Comments for CUT-THE-CABLE.COM http://cut-the-cable.com the anti-COMCAST blog & resource site Tue, 09 Aug 2011 12:54:13 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Comment on Comcast Contractor Accused of Raping a Child by systek http://cut-the-cable.com/comcast-contractor-accused-of-raping-a-child/comment-page-1#comment-878 systek Tue, 09 Aug 2011 12:54:13 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=863#comment-878 http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7689241.html Update your stupid article! http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7689241.html

Update your stupid article!

]]> Comment on Comcast Contractor Accused of Raping a Child by christina http://cut-the-cable.com/comcast-contractor-accused-of-raping-a-child/comment-page-1#comment-871 christina Thu, 04 Aug 2011 22:59:32 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=863#comment-871 DNA cleared him today!!! Now let's see if the news airs this, probably not since it wouldn't be "big news". Screw all the news channels! DNA cleared him today!!! Now let’s see if the news airs this, probably not since it wouldn’t be “big news”. Screw all the news channels!

]]> Comment on Enjoy the Convenience of a DVR WITHOUT Cable by Greg http://cut-the-cable.com/enjoy-the-convenience-of-a-dvr-without-cable/comment-page-1#comment-759 Greg Sat, 18 Jun 2011 14:05:11 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=583#comment-759 We cut the DirecTV fees, and now have 2 of the DTVpal units. They are not perfect, but the best standalone OTA DVR units I could find on the market. The good news is that if a hard drive fails (mine did), you can just pop another one in there, and the drive is auto-reloaded by firmware. Other problems I've had: * The HDMI output failed on one unit. Fortunately the component video output still worked just fine. * They can freeze up, especially when monkeying with the remote control right when it's starting to record. * On one unit, the Date/Time setting gets unset somehow, and has to be manually re-entered. That messes up any scheduled recordings. * Lately, some TV shows (especially Glee) have odd schedules where they start or end one minute late. This can cause DTVpal to skip the next recording (unless you enter the times and channels manually). We still use them every day, and for the most part work fine. But, you will experience a problem occasionally. They are not as refined as TiVo, but then again, you don't have to pay a monthly fee. My DirecTV bill was up to $160. When I did the math on how much it was costing me per show that I watched, it was ridiculous. We cut the DirecTV fees, and now have 2 of the DTVpal units. They are not perfect, but the best standalone OTA DVR units I could find on the market. The good news is
that if a hard drive fails (mine did), you can just pop another one in there, and the drive is auto-reloaded
by firmware.

Other problems I’ve had:
* The HDMI output failed on one unit. Fortunately the component video output still worked just fine.
* They can freeze up, especially when monkeying with the remote control right when it’s starting to record.
* On one unit, the Date/Time setting gets unset somehow, and has to be manually re-entered. That messes up any
scheduled recordings.
* Lately, some TV shows (especially Glee) have odd schedules where they start or end one minute late. This can cause DTVpal to skip the next recording (unless you enter the times and channels manually).

We still use them every day, and for the most part work fine. But, you will experience a problem occasionally.
They are not as refined as TiVo, but then again, you don’t have to pay a monthly fee. My DirecTV bill was up to
$160. When I did the math on how much it was costing me per show that I watched, it was ridiculous.

]]> Comment on Class Action Lawsuit Against Comcast on the Horizon by Jill http://cut-the-cable.com/class-action-lawsuit-against-comcast-on-the-horizon/comment-page-1#comment-754 Jill Sat, 04 Jun 2011 17:31:05 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=465#comment-754 I am fine with paying a fee to receive an HD signal in my home, but I am not fine with paying $9.25 per month, per set to be able to watch that same HD signal on my three additional HD televisions. I am disabled and that social security check does not go far. Why must I pay Comcast for the same product four times? It can't be legal! It is certainly not ethical. I am sure that Comcast could devise a way to send that HD signal to other TVs within the home at a much lower cost or at no cost at all. Of course, they would not consider this because they could no longer steal as much money from their customers. I would be happy to participate in a class action lawsuit. I am fine with paying a fee to receive an HD signal in my home, but I am not fine with paying $9.25 per month, per set to be able to watch that same HD signal on my three additional HD televisions. I am disabled and that social security check does not go far. Why must I pay Comcast for the same product four times? It can’t be legal! It is certainly not ethical. I am sure that Comcast could devise a way to send that HD signal to other TVs within the home at a much lower cost or at no cost at all. Of course, they would not consider this because they could no longer steal as much money from their customers. I would be happy to participate in a class action lawsuit.

