Slashdot Mirror
Comcast Launches Program For Low-Income Families
wasimkadak writes "Comcast rolled out its Internet Essentials program nationwide today, offering low-income families in its service territory $10/month Internet connections and access to $150 computers. Any family with at least one child who qualifies for the free lunch program at public schools can subscribe to a low-speed (1.5Mbps) Comcast Internet connection for $9.95 a month. Comcast guarantees that it won't raise the price and offers the plan without equipment rental or activation fees. Subscribers also cannot have 'an overdue Comcast bill or unreturned equipment,' and they can't have had Comcast Internet in the last 90 days."
The last paragraph of the linked article mentions that they had no choice but to do this:
Though Comcast no doubt loves children and cares deeply about the digital divide, its Internet Essentials program was also a part of the conditions under which it was allowed to buy NBC earlier this year. The company pledged to reach 2.5 million low income households with high speed Internet for less than $10 a month, and to sell some sort of computer for $150 or less.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
A revenue maximizing price-discrimination tactic and a PR coup that should keep those meddlesome regulators from breathing down their duopolist-at-best necks... Plus, the odds are good that at least some of your customers will feel more shafted by the fact that nasty, undeserving, poor people are getting low prices than by the fact that those prices only look low because all the other prices are so high.
Comcastic work, boys.
As mentioned before, the launch isn't exactly new, and it was a provision of the NBC/Comcast merger. Nevertheless, it has gotten more attention than usual in the past day or two. Here's an alternative viewpoint, heavily biased against Comcast but still worth reading (at least in my opinion): http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Comcast-Highlights-10-Broadband-in-DC-116216
If you think it's expensive now, wait till it's free...
That's true today, but the entire public library system is under assault and I would not be surprised to see it dismantled within a decade. Slashdotters routinely make remarks like "who needs libraries when we have Google Books!" Libraries are trying hard to remain relevant. Free, public internet access is one of their real services to the community ... but now on Slashdot, and at town budget meetings, people can stand up and shout "who needs libraries when Comcast offers free^H^H^H^H cheap(er) internet access to (some) poor people (in select markets)!"
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
While I'll never qualify for this, I still find myself having to criticize Comcast for doing everything possible to avoid helping as many people as they can. The very last line of the stipulation is what ruins it for me, when they state: "and they can't have had Comcast Internet in the last 90 days." If people qualify for it because they NEED it, stop doing everything possible to keep people from being able to qualify for it. Having had Comcast in the last 90 days doesn't somehow make someone who is on the list of those in poverty from being any less poor. Just give them the damn benefit like everyone else who falls into the "need" demographic. Yeah, I know no one really "needs" it, but if they're going through and pretending to be helpful, at least be helpful.
Sarbonn's blog: http://www.sarbonn.com/blog