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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 08:27 PM
Original message
Comcast exposed
If you are a Comcast victim, this article will be interesting. It's long, but revealing.

.......

In August, the FCC issued a 67-page report that read as if Comcast was the worst company the FCC had ever regulated. Comcast lied about its actions, schemed to prevent oversight, confused customers, and put the future of Net-based innovation at risk. The commissioners doubted Comcast's contention that blocking BitTorrent helped its network. If that were the case, the report asked, why was the company doing it during times of light traffic and in areas where there were few bandwidth-sucking households? Wasn't it possible that Comcast was trying to stop a technology that was a threat to its own video-on-demand cable services? The final verdict was devastating: "In laymen's terms, Comcast opens its customers' mail because it wants to deliver mail not based on the address or type of stamp on the envelope but on the type of letter contained therein," the FCC wrote. "This practice is not 'minimally intrusive' but invasive and outright discriminatory."

......

http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/17-02/mf_brianroberts?currentPage=all
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Vanje Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 08:50 PM
Response to Original message
1. Horrible company! nt
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Jkid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:02 PM
Response to Original message
2. Only solution? Real competition
Force Comcast to share their wires with other cable companies. Have the federal government take over the wiring and maintenance so that everywhere there's a home, you should get cable. Make Comcast and other companies pay for the maintenance.

Of course, that would never happen, as the corporations hate real competition.
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leeroysphitz Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:10 PM
Response to Reply #2
4. Right. Besides they aren't Comcasts wires they our public property held in coomon.
or they are at least on public land, either way those are OUR friggen wires and I wish our local, state and federal governments would remember that once in a while.
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DCKit Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:13 PM
Response to Reply #2
5. And, by making large political donations, they've made sure they don't have much competition.
Not to mention the few companies remaining present a united front against Net Neutrality.

It's a real shame that there are several third-world countries with a more developed, faster Internet structure than ours.
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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 08:21 AM
Response to Reply #5
17. Maybe they want Americans to have less
information. That isn't much of a challenge.
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Greyhound Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 08:34 AM
Response to Reply #2
18. Competition is not allowed in Amerika. All goods and services are to/will
be provided by The State Our Benevolent Corporate Masters.



That is all.


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SammyWinstonJack Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 06:27 PM
Response to Reply #18
25. The United States of Corporate America.
:puke:
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Changenow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:06 PM
Response to Original message
3. Regulation would be nice. nt
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Metta Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:33 PM
Response to Original message
6. Good. They're a bunch of malevolent neo-fascists.
:hi:
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onenote Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:55 PM
Response to Reply #6
9. Really? Then why do they give so much to Democrats?
In the most recent election cycle, Comcast's PAC gave to Democrats over repubs by a nearly 60/40 margin and Comcast employees gave more than twice as much to Obama as to McCain. One of my contributions to Obama was made as part of a bundled contribution arranged by a Comcast executive who, over the past decade, has personally donated close to a quarter million dollars to Democratic candidates.

Comcast, like most big corprorations, is tone deaf about a lot of things and puts its interests and those of its stockholders ahead of pretty much everything else -- but does that make them "malevolent neo-fascists"?
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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 10:50 PM
Response to Reply #9
10. So they know how to butter their bread
Edited on Sat Jan-24-09 10:55 PM by spotbird
They are still crooks.

On edit:

To answer your question, yes.
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Seldona Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 11:26 PM
Response to Reply #9
15. "Doesn't take a weatherman to know which way the wing blows."
Bob Dylan
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Metta Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 12:45 PM
Response to Reply #9
21. Playing both sides of the street.
:hi:
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Kip Humphrey Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:35 PM
Response to Original message
7. Comcastic.
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Greyhound Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 10:14 AM
Response to Reply #7
20. Love that graphic. Yours? n/t
:kick:

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druidity33 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 09:40 PM
Response to Original message
8. that article
actually puts Comcast in a pretty good light. I sure wish i had Broadband. I'd take Comcast over HughesNet any day of the week.

:shrug:


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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 10:52 PM
Response to Reply #8
11. Be careful what you wish for
I've lived many places and Comcast is in a league of its own.
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depakid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 11:09 PM
Response to Reply #11
12. I don't say this sort of thing very often- but comcast is a den of thieves
Bills are full of mystery charges- offers of service are withdrawn, price increases come without notice, and if you don't pay them, they cut off your service.

Not to mention the issue a few years back about illegal tying contracts with cable TV service.

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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 11:13 PM
Response to Reply #12
13. Cutting your service is
the least of it, they can also destroy your credit rating.

It is why government must regulate monopolies.
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depakid Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 11:20 PM
Response to Reply #13
14. Not just regulate- prosecute
Among other things, false statements of fact provided to government regulatory officials constitutes a felony.

Every single person in a position of authority who made (or approved) such statements to the FCC ought to be indicted by the Justice Department.
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spotbird Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-24-09 11:40 PM
Response to Reply #14
16. Who prosecutes major criminals these days?
There is an exemption for those who steal more than a million. Thieves who can leverage more than a billion are awarded.
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KharmaTrain Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 08:48 AM
Response to Original message
19. A New Day Is Coming...
File this under the "Elections Have Consequences" folder...the cable industry is about to get a big shake-up. This is the first FCC in 14 years that will have both a Democratic majority and Chairman. Gone is Billy Tauzin, Michael Powell and Kevin Martin...in is Michael Copps and a definite change is about to happen to telecommunications.

Just like how deregulating banking turned into a disaster, so has media "deregulation"...consentrating too much money and power in few hands with virtually no government oversight. The big cable companies and broadcast conglomerates feathered GOOP nests big time and it has created a communications financial meltdown as revenues for advertising are vanishing along with a large drop in subscribers who can no longer afford "service". They went to the well one time too many and always thought their golden goose would never stop cranking out the eggs.

Part of the incentive package is money to develop new fiber and wireless internet and cable systems...and with it opening up the competition. Look to see "ala carte" pricing...or paying for what you want...and for rate structures to become regulated like the utility it has become.

Yes...a new day is coming...
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bvar22 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 01:52 PM
Response to Original message
22. Wires and Cables are OBSOLETE.
I recently purchased an Alltel Wireless Intenet USB adapter. I am delighted with it.
My connection speed isn't as fast as my old Comcast cable, but the speeds are in the good DSL range...entirely adequate, especially considering that Cable is not available in my rural location.

There ARE options.
YOU can kill Comcast.
Just say NO MORE!
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tavalon Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 05:57 PM
Response to Original message
23. We're moving in the next few months and we're leaving them behind
I get so tired of them fucking with our system every time one of my family members uses bit torrent.
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slay Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 06:25 PM
Response to Original message
24. Most US high-speed ISP's suck, but Comcast is HORRIBLE
As you can tell by the article. :puke:
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4 t 4 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jan-25-09 10:24 PM
Response to Reply #24
26. They are like
dictators,this is how it is or forget it just an awful company.
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