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ATT Raises Prices for Cable Modem Owners
MBCook writes: "It appears that AT&T broadband doesn't like it when customers own their own cable modem. According to this article at ZDNet, ATT will be 'changing' their prices for all users. If you own your own cable modem, your bill is going up $7. If you lease your cable modem, you end up paying the same ammount you were before. I guess AT&T likes to milk it's customers. If I don't have a long distance service with any phone company, I have to pay for the privilage of not depending on them. Now I'll have to pay for the privilage of not depending on AT&T for a modem?"
While everyone will shout and scream "I don't want AT&T to maintain my cable modem", but when the line gets dropped and AT&T need to diagnose the problem they will apply the first rule of problem resolution
"The user is a moron, the fault is at their end"
This involves them doing the standard, is your modem turned on, is it working, is the green light flashing.... you don't have a green light, oh its your own modem, so how do you tell if thats working ?
So it does cost them money in terms of call and tech support. They have to have special call centre scripts, new diagnosis procedures etc etc.
And your cable modem might have a bug which buggers their network.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Now that a major US provider is changing the rules, it'll be interesting to see how Slashdot readers take the news when it affects them a bit closer to home.
This is a problem that affects us all.
DD.
"You can justify anything by putting it in quotes, adding a famous name and making it a sig" - Albert Einstein
Cable modems got cheaper so the difference between
those who own c modem and those who don't should be
smaller - down to $5. This means that overall
this is a rise for everybody - just for
those who don't own cable modems the rise is
compensated by the fall of cable modem prices.
According to the ZDnet article, the additional charge for renting a cable modem is $10; you're still getting a discount if you own your own cable modem (albeit a very small one).
They have increased the price of their service by $7. They are reducing the sting a little by allowing people to rent their cable modems for free. People who have their own modem can still take advantage of this offer. People who do not will not be paying more. They simply will not be paying less.
What we really need is more competition in the marketplace. We need at least a dozen different services, then one of them would relaise the good niche market of people with their own cable modems.
Some days ago, users in Australia had their broadband access severely limited [slashdot.org] as the major providers changed the rules [slashdot.org]. There were many Slashdot posts effectively telling these users to 'get over it'.
- contracts (even those with obscure clauses, or that get rewritten by the vendor after they have your money) posts. This whole meme that businesses have as their sole responsibility to make money, and ethics, much less their customers' satisfaction, be damned is nonsense from start to finish, doubly so when you're dealing with telco type situations (of which cable companies are an example) where there is an effectively monopoly (or duopoly) on your choices.
... perhaps we should end that sufference in a couple of high-profile cases and the other behometh's will fall in line. That presupposes, of course, that our democracy isn't so far gone, and our leaders so profoundly corrupt, that the people can still have a voice politically. The jury is definitely still out on that, but it would certainly be worth a try.
[...]
Now that a major US provider is changing the rules, it'll be interesting to see how Slashdot readers take the news when it affects them a bit closer to home.
A-fucking-men. I get so utterly sick of these Randian libertarianesque businesses-can-do-no-wrong every-consumer-should-be-an-expert-at-deciphering
Most homes can only get cable/cable-modem service from one providor, or local telephone service from one providor (in both cases, the company that owns the last mile of copper going to your house), so telling people to "vote with their feet" is literally tantamount to telling them to physically move to a new community or do without what is becoming an increasingly vital service.
It is utter crap when these self-styled free marketeers (who apparently can't recognize a limited, non-free market when it hits them in the face) tell folks in Australia that sort of nonsense, and it will be equal crap when they do so in this thread.
It is past time that people and consumers organize once again and restore some social responsibility to these businesses. Businesses and corporations exist at the sufferance of the people
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Free Market? Excuse me? I have one choice for Cable -- AT&T. I have one choice for local phone service -- SBC. I have one choice for Broadband Cable -- AT&T. I have no choices for DSL. How exactly is this a free market when the FCC limits which companies can offer service in my area? If you want a real free market, get the FCC to either enforce the rules of the 1996 telecom act requiring local providers to open their markets or have Congress rewrite the rules. Me, I won't hold my breath. Political contributions from Fortune 500 companies always win out over the desire of the people.
Chances are if you're the kind of person who would want to own your own cable modem, you're the kind of person they'd really rather leave anyway. It probably means you're more technically inclined and not willing to simply be a "consumer" -- you probably want to run some services, perhaps use some VPN tools to get to work, and all that other stuff that really pisses them off. They really just want customers who might browse the web for a couple of hours a night or send an E-mail to grandma. Once customers actually start really using the internet for serious applications, their revenue model gets all screwed up.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Customers will bitch, a few will change providers (those lucky few that can)
That's the real issue. Change providers? To who? Cable is an unregulated monopoly in the US, so you can't just change cable companies and get different service. And the FCC and Congress decided that allowing customers to choose their ISP on cable/DSL was unimportant, so you are stuck with AT&T/Charter/Time Warner/whoever for what you do have. DSL is going down the same path now, if you can even get it.
What other options are there really? Partial T1 tends to be too expensive, even in major cities with heavy telecomm systems.
The rule is simple - when there is no competition then the companies have all of the cards. Traditionally the consumer has the ultimate power in the form of voting with their wallet. However when there is a monopoly that sole ability is removed, because the consumer has no place else to go.
It's sad, really... the Telecomm Act of 1996 was supposed to fix all this. All it's done is move us backwards 50 years AND removed government oversight. Happy happy, joy joy.