that agreement due to some unforeseeable event, and massive debt to honor all promises is *not* unforeseeable, then the contract should have escape clauses. These clauses may include fines, mandatory price reductions (both designed to change the economics of the situation to make it cheaper to comply with the contract than to breach it), or even early termination of the franchise agreement to replace the non-performer with another company.

If the company negotiated in bad faith (knowing that it never intended to honor the terms of the agreement), then that's a breach that warrants immediate termination of the contract.

If the company was honest and admitted that it couldn't provide service for N years, then it might lose the franchise.... and would probably get it back when the other company defaulted if they made impossible claims. Or it might prompt the community to identify alternative solutions to the problem.

... or is this yet another example of the New Feudalism where individuals are held to contracts even if they never agreed to them (AOL purchases recently discussed), while companies get a walk?

Re:Business logic

[Technician]

Since when is higher prices = pay off debt sooner? It's higher prices that still have me on dialup at home. I do dialup at home for /. and e-mail. High speed stuff is done at work. I contribute nothing to paying off the debt load. Cable is only cost effective at a certain connect ratio. Putting in high speed access in a neighborhood and having only one in thirty homes connected is not cost effective. They should be priced for greater than 50% connectivity which they are not. When they call asking for me to sign up, I ask "tripiling the price gets me what added value? It gets me no new content and adds many secutity concerns making me the target of script kiddies.

Re:Business logic

[crow]

At current prices around here, cable modems are within a few dollars of what you would pay if you had a separate phone line for Internet access and also paid about $20/month for your ISP. Depending on what extra options you're accidentally paying for on the phone line and what ISP you're using, cable modems can still be cheaper--significantly so if you don't rent the modem.

And based on the number of people complaining about the lack of cable Internet access, it seems that the demand is rather inelastic, so raising prices does, indeed, bring in more revenue.

For people who don't use the Internet enough to need a separate phone line, it is and always will be a tougher sell.

Re:Business logic

[kwertii]

hmm.. According to AT&T's year 2000 balance sheet, they had cash assets of $126,000,000 lying around at the end of the year, not to mention $3,341,000,000 they paid to stockholders in dividends. Good to see they have their priorities straight....

Re:I wish I could sue Colorado

[Anonymous Coward]

Gee, I'm surprised the Internet is even legal in lilly white, evangelical Colorado Springs. Thankfully, there's a little liberal haven just above it: Manitou Springs. Hmm...Evangelical Christians, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons....maybe we can get them classified as Religious spammers!

Re:I wish I could sue Colorado

[topher71]

The big religion of Avon is the almighty dollar. It's a high-end ski/mountain town made up mostly of huge vacation homes for obscenely rich people.

You're thinking of Colorado Springs, where 'Focus on the Family' is headquartered. It's mainly a bunch of ex-Orange Country suburban types who bailed from S. Cal. because reality encroached.

Colorado overall seems to be mostly anti-tax and anti-government. At election time this falls into the Republican camp, although it seems more Libertarian than anything else to me.

That is, except Denver and Boulder, which are tax happy and government happy:)

What amazes me

[Rick the Red]

What amazes me is how many people forget that, as bad as AT&T Broadband may be, TCI was far worse. I don't wish to defend AT&T Broadband, but they brought me more than 40 cable channels, which TCI certanly did not do (TCI reduced our lineup when they bought our previous cable company), and AT&T brought us broadband internet (USQWest says they will never bring DSL to our neighborhood -- we can't get better than 26,000 bps dialup!).

AT&T isn't great, but they're not the devil incarnate. (Bill Gate$ still holds that title :-) I'd rather stay with AT&T than switch to Comcast, but I guess I won't have a choice in that.

Re:What amazes me

[billh]

USQWest says they will never bring DSL to our neighborhood -- we can't get better than 26,000 bps dialup!

You probably have fiber between yourself and the phone company. Let me guess - 26.4k is the fastest you receive, even with a 56k modem? If that is the case, you will not be able to get DSL until:

- Qwest replaces the fiber with copper (never)
- Someone installs a remote DSLAM (likely)

The RDSLAMS are being tested now. Depending on where you live, you might see one within a couple of years.

Re:What amazes me

[Rick the Red]

I wish! Where I live, I'll see an RDSLAM on the 12th of Never. We have copper between us and USQWest's switch (fiber! LOL -- nobody used fiber back when these lines were laid). The problem is distance. We're too remote. That's why I'm doubly amazed at AT&TB -- as bad as they are, at least they consider us customers; USQWest considers us a nuisance.