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Time Warner Cable: No Consumer Demand For Gigabit Internet
Freshly Exhumed writes "Chris Welch at The Verge tells us: 'Speaking at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference moments ago, Time Warner Cable's Chief Financial Officer Irene Esteves seemed dismissive of the impact Google Fiber is having on consumers. "We're in the business of delivering what consumers want, and to stay a little ahead of what we think they will want," she said when asked about the breakneck internet speeds delivered by Google's young Kansas City network. "We just don't see the need of delivering that to consumers."' The article goes on to quote her: '...residential customers have thus far shown little interest in TWC's top internet tiers. "A very small fraction of our customer base" ultimately choose those options.'"
How about the price?
in rotterdam you can get 200 mbit for 30 euro's, 600 mbit for 37 euro's and 1Gbit for a few hundred euro's more...
I love to have 1Gbit, but I guess 600mbit is okay for now, well hell I would be happy if I could get 200 mbit at all...
It's just how much people are willing to pay for it. I think it still costs far too much....
"We just don't see the need of delivering that to consumers."' The article goes on to quote her: '...residential customers have thus far shown little interest in TWC's top internet tiers. "A very small fraction of our customer base" ultimately choose those options.'"
Translation: "We have a near monopoly and don't want to spend the money to do the upgrade because we don't have to"
I pay for 50Mb/s access and my ISP offers 100Mb/s. Why don't I pick 100Mb/s? Because it costs $200/month versus the $80/month I'm already paying. Huge diminishing returns. The expensive bit is running the cable to my house. After any arguments against offering the fastest possible speed for a reasonable price are pretty weak.
The article goes on to quote her: '...residential customers have thus far shown little interest in TWC's top internet tiers. "A very small fraction of our customer base" ultimately choose those options.'"
Um, yeah - that's because it's waaaaaaaay overpriced.
I think $20 more per month is a fair price for any extra 1mb, and with the top tier at 35mb its faster than any consumer will ever need! I love my triple lock-in play!
Meh, here in Finland I pay 29e/month for this (uncapped) and I live in a town of 10k people. If they tried to raise their prices they'd lose my business to any of the 4 competing ISP's.
my sarcasometer is out for repair, so I'm unsure if serious... but I *am* a TWC customer, and I pay for their top residential tier, because I require it for my home business (IT consulting). It's stupid expensive for the upload speeds that I'm offered, which is really what I need the top tier for. I most certainly *am* their target audience, I get no less than two pieces of physical mail per month asking me to go for their TV and phone bundle. They LOVE the fact that they can charge me as much as they do, because I have no viable alternative right now, at least not until I can move to the next town over (Verizon FiOS) or into an office with a fiber provider. The woes of living in the 'burbs.
In my case, it is because although down speed is higher, up speed and latency are no better.
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
It seems to vary widely by region; in Upstate NY, our basic service is 5mb down, 1mb up and costs $55 monthly after all of the first year deals fall away.
I'd love gigabit service, but at their current pricing model up here, $11,000 a month is a bit steep.