It's been said that you can't really say there's a price-war between DSL and Cable until the cable companies actually start cutting prices. So far it's been a pretty one-sided affair, with the just The Bells slashing prices. Well, still no price war. Starting next year Comcast will be hiking its monthly rate by 8%. Not only that, the price-hikes are targeted towards the Bay Area, so they have to expect a million whining bloggers to proclaim that Comcast just "doesn't get it".
Also, let's take a quick moment to discuss a la carte cable pricing, i.e. allowing customers to subscribe to only specific channels (cough, ESPN) and pay a lower price. The FCC has announced that they find the idea intriguing, and while it might be good for customers, it seems unfair to the cable companies. Should a grocery store have to allow its customers to rip of the stalks of the portobello mushrooms before they're weighed for pricing? No, the business model of the grocery store and the portobello pricing assumes that the customer pays for the stalk and the cap. If the customer's are gonna tear off the useless parts of the product, then they'll have to pay for the service in other ways.
That being said, any cable company opposition to this will probably just hasten TV over the internet, so they're probably screwed either way. And really there's no reason to sympathize with the Cable companies. They've been treated well by the FCC in the past. This is what happens when you deal with the devil.
The stem analogy is not a good one. A more relavent one would be a grocery store forcing you to buy lettuce, radishes, tomatoes, onion and mushrooms. That would be bundling. At stem comes with a mushroom. Onions do not come with lettuce. I should be able to buy what I want for my salad.
Posted by: me | November 30, 2005 at 07:18 PM
Free Internet TV is an Internet television tuner program.
broadband internet
Posted by: broadband internet | May 22, 2006 at 08:04 PM