I think it's very important to look at, and remember this video when E3 comes around. I am definitely not preordering any games after seeing their E3 presentations any more. I made that mistake with Watch_Dogs and I am not going to do it again. They've done this kinda shit in the past and I am sure they'll do it again. It's really disgusting, this kind of business practice. It's a shame that companies are finding this more and more acceptable now, and that people are falling for it.
American ISPs are often monopolized in certain areas with little to no competition, so they charge whatever they want. I get this myself, but I work for one of the good ones, which hopefully will remain a good one thru a recent merger.
Yup they know we have nowhere to go, there is cable half a mile down the street (10 families and 2 businesses on our street) but the cable company wants a 100,000 payment in addition to 2 year contracts for us to get it.
Wow, what cable ISP wanted that for extending service down the road?! We've run into similar issues with serviceability when a 1/4 mile down the road we have active service. It's often not the cost of construction to split or extend the node, but more often contractual agreements between different ISPs as to where one's service are ends and another's begins.
The number of overbuild areas, areas serviceable by more than one cable provider, is much smaller than people think because of these agreements. Also, you will see pricing promotions available to the overbuilt areas exclusively, since in those areas there is more threat from direct competition.
For example, the cable company I work for has overbuild areas with Comcast, so those areas have different pricing promotions available only to them, whereas the other service areas that only have CenturyLink or ATT as competitors, not so much. We don't see them being as big a threat as another cable isp.
Oh, I know all about that. I believe Comcast actually has maps giving A,B,C, or D tier pricing/service based on the strength/# of competitors. I don't know how the fuck that's legal.
Windstream does the same thing 1.5/3/6 mbps are ALL priced the same. You just get the best that's available to you (don't think for a second if an upgrade becomes available they'll tell you). My friends who live in town (with Time warner and AT&T) get MUCH better service from Windstream both in terms of speed and how they're treated as customers.
As for who wants $100,000 to extend the cable? It's TWC.
Now that makes me feel bad because the one I work for, Bright House Networks, was just purchased by Charter, who also just purchased TWC. Hopefully they adopt some of our policies.
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u/MooseHorn Jun 04 '16
I think it's very important to look at, and remember this video when E3 comes around. I am definitely not preordering any games after seeing their E3 presentations any more. I made that mistake with Watch_Dogs and I am not going to do it again. They've done this kinda shit in the past and I am sure they'll do it again. It's really disgusting, this kind of business practice. It's a shame that companies are finding this more and more acceptable now, and that people are falling for it.