On The Media

Thank you for the informative piece on Comcast. I wish to point out IMO an important omission, as well as a point I disagree with, regarding Comcast's policy of limiting bandwidth usage to 250GB/month.

First, this piece didn't mention how Comcast has implemented this. How did Comcast notify customers of this policy? There was no paper, phone or email notification. Also at first they didn't offer a way to self monitor usage. Later they offered a 3rd party tool to Windows users only. They promised but did not release a general tool. For many, unless one undertook to attempt to self monitor network service, but note without guidelines from Comcast about what to measure, then one was left unable to know whether or not they would be disconnected. The policy was to disconnect only, and not notify the customer of impending loss of service. "Shoot first, and ask no questions." Unless one periodically reread the Terms of Service web pages, one wouldn't know about this change possibly until after being disconnected, with no recourse no alternative service plan, and no ability to reestablish service for one year.

Secondly, the gentleman interviewed in your piece voiced the opinion that 250GB/month is generous. I wish to differ. Today, perhaps, but soon there will be more users hitting that wall with the rising use of internet resources of downloading HD media, gaming, streaming video.

A question left unanswered is what is Comcast doing other than penalizing high volume users, to plan for future usage? Comcast says they need to take these steps to use their current, overtaxed infrastructure. Is there planning for infrastructure improvement? I have not heard that question asked of Comcast.

Finally, how does disconnecting top end customers, paying the maximum amounts for service fit into a profit driven business model? Chasing away best customers doesn't gel with their PR goal: "Providing excellent customer service is our #1 priority."

If you're using a bunch of bandwidth to watch porn or download copyrighted material (which is the biggest user of bandwidth) you should pay more. In addition, your downloading of porn, slows my downloading of email so I say make the bandwidth hogs pay up. Fat media opinionists/commentators should pay more as well.

In response to Jeff's comment, two items:

1. Today, there are many legitimate and legal users of high bandwidth usage, and not only for file transfer. Many security measures now "hog" bandwidth (such as VPN and other connections for secure banking, and other commercial transactions that residential customers use more and more. This problem may affect a minority now but common sense dictates that as internet services become more bulky (all those Flash ads that appear on websites are up/downloading constantly, for example), eventually the majority will hit this 250GB wall. And if Comcast continues their current policy of shutting off their service, what will happen? Will they end up shutting off the majority of their customers?

2. Comcast does not offer any tiered payment for bandwidth usage, would that they did, I and others would have been glad to pay for the usage.

So what is the problem exactly? Why can't their infrastructure accommodate all users fairly? Those who wish to use more, but without negatively affecting their lesser use neighbors? Compare this to their cable TV service. If I keep my HD TV on to CNN 24 hours a day, should my next door neighbor then not be able to watch the 11:00 local news for 30 minutes once a day? This is not an exaggerated analogy since, most of the broadband infrastructure includes cable TV also. We (or you, since, I am no longer a customer) may see this for real. It is indeed, "comcastic."

When you frame discussion of the cap in terms of numbers of standard-definition movies, like your guest did and as Comcast does, yes it can sound generous -- at first.

But compare that to how we watch TV today. At two hours a movie that's about 8 hours a day of standard definition video. Could a household watch more than that -- say a family with two teenagers and a TV in every room? Absolutely.

But how is watching TV relevant to the bandwidth cap? Well, fast forward a few years and imagine that the members of that family want to watch in high definition (fewer minutes per GB) and starts finding content on the internet more attractive than Comcast's "on demand" service or premium channels. Could they run into the cap? Absolutely.

I feel I must point out one glaring omission in your Comcast story, (which has led me to not use Comcast as my internet supplier), is that as of last summer, Comcast was apparently denying the airing of political ads that were critical of the company and the politicians it supported. See Glenn Greenwald's story in Salon.com from June 9, 2008. ( http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/06/09/comcast/ )

This action along with their complicity in warrantless wiretapping for the Bush administration has me avoiding doing business with them as much as I can. However since they do exercise a near monopoly on cable television where I live, I purchase their lowest level of service to at least be able to see John Stewart and the Daily Show.

Sorry guys, the glaring omission in this piece is that Bob Garfield used to run a website call comcastmustdieDOTcom - how can this not ever be mentioned in the piece? To brush over such venemous language by calling it a "clearinghouse for customer complaints" is a joke. And he created the site "a few years back"? Try not even 2 years, try just 16 months, try October 2007.

Perhaps I'll create a website titled onthemediamustdieDOTcom, will you guys call it simply a "clearinghouse for complaints"? I highly doubt that. But thank you, OTM, for your pathetic disclosure, for your lies about when his website was created and about the nature of the website. Thank you for examining the media with such transparancy as you examine yourselves. Yeah, I really mean that, THANK you.