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Government The Internet

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Says Switching ISPs Is Too Hard 145

Posted by timothy from the good-reason-to-use-webmail dept.
Jason Koebler writes Did you hear about those Comcast service calls from hell that have been cropping up over the last couple months? So did FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, who said today that switching internet service providers is too damn hard, in part because ISPs have grown used to having a monopoly on broadband services. "Once consumers choose a broadband provider, they face high switching costs that include early-termination fees and equipment rental fees," Wheeler said in a speech today. Wheeler didn't specifically say what the FCC will do (if anything) to change that, but said the answer is to help facilitate more true competition: "If those disincentives to competition weren't enough, the media is full of stories of consumers' struggles to get ISPs to allow them to drop service."
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FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Says Switching ISPs Is Too Hard More

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Says Switching ISPs Is Too Hard

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  • Too damn hard? I don't even know how to begin to reply to that.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Too damn hard? I don't even know how to begin to reply to that.

      My wife doesn't want to switch our ISP because her main e-mail address uses that at the domain name, and maybe a thousand friends, business contacts, and acquaintances have it as her contact info.

      Yes, she could change to a gmail account, and after a while the people who need to contact her would change the address in their address books. Eventually. Most of them.

      * (She's a freelancer. In general, when they fail to get in contact with a freelancer, customers usually just go to a different one rather than

      • Re:Seriously? (Score:5, Informative)

        by mrchaotica ( 681592 ) * on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:46PM (#47828031)

        This is why if you're a freelancer, you should have your own domain.

        • Re:Seriously? (Score:5, Insightful)

          by CastrTroy ( 595695 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:04PM (#47828281)
          Not just freelancers, but any business use whatsoever. It's amazing the number of businesses that use ISP email addresses or email addresses from some free service (hotmail, gmail, yahoo, etc.) as their primary contact on business correspondence.

          I would add in personal use as well, but it's hard to convince the generic home user of the benefits of owning their own domain name and email address. The best you can hope for with most of them is to use a dedicated email service like gmail rather than what their ISP gives them. No to mention, having your own domain name comes with its own set of problems. Paying to renew the domain name, as well as paying for a hosting service to handle your email isn't fee. Most home users are far more likely to forget to renew their domain name and have it snatched up by a domain squatter than to have a problem with GMail or a similar service.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by taustin ( 171655 )

            Most home users are far more likely to forget to renew their domain name and have it snatched up by a domain squatter than to have a problem with GMail or a similar service.

            Are there registrars that do not send out reminders to the various contact address in the registration? And why would anyone deal with such a fly by night outfit? Or, to put it another way, it's not so much "forget to renew their domain name" as it is "ignore the reminders" or "put in bogus information in the first place, which is a violation of the terms of service."

            I feel zero sympathy for these people. I've run my own mail server since 1995, and have no regrets.

            • My domain contact email is my work email, not the one on my domain, because if the hosting service has problems and the domain is down I want to be able to move to a new service (this has happened). I wouldn't trust a third party email to this either - Yahoo closed lots of unused accounts last year and Google or anyone else could do the same. My work email I check daily and has been stable for more than a decade.

              And yet - were I to get fired or quit, I could forget to switch, or miss a reminder email befo

          • Paying to renew the domain name, as well as paying for a hosting service to handle your email isn't [free].

            Yeah, it makes me sad that gmail isn't free for custom domains (I think it used to be, but I missed out on it).

            • If you can get onto the testing group for Google's domains, you can set up an alias for any domain you have with them pointing to your Gmail account.
            • For years, I had all email for my vanity domain forwarded to my gmail account, and gmail lets you send email out with the Reply-to header set as your vanity domain. It was only when I wanted some more advanced capabilities of Google Apps did I suck it up and start spending the $50/yr/user to fully port my domain over.