]]> Comment on Inherent Flaws in Cable TV Business Model by Robert C http://cut-the-cable.com/inherent-flaws-in-cable-tv-business-model/comment-page-1#comment-748 Robert C Fri, 27 May 2011 20:05:29 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=815#comment-748 I dropped Dish Network at the beginning of May after almost 6 years of being one of their customers. About 3 years ago, they started slowly raising their rates. 3 years ago, I was paying less than $88/mo for about 250 channels plus HBO. In March of this year, it reached to over $108/mo. Do the math, folks, that's a 23% increase! That's WAY more than inflation, and cannot be justified in this economy. It's in bad taste to do business like that (speaking as a business owner). The bottom line is that I just couldn't trust them anymore. It's a shame, too, because I really liked Dish Network. To answer the question of the "logic" of all of this insanity, you'll have to go back to 1996 and "The Telecommunications Act of 1996". About 15 years ago, lobbyists from the broadcast and cable channels convinced lawmakers that cable and satellite companies were ripping them off. Cable and satellite companies were charging to carry their content, so they were therefore entitled to a share of that revenue. It's sort of like radio stations; whenever a radio station plays a song, they pay a royalty to the record company that produced it. Cable companies were started to provide better reception for people who were in bad places for reception, or otherwise didn't want to deal with a big huge antenna on the top of their house or TVs. Satellite companies have a slightly different origin, but their service today is essentially the same. You are paying for the improved reception on cable and satellite, that's it! So this is where the analogy for the broadcast and cable channels falls apart. If we all paid money to receive broadcast channels over the air, they might have a point. But we don't all receive bills in our mail when we use an antenna to receive our local channels. And the cable channels? Well, if it weren't for the cable and satellite companies, they wouldn't even exist! They owe their entire existence to cable. It used to be that the only cable channels we paid for were the premium channels; the ones that don't generally run commercials, like HBO, Showtime, etc. Now, when you have cable and/or satellite service, EVERY channel is in essence a premium channel because we pay for all of them, EVEN THE BROADCAST CHANNELS, because of the way the Telecommunications Act of 1996 is structured. I'm of the opinion that if you run commercials, and you cannot make a profit from that alone, you deserve to go out of business if you are a broadcast or cable station. Stations were making money that way for a long time before the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and very few stations went out of business. It isn't as if there was an epidemic of station failures during the 90's. This was just greed on the part of the station owners, plain and simple! As for me, I dropped Dish and ordered BASIC cable from Comcast. Yes, I only really get broadcast channels, a few cable channels and a whole slough of shopping channels. But it is, unfortunately, a necessary evil for me. I live 50 miles from most of our area broadcast stations with no clear line-of-site, with only a couple of local broadcast stations in the area. Plus, since we rent the condo we are in, I didn't want to have a war with the HOA about putting up an antenna. But at $16.92 a month, I'm okay with that. For most everything else, I built myself an HTPC so we can stream much of the programming we used to watch on satellite. It isn't perfect, and I don't get baseball games anymore unless they're on broadcast TV, and MLB.tv won't let me watch my teams because I live in the area where they play (which is absurd!), but overall it's been a positive move. Besides, we get all kinds of interesting channels that we didn't get on satellite, like the sub-channels of all the broadcast stations. In that respect, it's been a fun adventure so far. I dropped Dish Network at the beginning of May after almost 6 years of being one of their customers. About 3 years ago, they started slowly raising their rates. 3 years ago, I was paying less than $88/mo for about 250 channels plus HBO. In March of this year, it reached to over $108/mo. Do the math, folks, that’s a 23% increase! That’s WAY more than inflation, and cannot be justified in this economy. It’s in bad taste to do business like that (speaking as a business owner). The bottom line is that I just couldn’t trust them anymore. It’s a shame, too, because I really liked Dish Network.

