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No more Colbert Report for the three of us who are RCN customers?
By adamg on Mon, 03/31/2014 - 11:47pm
Seems Viacom and RCN are having one of those fun little cable/network tiffs and as I watch the Daily Show and the Colbert Report tonight, I'm getting a scroll that sends me to some Web site that calmly and rationally explains how Viacom is having to take time out from hugging puppies and cooking hot meals for elderly nuns to defend itself from the heartless oligarchs who run RCN. Or something like that. RCN in turn is using its ad time during the shows to ask why Viacom doesn't believe in freedom.
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Comments
Not seeing it
Yeah I'm one of those RCNers.
BTW, your site keeps telling me there's new comments on articles that I know I have already read. This started happening 2 days ago or so? New upgrade?
broken
Yeah I know, it's broken. Its def the site, not the browser as it happens in IE and Chrome.
Looks like Adam switched the voting system (again)
We all lose
Except for those of us with internet via RCN too. We will just watch the shows online or download them anyways.
Wait, so the three of us are
Wait, so the three of us are you, Adam and myself?
On a side note, the other day I found a flyer under my apartment door for RCN, which I'd have taken into consideration if I wasn't already an RCN customer...
Make that four.
Make that four.
Make that Five!
Long time RCN Boston customer.
Make that six
I have the choice between RCN and Comcrap. Didn't have to think for more than about 1 second on that one.
Make that seven
I've had both RCN and Comcast. Comcast would have to pay me about $200/month to go back to them.
Make it a lot more than 8
One of my criteria when house hunting is RCN availability. My neighbor with Comcast seems to have more downtime than uptime.
Haven't seen the crawl, but I TIVO TDS/TDR and haven't seen last night's (yet). I assume Viacom is trying to both raise their rates and require RCN to carry some crappy channels that nobody wants to watch.
I just checked, and Viacom is trying to nearly double the rates to all of the small regional cable operators, including RCN. GRRRR.
Viacom channels are still airing (well, Comedy Central, Nick, and NickJr are), so maybe this is their idea of standard negotiating tactics.
more than 8.5?
I have RCN for phone and internet, but I don't have cable service. I watch TV over the air, and when I watch Colbert, I watch it via the web.
Maybe Brookline/Boston should
Maybe Brookline/Boston should lift the monopoly restrictions on cable companies and allow real competition... lets see how long their 65% gross margins last
I thought all places served
I thought all places served by RCN have competition from comcast. Not sure what you are suggesting.
They're saying that all the
They're saying that all the places only served by Comcast should be allowed to have RCN and see how the market share changes.
You're confusing cable providers and content providers
Arguments about reasonable cable competition aside, this hubbub is not about cable companies behaving like monopolies, it's actually about Viacom - one of the 'big five' media conglomerates that owns a slew of networks but is not in the transmission business - increasing the price it charges cable companies to carry those networks.
Viacom, not the cable companies, is the one playing the "my way or the highway" card here. Whether it is justified in more than doubling the rates it charges RCN et al smaller cable companies is left as an excercise to the reader|market|courts.
p.s. Adam, in the parts of Boston where RCN actually provides service, it's quite popular - there's many neighborhoods in the western half of the city where it's the majority provider. I've never understood why they couldn't finagle City Hall to let them push into downtown, given Menino's publica pro-stance on cable competition and the location of their Boston technical headquarters (Fort Point Channel along N380 just past the convention center).
Kinda
Has nothing to do with that. Franchise is for the entire city. Its more RCN just does not have the $ to build out a large network other than what it has now. RCN owns its own coax network, unlike companies like Earthlink whereas they RENT space on Comcast's Coax network.
When you sign up for RCN, they disconnect the Comcast wire from the entrance point on your home and connect the RCN wire. It's 100% separate network (except your internal wiring)
As I was told by an RCN tech once a long long time ago, if your street doesn't have RCN, even if your town has a contract with them, you will not get RCN until its wired.
RCN is always two breaths away from bankruptcy, which is why they have not expanded at all in many many years. They just do not have the cash to do so (surprised they have not been bought out yet either)
> surprised they have not
> surprised they have not been bought out yet either
They were bought in 2010... at the time there was hope Abry would take on more debt to expand RCN's presence.
http://www.abry.com/News/10-08-26/ABRY_Partners_Completes_Acquisition_of...
RCN question
Is RCN "local phone" service really local phone service -- or really just Internet phone service?
Mine is VOIP, where the phone
Mine is VOIP, where the phone plugs into my router, not into an RJ11 jack, if that's what you're asking.
Comast has monopoly in JP
Comcast is the only provider to parts of JP. I don't understand why RCN refuses to service those areas. There is plenty of money to be earned and I am sure that they would quickly sign up quite a few customers.
But then Verizon could make plenty of money in Boston. Verizon execs say Boston is to expensive to wire but if they can do it in New York then Boston should be a breeze. I wonder whether a new mayor and relatively new CEO will be able to play together better than their predecessors.
See above
See my comment above on why.
Nothing to do with not getting customers, more to do with ROI. As high as you think you're paying for cable tv and internet, the profit margin isn't very much. This is also why you get fee'd to death (outside of fed, local, and state fees/taxes), because its box rental (or modem rental), PPV, and premium services is where the cable co makes it money, not giving you basic service for TV and internet.
So I can sink several billion to explain my cable network, only to have it take several YEARS to get my ROI back. It's just not feasible.
This also explains why for most areas only one cable co exists. Because its just too costly to plan, build, and expand a coax cable network.