              • "For years, I had all email for my vanity domain forwarded to my gmail account"

                That's how I do it

                "and gmail lets you send email out with the Reply-to header set as your vanity domain"

                Yeah, sort of. I set my defauly from address to be my "vanity". It still seems to default to my gmail address sometimes if I don't watch it. (I rarely think to look before hitting send). It sucks because it seems like as soon as someone receives something from my gmail address that's the only address they will send to. I wa

          • " The best you can hope for with most of them is to use a dedicated email service like gmail rather than what their ISP gives them"

            Yes. That would be the sensable thing. Non business don't NEED domain names but it is pretty dumb to lock yourself into an isp by using the email.

            "Paying to renew the domain name, as well as paying for a hosting service to handle your email isn't fee.[sic] "

            No. Good things rarely are. But it IS pretty cheap if you shop around.

            "Most home users are far more likely to forget to re

            • I've worked with major corporations that have let domain names lapse. Not their main official one, but still a domain name they were using for a pretty big project. I don't know why they wouldn't just use a subdomain, but after working with some corporations, it was probably easier for them to set up a whole new domain than to get their IT team to create a new subdomain of the main one. Of course the guy who originally created the domain might have since left the company, and they may have no idea what t

      • Re:Seriously? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Charliemopps ( 1157495 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:46PM (#47828039)

        Too damn hard? I don't even know how to begin to reply to that.

        My wife doesn't want to switch our ISP because her main e-mail address uses that at the domain name, and maybe a thousand friends, business contacts, and acquaintances have it as her contact info.

        Yes, she could change to a gmail account, and after a while the people who need to contact her would change the address in their address books. Eventually. Most of them.

        * (She's a freelancer. In general, when they fail to get in contact with a freelancer, customers usually just go to a different one rather than bother to spend the time to look up the new address.)

        I work for an ISP. That's intentional. In fact, it's the only reason ISPs sitll offer email. It's a nightmare to maintain and has no other benefit to the ISP other than to make customers "sticky"

        • I work for an ISP. That's intentional. In fact, it's the only reason ISPs sitll offer email. It's a nightmare to maintain and has no other benefit to the ISP other than to make customers "sticky"

          Got to admit that this has kept me with Verizon for years... Not that I have an issue, but my Wife would have one...

          • I pay VZ $20.00 per year to keep my aged mother's VZ email address active.
            The only thing harder than having her change her email address would be to get all of her (aged) contacts to update their address books...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ron_ivi ( 607351 )

          It's a nightmare to maintain

          Really?

          I'd have thought that was a solved problem long ago - and if it really is still painful, there are plenty of email hosting services that would love to sign up a major ISP to provide that service for you.

          • AT&T uses Yahoo for web mail, though you get an AT&T address. It would make more sense to have more generic email providers separate from ISPs, though quality ones without bad reps like Yahoo or Gmail.

        • I work for an ISP. That's intentional. In fact, it's the only reason ISPs sitll offer email. It's a nightmare to maintain and has no other benefit to the ISP other than to make customers "sticky"

          I guess I'm struggling to believe this bullshit when I can name exactly zero friends with an ISP-level email address. All of them converted to webmail services (or use their own domain they own) long ago.

          In fact, I'd challenge you to find anyone who even knows their ISP offers email as a service, since the first (and last) time I heard of that service was on the day my broadband was installed.

          That was 1998. Not a damn peep since then about ISP email. That's one hell of a "sticky" sales tactic.

          • I can name 2.6 million people (Score:4, Insightful)

            by beanpoppa ( 1305757 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @02:48PM (#47829351)
            2.58 million [consumerist.com] people are still paying AOL for their email address. It sounds like you have a very biased circle. Looking through my contact list, I see several family and friends with optimum, comcast, and verizon email addresses.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by jjhall ( 555562 )

            Well my provider uses Google for their e-mail addresses, so if I really wanted to get one I could have something@provider.com and access it via Gmail.