To answer the question of the “logic” of all of this insanity, you’ll have to go back to 1996 and “The Telecommunications Act of 1996″. About 15 years ago, lobbyists from the broadcast and cable channels convinced lawmakers that cable and satellite companies were ripping them off. Cable and satellite companies were charging to carry their content, so they were therefore entitled to a share of that revenue. It’s sort of like radio stations; whenever a radio station plays a song, they pay a royalty to the record company that produced it.

Cable companies were started to provide better reception for people who were in bad places for reception, or otherwise didn’t want to deal with a big huge antenna on the top of their house or TVs. Satellite companies have a slightly different origin, but their service today is essentially the same. You are paying for the improved reception on cable and satellite, that’s it!

So this is where the analogy for the broadcast and cable channels falls apart. If we all paid money to receive broadcast channels over the air, they might have a point. But we don’t all receive bills in our mail when we use an antenna to receive our local channels. And the cable channels? Well, if it weren’t for the cable and satellite companies, they wouldn’t even exist! They owe their entire existence to cable.

It used to be that the only cable channels we paid for were the premium channels; the ones that don’t generally run commercials, like HBO, Showtime, etc. Now, when you have cable and/or satellite service, EVERY channel is in essence a premium channel because we pay for all of them, EVEN THE BROADCAST CHANNELS, because of the way the Telecommunications Act of 1996 is structured. I’m of the opinion that if you run commercials, and you cannot make a profit from that alone, you deserve to go out of business if you are a broadcast or cable station. Stations were making money that way for a long time before the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and very few stations went out of business. It isn’t as if there was an epidemic of station failures during the 90′s. This was just greed on the part of the station owners, plain and simple!

As for me, I dropped Dish and ordered BASIC cable from Comcast. Yes, I only really get broadcast channels, a few cable channels and a whole slough of shopping channels. But it is, unfortunately, a necessary evil for me. I live 50 miles from most of our area broadcast stations with no clear line-of-site, with only a couple of local broadcast stations in the area. Plus, since we rent the condo we are in, I didn’t want to have a war with the HOA about putting up an antenna. But at $16.92 a month, I’m okay with that. For most everything else, I built myself an HTPC so we can stream much of the programming we used to watch on satellite. It isn’t perfect, and I don’t get baseball games anymore unless they’re on broadcast TV, and MLB.tv won’t let me watch my teams because I live in the area where they play (which is absurd!), but overall it’s been a positive move. Besides, we get all kinds of interesting channels that we didn’t get on satellite, like the sub-channels of all the broadcast stations. In that respect, it’s been a fun adventure so far.

]]> Comment on Comcast Charges Extra for Tivo HD by Annie Wheeler http://cut-the-cable.com/comcast-charges-extra-for-tivo-hd/comment-page-1#comment-744 Annie Wheeler Thu, 26 May 2011 03:27:30 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=505#comment-744 CHECK YOUR BILL....I just got double billed for next month's services. PLUS they unbundled STARZ from my service package and almost doubled the price for the service. When I complained the online person told me that he could send in a request to have the charges removed but that he had no authorization to take off an obvious double charge. He did offer to expedite the request. Also he said that there was no way he could send me a rate schedule because I could get it online. Today I called and got the same run around. I also say their new way to list shows and it sucks. It's slow and hard to read on individual stations and you actually see LESS information on the channel listings than the old service. In the past I had nothing but good service from Comcast but it's ridiculous that their people can't fix a simple overbilling or mail me a rate schedule. CHECK YOUR BILL….I just got double billed for next month’s services. PLUS they unbundled STARZ from my service package and almost doubled the price for the service. When I complained the online person told me that he could send in a request to have the charges removed but that he had no authorization to take off an obvious double charge. He did offer to expedite the request. Also he said that there was no way he could send me a rate schedule because I could get it online.
Today I called and got the same run around. I also say their new way to list shows and it sucks. It’s slow and hard to read on individual stations and you actually see LESS information on the channel listings than the old service.
In the past I had nothing but good service from Comcast but it’s ridiculous that their people can’t fix a simple overbilling or mail me a rate schedule.

