FCC bans cable TV industry’s favorite trick for hiding full cost of service

Wilshire@lemmy.world to Technology@lemmy.world – 624 points –
FCC bans cable TV industry’s favorite trick for hiding full cost of service
arstechnica.com
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hyper-competitive marketplace

Ah yes, when I think of "hyper competitive" I think of the one and only one cable provider who services my neighborhood.

Comcast calls me all the time trying to sell me on their Trojan horse streaming box or their cell service. I’m polite to the caller cause I know it’s just a gig for them but I always calmly tell them I only have Comcast as I have no other choice and I’d rather peel off my finger nails than give them any other business. It speaks to how bad things are that I’m dying for Verizon of all companies to come “save” me. Hyper-competitive, fucking lol.

Verizon FIOS is like a unicorn. Service is stable, price hasn't moved, support is available, clear and friendly. Install and repair dates are quick.

one day the shoe will drop, been waiting for it for years, but in my little corridor they just keep kicking comcast's ass.

The shoe dropped on most of Verizon's former territory. Basically anywhere they had DSL but didn't want to lay fiber they sold off instead of even trying.

Yeah, if you ended up with frontier or anyone else they sold to you're going to have a bad time.

I had them when I rented and I was also surprised by how few complaints I had

I was so happy when I was able to tell Comcast/Xfinity to suck toads after moving to an area with Google Fiber. Google may be a shit company, but I gotta admit I really love symmetrical gigabit service for $70/month.

There's a local company in my city that offers fiber to the home. I'm so happy not to be stuck with Comcast!

Same! I've lived 3 different places in this city and this is the first one that had an independent fiber internet provider. It's hilarious getting Comcast/Xfinity mailers advertising internet offers that are higher priced and slower than what I have.

I only have Comcast as I have no other choice and I’d rather peel off my finger nails than give them any other business

Literally me and cox communication

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I would hope this would also apply to the live TV streaming services like Hulu+live tv, Fubo, YouTube TV, etc. I looked into some of them, and the added fees took the monthly bill from like $83 a month to over $100 a month, but you don’t know that unless you read the disclaimers since they advertised it at $83 a month.

Seems like it certainly needs to. I haven’t noticed any such added fees for the services I subscribe to. If true, that’s a good indication someone is seeking a competitive advantage by misleading potential customers, and good reason to act

This isn’t the worst offender I’ve seen, but it’s still bullshit. They should never be able to advertise it at $84.99 when there are $30.99 in required fees

That would go immediately on my list of “never do business”

And the thing about regulation like this is that it just resets the bar height for everyone. It's not like this doesn't apply to all competitors.

Unless we mean non-cable competition, i.e. streaming. Maybe that's not under the jurisdiction of FCC? If not, though, then I have to wonder why this has to be an FCC thing in the first place. This is about truth in advertising, in general.

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