            My mother still uses dial-up Internet, primarily because she had a hard enough time getting all of her acquaintances (most of them aged admittedly) to get her simple address (lastnamefirstinitial@provider.com) correct in their address books to begin with, and getting them to update it correctly to the new address would be a craps shoot. This is the biggest re

          • I don't even know what my "ISP email" address is. I set it up two years ago cause ATnT forced me too...never checked it, never logged in. oops.

          • I'm on TWC. I opened a new account when I moved in March, and was not prompted in any way to create an e-mail address. My cable modem (owned by me, not rented) died a few weeks ago, and I could not activate the replacement until I created a useless @local.rr.com address.

            People who aren't techies all used their ISP mail, until Hotmail, Yahoo, and especially GMail became known to the general user. The latter becoming extremely popular because of Android, which started becoming popular in late 2009/2010.

            Eve

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dj245 ( 732906 )
          I've had a personal domain name for the last 10 years or so. The spam has got to be such a big problem that I am switching over to gmail, albeit slowly. I could probably fix it, but I was wasting too much time trying. It wasn't worth the hassle to me.

          I haven't been giving out the personal domain address for some time now, I have forwarding set up, and the when I reply, the gmail address is used. The number of emails coming to my old address has dropped to the point where I could probably drop it. Go

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Why did your wife do things that way? It's a problem of her own creation. For these types of situations, my attitude is that she will have to cover the incremental cost of keeping her existing ISP as a cost of doing business and hopefully it's a lesson well learned. Not sure who her existing ISP is, but did she ever consider that they may go out of business or be bought out at some point? She may still be forced off of her existing e-mail account at some point, whether she wants to or not. She should s

      • That's the big issue I think. My mother does not want to switch from her dial up because (other than cost) it means a new email address.

        I snagged a "free for life" address in the 90s, though it soon became a pay service. Though it's only about $40 a year to have email forwarded to my real ISP. I really should have set up my own domain a long time ago but when I was thinking about that it was relatively expensive to set up and not like today.

      • Re:Seriously? (Score:5, Informative)

        by David_Hart ( 1184661 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:29PM (#47828579)

        Too damn hard? I don't even know how to begin to reply to that.

        My wife doesn't want to switch our ISP because her main e-mail address uses that at the domain name, and maybe a thousand friends, business contacts, and acquaintances have it as her contact info.

        Yes, she could change to a gmail account, and after a while the people who need to contact her would change the address in their address books. Eventually. Most of them.

        * (She's a freelancer. In general, when they fail to get in contact with a freelancer, customers usually just go to a different one rather than bother to spend the time to look up the new address.)

        Easy to fix...
        - Set up a new domain and email address for her.
        - Configure the old email to forward to the new one.
        - Keep the old email for a year or two.
        - Have her send out new business cards and an email change notice to all clients, add a vCard .vcf attachment to make it easy to add to contacts
        - Use the new email address to send all replies and to remind customers to update their contact lists if they send to the old address.

        Eventually all active clients will have the new email address. It takes time, but it does work....

        • * Install one of the many email programs on your local machine and start using it instead of your providers software or web page.
          * Add a rule to automatically reply to names in your address list that your email address has changed and what the new one is.
          * Start moving over any business emails that you get.
          * After a month or two, every time you get an email, click on 'unsubscribe', go to their web site and change your profile, or make sure they got an auto-reply.

          I did this a couple of years ago for my Cox c

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward

          "Configure the old email to forward to the new one."

          Tried that. Somehow the old ISP would always find a clever way to break the forward, resulting in lost email. They would change or rest the forwarding function without notice.

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by Anonymous Coward

            Well Drop them then! oh wait...

          • I would not trust the old ISP to forward anything. It should be a pull from a new account. Something that I've used before is to setup a Gmail account, which can pull from any standard POP3 account, and then have GMail forward as appropriate.

      • Re:Seriously? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by taustin ( 171655 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:33PM (#47828631) Homepage Journal

        That is the price of having made a bad decision early on. The longer she waits, the more severe the pain will be when she finally does switch.

