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Americans Hate TV and Internet Providers More Than Other Industries

Posted by Soulskill on from the show-of-hands-who's-surprised? dept.

An anonymous reader writes "According to a new report by the American Customer Satisfaction Index, subscription TV providers and ISPs were the industries Americans disliked the most over the past year. 'Over-the-top video services, like Netflix and Hulu, threaten subscription TV providers and also put pressure on ISP network infrastructure. Customers question the value proposition of both, as consumers pay for more than they need in terms of subscription TV and get less than they want in terms of Internet speeds and reliability.' Unsurprisingly, Time Warner Cable and Comcast are the companies with the most dissatisfied customers. The ACSI said, '[I]t's a concern whenever two poor-performing service providers combine operations. ACSI data consistently show that mergers in service industries usually result in lower customer satisfaction, at least in the short term. It's hard to see how combining two negatives will be a positive for consumers.'"

18 of 255 comments (clear)

  1. Not me by rossdee · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The industry I hate the most is the fossil fuels industry
    Not just because of global warming, but mostly because they control the politicians and stop anything being done about it.

    1. Re:Not me by Cornwallis · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't blame them for doing what a business is supposed to do as much as I blame the politicians.

      Read "Extortion: How Politicians Extract Your Money, Buy Votes, and Line Their Own Pockets" -http://www.amazon.com/Extortion-Politicians-Extract-Money-Pockets/dp/0544103343

    2. Re:Not me by cryptolemur · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If we started to assume that business is not supposed to behave the most sosiopathic and misantropist way possible, the world might become a better place.

      In other words, the bottom line is no excuse for anything. Not even in business. A creepy bastard is a creepy bastard, even if it's for profit.

    3. Re:Not me by FudRucker · · Score: 5, Insightful

      RE:" A creepy bastard is a creepy bastard"

      that is the truth, and especially when they do it for profit, no wonder the rest of the world hates the USA, the politicans and corpirates have raped and murdered across the globe for profits http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

      --
      Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
    4. Re:Not me by jythie · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It is interesting how much more people get worked up about interruption of entertainment and connivence then things that actually impact their life. I guess if nothing else this does indicate just how good Americans have it. If this is the industry people complain the most about, then that means other more critical things are doing pretty well.

      Though I suspect that the people in the US who actually do have to worry about things like power, water, roads, food, etc, are not generally covered by such surveys. 'consumer' tends to be code for 'middle class with significant disposable income and an inferiority complex in regard to the upper class and blindness in regard the lower class'.

    5. Re:Not me by macpacheco · · Score: 4, Insightful

      As if the fossil fuels industry is the only power block with politicians in their backpockets.
      Don't forget about the military industrial complex, the auto industry.
      If the Comcrap and Time Warner didn't have a boatload of politicians in their back pockets they wouldn't dream about this deal.

    6. Re:Not me by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You need to assume that a business will first and foremost look after its own interests, which is to make money.

      Isn't any corporation composed on individual humans? Don't those individual humans have any responsibility or culpability for wrong-doing?

      If I get mad and kill somebody, I go to jail. But if I band together with a lynch mob and go out and kill people as a group, am I absolved because the mob was "looking after its own interests, which is to" kill people?

      Perhaps you think I'm being inflammatory. But "make money" is not a morally neutral goal -- it can easily result in serious harm and even deaths to people.

      it is not their role to be nice to society, unless we make them.

      Why isn't that part of their role? Or -- well, I agree their role may not necessarily be to "be nice to society," but surely part of their role should be not to significantly harm society, no? After all, they only exist as legal fictions created by a government that is enabled by the collective social contract of civilization. If they aren't contributing a net positive impact to society, they aren't serving a purpose for the collective good -- and therefore they should be dissolved.

      Why do you wish to absolve collections of people from ethical behavior? As a civilized society, if we would not tolerate that behavior from an individual, it should not be tolerated from a corporation. Otherwise, there is no reason to allow their existence.

    7. Re:Not me by itsenrique · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You sound like a pretty fearful person, who never lived in a big city.

    8. Re:Not me by Xyrus · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Later the parent discovers that the AGW industry has a larger reach, controls more government bodies, and is screwing over developing nations, under the guise of "helping" them.

      Yeah, because I can't count how many times we've gone to war over some other country's solar panels, overthrown democracies to secure their wind power farms for ourselves, and ruthlessly crushed third world nations for their geothermal resources. I mean it's not like Exxon makes more money in one year than all green-power companies combined or anything. If it wasn't for the billions of dollars of tax payer money flowing into the pockets of oil companies as subsidies, why the fossil fuel industry would just shrivel up and die.

      Oh, and there is a rainbow colored talking platypus eating raspberry cake behind you. He seems to think you're more disconnected from reality than he is.