]]> Comment on Class Action Lawsuit Against Comcast on the Horizon by Barf http://cut-the-cable.com/class-action-lawsuit-against-comcast-on-the-horizon/comment-page-1#comment-736 Barf Fri, 20 May 2011 01:23:30 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=465#comment-736 What about Wideopenwest Wowway. We were so relieved to know that our cable company had us covered when the government started saying everything is digital and offering customers a box world wide. But to know our cable internet ph bundle included digital capability and we were safe. NOW WELL GUESS WHAT... WE ARE NOW BEGINNING I THINK IN A FEW MONTHS $1.99 FOR EACH BOX IN OUR HOUSE. wE CANT afford digital flat screen tv's. we have 6 tv's in our house. How can this be fair. I want to know more about these class action law suits. and how to be involved in one and push to stop all these companies trying to pull things over on customers and strong arming all the damn time. Corporate Crap ! What about Wideopenwest Wowway. We were so relieved to know that our cable company had us covered when the government started saying everything is digital and offering customers a box world wide. But to know our cable internet ph bundle included digital capability and we were safe. NOW WELL GUESS WHAT… WE ARE NOW BEGINNING I THINK IN A FEW MONTHS $1.99 FOR EACH BOX IN OUR HOUSE. wE CANT afford digital flat screen tv’s. we have 6 tv’s in our house. How can this be fair. I want to know more about these class action law suits. and how to be involved in one and push to stop all these companies trying to pull things over on customers and strong arming all the damn time. Corporate Crap !

]]> Comment on Comcast Contractor Accused of Raping a Child by admin http://cut-the-cable.com/comcast-contractor-accused-of-raping-a-child/comment-page-1#comment-735 admin Wed, 11 May 2011 12:24:38 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=863#comment-735 Hi Yesica, I agree with everything you say. Too often people are put on trial in the media and our justice system isn't given a chance to work. However, my point with this post is that it is COMCAST that puts the general public at risk. They use contractors and essentially wash their hands of any culpability. This is WRONG and it SHOULD BE where the media focuses their attention. Unfortunately, a MUG SHOT of an alleged rapist makes for better ratings. Hi Yesica, I agree with everything you say. Too often people are put on trial in the media and our justice system isn’t given a chance to work. However, my point with this post is that it is COMCAST that puts the general public at risk. They use contractors and essentially wash their hands of any culpability. This is WRONG and it SHOULD BE where the media focuses their attention. Unfortunately, a MUG SHOT of an alleged rapist makes for better ratings.

]]> Comment on Comcast Contractor Accused of Raping a Child by Yesica http://cut-the-cable.com/comcast-contractor-accused-of-raping-a-child/comment-page-1#comment-734 Yesica Fri, 06 May 2011 18:43:12 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=863#comment-734 Hello, I actually met this guy and he claims to be innocent.... When we hear something bad about someone or something we just believe those rumors. We dont care or bother to investigate the other side of the story!! I actually met this guy and to me he is innocent till proven guilty by the law. How many times do we have an opinion of something or someone we don't even know... We have to hear both of the stories to make our own judgement. Why is it that we only know the victims side of the story and not the allege raper??? Does he not have the right to speak out and plead his case??? I guess not..in our minds he is a rapper since everyone is saying he is guilty. Hello, I actually met this guy and he claims to be innocent…. When we hear something bad about someone or something we just believe those rumors. We dont care or bother to investigate the other side of the story!! I actually met this guy and to me he is innocent till proven guilty by the law. How many times do we have an opinion of something or someone we don’t even know… We have to hear both of the stories to make our own judgement. Why is it that we only know the victims side of the story and not the allege raper??? Does he not have the right to speak out and plead his case??? I guess not..in our minds he is a rapper since everyone is saying he is guilty.

]]> Comment on Class Action Lawsuit Against Comcast on the Horizon by Stephanie http://cut-the-cable.com/class-action-lawsuit-against-comcast-on-the-horizon/comment-page-1#comment-730 Stephanie Tue, 03 May 2011 20:43:22 +0000 http://cut-the-cable.com/?p=465#comment-730 Comcast sucks. Enough said. Sign me up. Comcast sucks. Enough said. Sign me up.

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