      • This is why you never ever use the email address provided by an ISP. Not only is it a blatant lock-in tactic, but these days the email service they provide is inferior in every way to the free offerings out there.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Anonymous Coward

          these days the email service they provide is inferior in every way to the free offerings out there.

          I.. what??

          Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they are superior to the free services. I'm just having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that any one service can be considered "superior" to another. It's nothing more than a storage box, holding the received email until Outlook/Thunderbird/whatever downloads it. What is there that can be improved upon?

          • For example, ISP services usually don't offer IMAP, SMTP, AND web interface access, while many free services do. The storage on the ISP-hosted mail is also usually pathetic by modern standards - and if you're someone like me who accesses their mail exclusively through the web interface, that's important.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by koan ( 80826 )

        Yeah your wife should have gotten a gmail, (or other) anyone that uses ISP emails is foolish.

        • no, his wife should GET BACK IN THE KITCHEN and leave the computer alone. The computer is a boy thing...if she wants to have something electronic there's always a vacuum cleaner. /sarcasm

      • My wife doesn't want to switch our ISP because her main e-mail address uses that at the domain name, and maybe a thousand friends, business contacts, and acquaintances have it as her contact info.

        I've switched ISP's and my old ISP still keeps alive the email address they created for me. I don't use it for much, but it's quite possible it would be more effort for the ISP to disable the mailbox than it is for them to keep it running.
        Besides, lots of people have 'connected' accounts via Facebook, gmail, or a Microsoft Account. For all of those you change your primary address, and the email address for you changes on all of your contacts.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I just closed my account with Comcast since I'm moving to a different town controlled by a different monopoly.

      I didn't call them up. I simply unplugged all of the boxes, brought them to the local branch office, put them on the counter, and asked to close my account. That was the end of it. The girl at the counter knew there was no talking me into keeping them.

    • Yes, seriously.

      For a great many people, "switching ISPs" basically means moving. Because if you're lucky, you've got an option of DSL or cable, with DSL being effectively useless for anything but simple web browsing and email.

      This is why we need true net neutrality—which means separating the medium from the message. Force the people who own the lines to at least lease them to anyone who asks, basically at cost...or, even better, break up the companies that own the lines so that that's all they do, and

  • Switching is too hard? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dontbemad ( 2683011 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:34PM (#47827879)
    How can you call it switching when there is no one else to switch to in most places?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You can always move.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by taustin ( 171655 )

        Two moves back, I chose where to move based on who had better DSL. Last move, I stayed in the same city.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by antdude ( 79039 )

        I moved, and same problem. Argh. There used to be DSL service here, but it is no longer offered. WTF?

    • Other than DSL, no other choice around here either.

      • I have choice DSL or crapcast. However the copper lines are so old that you can't actually run DSL over them. You can barely use regular phone lines.

        So I don't have choice.

    • Logged in to say this, but see you already got to it. This monopoly crap is what needs to be fixed. Right now, I would gladly take a difficult (and expensive) to terminate service over the choice I have now: Take Comcast or take nothing reasonable (satellite? Riiight...)

      We need someone to bust up these monopolies and let other companies in to compete. This "we are locking in this neighborhood" crap has got to stop and I think it's the biggest hurdle to any sort of competitive broadband in this country (co

  • It's the Net Neutrality, Tom (Score:5, Informative)

    by destinyland ( 578448 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:37PM (#47827907)
    I wonder if this is just a cynical attempt to appear "tough on monopolies" -- right before Tom Wheeler guts Net Neutrality forever.

    Reminder: next Wednesday is a "Day of Action" to publicize the need to maintain Net Neutrality.

    http://www.theverge.com/2014/9... [theverge.com]

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by tomhath ( 637240 )
      Think about what is going to happen in about two months. Why would the administration that hasn't done much of anything for the past five years be talking tough on consumer related issues now? Hint: First Tuesday in November.

