[SLL] OT warning--Comcast opt out

[Glenn Stone]

On Mon, Jul 16, 2007 at 01:50:54PM -0700, Chris Fischer wrote:
>Glenn Stone wrote:
>>Dif'rent strokes... Verizon doesn't tend to nuke your service when you go
>>download the latest ISO.  The horror stories abound.  
>I'm glad you're happy with Quest.
>
>Horror stories will abound with any provider...Quest, Verizon, Comcast, 
>$ISP, $Phone_Company, $Cellular_Company, $Health_Care_Provider etc.
>
>But there are so many disconnected bureaucracies within Verizon that 
>they are unable (even if they are willing) to provide good customer 
>service when a problems come up (unless your a new customer ordering 
>something). My personal experience with Verizon isn't worth getting into 
>here, but I will say that of all the large company customer service 
>departments I've ever dealt with, Verizon hands down is the absolute worst.

You've never messed with Sprint.  Verizon at least admits they're
disconnected.  Sprint... 

I never got cheesed off enough to outright fire Verizon.  

>Having said that, I've never had to deal with Comcast's customer 
>service, other than to order my service. In almost 3 years with Comcast 
>I've never had a problem. Maybe I'm just lucky in that regard...who 
>knows? But I did just recently discover that Comcast cranked up my 
>bandwidth from 5,000/512kbps to over 14,000/1,500kbps. Sweet. I should 
>probably thank Verizon for putting in their FOIS service in my 
>neighborhood. Nothing like good ol' competition. :-)

*shrug* if I want serious bandwidth, I just sneakernet the laptop into any
 King County library.  Forty megabits.  I don't know who's paying for all
 that, but... 

I still consider the idea that I'm not sharing my bandwidth with the skript
kiddie down the block (and thus, also not letting him snoop around in
everything I don't encrypt) to be worth paying for.  Ironically, in the long
run I end up paying less for the privilege; Qwest is doing 1.5/384 for
$27/mo.  Comcast's promo is $25/mo if you take cable with it, but after six
months it goes up to $57something and stays there.  Nay, screw that.  

Oh, and business class?  Comcast? $99/mo.  Qwest, $69.25, and that's for
seven megabits (!!) at a month-to-month rate.  

And though in practice folks' experience may vary, Comcast Residential
explicitly forbids servers of any kind ever ever ever, subject to
termination, collection, and dispatch of the Narn Bat Squad(tm).  

In a word, fuggeddabowdit.... 

There are other, better ISP's out there.  (Speakeasy's status as a WOS of
Worst Buy is still in doubt, but they didn't give me any trouble
disconnecting when I gave them the ticket number in which they said "so
sorry, we can't serve you there", so that counts for something)  But if
you're faced with Qwest vs. Comcast, and you're reading this, I think the
choice is obvious.  

This advice is worth the paper it's printed on.  

-- Glenn