      --
      ~X~
    9. Re:Not me by nblender · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I have a self-righteous friend who walks/cycles everywhere he needs to go. Doesn't own a car/truck.. Happily puts down those who do, etc ... You know the type. It's all fine and dandy until he needs to move a couch, or pickup some lumber, or get to the airport, then his vehicle-owning friends must come to his aid... When we all decide to get together for a beer or a meal, it needs to be near his part of town so he can walk; or if it's somewhere else, he'll arrange for someone to come pick him up.. If no one is able (or willing) to pick him up, he doesn't join in... He misses out (by choice)...

      Another point, just because someone drives a big SUV to work, doesn't mean it's a status symbol or what have you. Maybe they have 4 kids and don't want to (or can afford to) have a small car just for commuting. Or maybe they need the vehicle for work because they regularly carry large bulky items for sale or install... I've more and more tried to turn off my generalization engine...

    10. Re:Not me by jriding · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I love the "Job creator" argument.
      If they only kill 3 towns its ok because well, they are job creators. If they only poison 1 states water supply its ok. I mean they make all the jobs for those same people that are now dying due to drinking the water.

      If I promise to pay you 500K a year for a job I create for you, is it then ok to randomly kill your family members? I mean I am creating jobs.

      --
      love the taste, hate the texture
    11. Re:Not me by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I'm not talking about criminal wrong-doing; if a corporation engages in activity we wouldn't tolerate from an individual, or causes significant harm to society, it should be held accountable, as should the individuals who made the decision to break the law. What I mean is making moral choices within the bounds of the law.

      First of all, a corporation cannot make those, it's the leadership. And faced with a choice between something that benefits the community they are in vs. their shareholders, they could argue that the right moral choice is to go for shareholder value, since they are directly (and by law) charged with looking after the interests of those shareholders, not the community at large. If you, as a CEO, have the opportunity to shift your earnings to an overseas holding so you'll end up paying less corporate tax, should you not do so to benefit your shareholders? And if we do not want that sort of behaviour from corporations, we should not expect corporations hold themselves to some ethical standards higher than the law, we should set those standards into law, and/or exercise our rights as customers and shareholders.

      Corporations will follow the ethical decisions made by their leadership, or else hold themselves only to the minimum social / ethical requirements demanded by the law, the shareholders, and society inasmuch it influences their ability to do business. It is true that the world would be a better place if the people who ran those corporations would aspire to higher ethical standards, but that is true of people in any capacity, and a pipe dream. That's why we have laws.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
  2. Noncompetition by Travis+Mansbridge · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's a joke when Comcast uses the claim that TWC covers separate parts of the country as justification for their merger when this should just make it obvious that they were never competing in the first place.

  3. Re:Funny, they're not my first choices by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Since when is lawyering an industry

    Since it became profitable to make bullshit claims and settle.

    The lawyer division of RIAA is only flimsily connected to the music industry. Primarily it is part of the lawyering industry.
    Same with patent trolls.

  4. Re:RIAA/MPAA should top the list by ruir · · Score: 1, Insightful

    When your biggest provider, Comcast is owned by Microsoft, and all the Internet providers where born as TV content providers, and are in bed with the media cartel, and both are scared shitless people is giving up TV and turning to Internet, there is no incentive to make Internet cheaper, or debundle it from TV.

  5. Re:so? americans always hate some company by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's more along the lines of:

    "I started paying for cable back in the late 70s to early 80s, with the intention that my monthly bill was a replacement for having to watch all those stupid advertisements-- exactly as advertised-- with the perk that I would have more reliable and higher quality of service."

    which is being replaced with:

    "Today, I pay over 100$/month for 200+ channels, of which I only watch 15 on average, STILL have to watch advertisements, and have inferior video quality to over the air broadcasts-- which come in for free. I have better quality of service, advertisement free, and with more flexible control over what I can watch with the streaming services, which if I were to subscribe to the top 3 (Netflix, Amazon prime, Hulu Plus) is still only 1/3 the price of cable-- If I combine all three, with a competitively priced ISP, I pay about the same as I pay for just cable- Have internet, have all the shows and movies I actually want, none of the shit I dont want (including adverts in most cases), and have better quality video. Yet, these cable giants keep lobbying to keep abusing me, and to try to remove these options from me using a combination of Media Provider + Media transport mergers (Comcast + Time warner, et al) coupled with erosions on fundamental practices that preserve competition (net neutrality, et al). Fuck them!"

    It isn't "I hate them because I pay them money." It *IS* "I hate them because they conspire to fuck me over, and to prevent competition from superior offerings, and dont give a fuck about me other than how much money they can suck from my wallet."

    Thanks for playing.

  6. Break them up, don't combine them by AnontheDestroyer · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's sad that the state of affairs in this country has us discussing the MERGER of two hated monopolies, rather than busting them up into overlapping pieces like they should.

  7. Work visa by tepples · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Then move to a sensible country.

    How do you recommend that a U.S.-born U.S. citizen currently residing in the U.S. qualify for a work visa in what you call "a sensible country"?