  • Dingo states the obvious

  • And he missed the really egregious costs (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cid Highwind ( 9258 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:39PM (#47827939) Homepage

    Selling your house or breaking your lease, truck rental and fuel to haul all your shit halfway across the continent, being unemployed for however long it takes to find a job within commuting distance of your new home, etc.

  • Here's an idea, Tom (Score:5, Interesting)

    by EmagGeek ( 574360 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:40PM (#47827957) Journal

    How about the FCC does this: If you are an ISP and have taken billions of federal dollars to build out infrastructure, you actually have to do it and offer service to people?

    • Tell that to New Jersey residents that just got boned by Verizon.

  • Live in the country, another 500 feet away from teh big grey box and I couldn't even get my 1.5mb DSL. As is, I can get 3mb but can't use it because of too much signal loss.

    I could switch back to dialup... I'd have to dig out an old computer to act as a dialup box and gateway for my LAN. I could switch to Dish, but the latency will suck for playing games.

    Final option would be to go "dry line" and just buy DSL, but that isn't really changing my service - it just changes who I write a check to each month.

    So

  • Bring out your shills! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    But the ISP shills (alen and charliemopps) said the lack of choice is because of that bully Netflix. If they'd stop abusing the poor ISPs then we'd be drowning in choice!

  • A nothing statement that means nothing. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Arkiel ( 741871 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:43PM (#47827995) Journal
    So Wheeler googled "ISP outrage", clicked the "News" tab, and had an intern write a feel-good do-nothing speech about the Comcast outrage?

    If it were anyone we could at least momentarily pretend that this was an opening salvo in some course of action that would increase incentives to switch by doing something to promote competition to act against the disincentives Comcast forces on the consumer.

    No, no, this is all about draining the political pressure that news story like the Comcast outrage foment. Its about constituents having the illusion of progress and/or representatives being able to tell their constituents that Chairman Wheeler, notable industry shill, is on the case.

  • Isn't that cute (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MrLint ( 519792 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @12:43PM (#47828005) Journal

    FCC guy seems to think there is enough competition in enough of the US to make switching a thing that might actually happen.

    • Just an election year ploy from a partisan appointee.

      Put this Wheeler guy on ignore, unless you figure he's out slumming for more campaign cash and your are an ISP who hasn't ponied up yet for this round.

  • I don't know anyone that can switch! (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Switching requires two different providers. Most people can only get DSL over a phone line because cable companies do not cover most of the country. Where I live in Seattle, Comcast only provides service to about 1/3 of the neighborhood despite it being less than a mile from the center of downtown. In order for it to be difficult to switch, you must have the ability to switch. That is the logic problem with Wheeler's statement that makes it just dumb. It's either that or a bold-face lie because he is t

    • Hey, I know what you are thinking, there isn't any other options.. But that may not be exactly true. Where I live, even if you remove the two wire based options for ISPs, there are multiple wireless ISP's which cover my area. Now I live just outside a top 10 city in the USA, but I can tell you that wireless options exist well out into areas that would take hours to commute from. The problem is exactly what Wheeler says, it's EXPENSIVE to get the equipment necessary to hook up to these services... ( Not t

      • Hey, I know what you are thinking, there isn't any other options.. But that may not be exactly true. Where I live, even if you remove the two wire based options for ISPs, there are multiple wireless ISP's which cover my area.

        Oh yes, that's true! I, for example, have a whopping three options at my house (near downtown Atlanta):

        1. AT&T DSL (which doesn't work; my phone lines are too old)
        2. Clear Wi-Max (which doesn't work; my house is halfway between two towers
        3. Comcast cable (which is fast and reliable, but evi

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I've noticed a few people around here complaining about availability of Internet service in Seattle. Had one [slashdot.org] the other day claiming Republicans were at fault for Seattle's problems — 'greenwow' figures Republicans somehow control everything in a town where Greens have an even chance to beat them in elections.

      Are there any rational people around that can offer a theory about why Seattle is such an Internet desert? I know the US is generally not the finest example of Internet ubiquity, but I've had pe

  • I've had Comcast cable since it was Cablevision (then MediaOne, then AT&T), and it has been pretty much trouble free, except when they try to reconfigure their network. I find their internet acceptable but would never rely on their telephone service(friends in town have had month-long outages when amplifiers on their trunk line fail and there's no one competent to troubleshoot the problem) .

  • Alright! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Here's our daily dose of bullsh*t from the FCC.

  • The real problem for most (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:03PM (#47828259)

    Email.

    Yes, Email. They used the Email address they got from their provider for ... well, everything. Mostly because it's the only Email address they ever had. Now their Amazon, their Facebook, their Twitter, their Steam, and a billion other accounts are all tied to that one email address. Most of these could be redirected. But what if you forget one? How are you going to convince a company that doesn't give half a shit about you in the first place that you're not someone trying to gain access to an account that isn't yours?

    You can easily and legally forward your physical mail. But there ain't no law that forces providers to offer that service. And why the hell should they, after all it ties you to them!

    • Most ISPs have an "email only" product. They don't advertise it, but if you call, you'll probably find that for like $25/yr, they'll keep your email service alive for you.

  • Christ on a crutch (Score:3)

    by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:19PM (#47828473) Journal

    This weasely SOB says it's too hard to switch ISPs, when it's his own damn fault it's so hard. It's always going to be hard to switch when there are only two choices.

    And he could make it a lot easier to switch if he'd just take the industry's dick out of his mouth for a second and stop the attacks on Net Neutrality. Maybe get with the Justice Department and talk about how to break up Comcast and AT&T.

    I can't stand Wheeler. He's a symptom of the Obama administrations absolute failure. That he got appointed chairman of the FCC is just a joke. Guy's a former cable industry executive for chrissake. He's the last person who should be in charge of the FCC.

  • Switching is easy if you do it right (Score:4, Informative)

    by businessnerd ( 1009815 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @01:23PM (#47828519)
    Assuming you have an option to switch ISPs (and I realize that many of you don't), it's actually pretty easy to do, even with leaving Comcast. This is really just an order of operations issue. Most people will decide they want to switch, call up their incumbent ISP to cancel their service, and then order their new service. Seems logical, but for best results, flip it around. Once you have decided to switch to the other guy, call the other guy first. The other guy will then set up your account, come to your house and do all of the installation, port your phone number over (if applicable) and then once you have verified that the service is working to your satisfaction, you call up the incumbent and tell them to cancel. This is how I switched from Comcast to Verizon a few years ago. Granted, I still dealt with an extremely defensive (anti)cancellation person on the phone, but it was a much more straightforward conversation. It went something like this...

    Me: Hi. I switched to Verizon, cancel my service
    Comcast: Why do you want to cancel?
    Me: Your service doesn't work, I've had a tech out here 3 times and they didn't fix the issue. Fios has already been ordered and installed and it is working, which is something I could never have said for you.
    Comcast: defensive statement...yada yada..Verizon installed a new wire to your house, that's why it's fixed
    Me: Yeah, maybe you should have tried that on one of your 3 service calls, but you didn't. Anyway. I 'm not going to argue with you. I'm already receiving Verizon services, Comacast services have been physically disconnected. Cancel my account.
    Comcast: Fine. Done.

    And that was it. Hell I could have kept it even briefer if I had been prepared for such a defensive attitude, but even still, since you have physically disconnected their service and are already paying for their competitor, you know they have a snowball's chance in hell of getting you to agree to sending another tech over to re-connect Comcast and then go and cancel Verizon.

    Now if you are not planning on switching, but want to pay less, or want better service, I use their anti-cancellation policy against them. The first level CSRs have limited power to do anything like offer discounts, upgrade service for free, etc. They can do some, but that is child's play compared to your cancellation people. What you do is if you don't work something out with the first level, tell them you want to cancel. You don't have to actually mean it, you just have to make them think you mean it. Even if there are no good alternatives ("I'll switch to satellite and DSL. I don't really need all of your bandwidth" or "My 4G hotspot works fine for me"). Sounds ridiculous, but you need to commit to the role. They will then transfer you to the cancellation people. Their job on paper is to shut off your service and close your account, but as we have seen in the news recently, their actual job is to do anything they can to prevent you doing that. If you get here, you are golden. Walk right into their trap: "Why do you want to cancel?" "I'm sorry to hear that, you must be very frustrated. What if I were to offer you x y z? Would that change your mind?" Checkmate.

    • Me: Hi. I switched to Verizon, cancel my service
      Comcast: Why do you want to cancel?

      Yeah. Unfortunately that doesn't work if you're part of the huge chunk of the population whose only choices for Internet are a single cable company (hopefully not Comcast), 1.5 or 3.0 Mbps DSL, or wireless.

      The idea of municipal governments granting cable monopolies was founded on good intentions. By holding out the carrot of a monopoly, they got the cable companies to agree to concessions like providing service to remo

    • If you don't enjoy dealing with Retentions muppets, it's much easier to terminate a service in writing (or in the case of telephone service, by porting your number to a new provider). Check your terms and conditions for the official way to terminate, and you'll find the address there. Write them a letter and be done with it. There's no one to argue with you, that way.

  • and it was left ut of the summary.
    "At 25 Mbps, there is simply no competitive choice for most Americans. Stop and let that sink inthree-quarters of American homes have no competitive choice for the essential infrastructure for 21st century economics and democracy. Included in that is almost 20 percent who have no service at all!

    Things only get worse as you move to 50 Mbps where 82 percent of consumers lack a choice."

    So he recognizes a problem, wants people to have access to faster broadband, want's congress to do something, but most of you people just spew hate

    • I wouldn't consider 25Mbps essential. 5Mbps at a decent price would satisfy most users. Even that is almost impossible to come by anywhere in the US.

  • This will be relevant to much of the country maybe by 2025... or never if Mr. FCC is the one driving change. There is no other option. It's wired cable connection through 1 company for reliable, high speed service. The "second" options are either snail pace DSL (if it's even comparable with dial up) or a mobile hotspot device through a wireless carrier. The wireless device actually makes more sense but both are pitifully slow and unreliable.

  • I miss being able to plug a modem into any phone line and have internet access. Cable and DSL just destroyed that freedom of mobility (and we all accepted it, in exchange for Mbps bandwidth instead of Kbps bandwidth). Wifi kinda brought it back but its all locked down in Terms and Conditions away from any rights conveyed as a result of the lines being covered by common carrier rules.

    • LOL uh no zippy, if broadband was classified as common carriage FCC would be able to regulate and we'd have competition. As such it is not. I'm not sure WTF you mean by WiFi. WiFi is nothing more than an access point. It's not the pipe that connects you to the internet, like fiber or cable. So where WiFi is available somebody is using an ISP to connect you to the internet either via cable or fiber. If you are talking cellular like 4G, that's not wifi, and vastly worse.
  • Had a relative die and called. Canceling went smoothly right up to the "Please put him on the line to verify the cancellation..."

  • More competition? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Then perhaps the FCC will go up against the monopolies trying to stop municipalities from building their own broadband systems.

  • piffle (Score:2)

    by koan ( 80826 )

    This guy is an ass, he lies, he spouts propaganda, he is a shill for the very people destroying the Internet.

    My feelings on the matter is there is no FCC, it doesn't exist as anything but a title, they are toothless, and they want it that way.

  • Separate ISPs from telecom companies (Score:3)

    by MobyDisk ( 75490 ) on Thursday September 04, 2014 @02:59PM (#47829445) Homepage

    This is yet another example of why your local telecom (or cable) company should not be an ISP. Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, etc. should provide you with wires that connect you to your ISP of choice. Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, etc. should not even offer public email accounts.

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