California Approves Comcast/TWC Merger

[AndThenThereWas1]

The California Public Utilities Commission(CPUC) has approved the Comcast/TWC merger, however with a few conditions. Some of those conditions are: they must expand their program of cheaper priced internet for the poor (the program began due to the acquisition of NBCUniversal), stop pressuring customers against canceling their subscription, stop trying to block towns and cities from building their own network, offer broadband speeds (the newest definition by the FCC) throughout their territory within 5 years, protect customer privacy, improve reliability of their service (it’s that bad).

How does Comcast feel about these conditions?... Well, as you can probably guess, they don’t like it and think that the goals are “unattainable”.

What Comcast said:

"We are reviewing the proposed decision and conditions closely and look forward to engaging with the full California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) as it completes its review of the transaction," Cohen wrote. "While we have just received the recommended decision, it appears that a number of the conditions are ones that will benefit consumers and the company can work with. Some of the suggested conditions, however, could potentially prevent the full benefits of this transaction being realized by Californians, and create a more intrusive regulatory regime where innovative services could be hampered rather than helped. In addition, at least some of the suggested conditions simply lie outside the authority of the CPUC or are unrealistic."

...

"ome of the penetration rates and time frames suggested by the conditions are simply unattainable under market conditions, especially with populations that have been slowest to adopt broadband," Cohen wrote. "Deeper broadband penetration among all populations is a goal we share, and one we’ve worked very hard on for the nearly two decades we’ve been marketing broadband. Nationally, across our footprint though we only have a penetration rate of 40 percent of homes we pass taking our broadband service. In California, it’s about the same. And that’s after we’ve spent billions marketing and advertising those services."

 

Longer list of Conditions:

Comcast offers $10-per-month Internet to poor people through its Internet Essentials program, which was required by its 2011 acquisition of NBCUniversal. California wants Comcast to expand eligibility for this program, offer it throughout the Time Warner Cable territory, double download speeds to 10Mbps, provide free Wi-Fi routers, connect schools and libraries in underserved areas, and sign up at least 45 percent of eligible households within two years. Comcast must submit specific plans for signing up more low-income subscribers, reduce wait times, and make the sign-up process less difficult. Customer advocates complained in July 2014 that only about 11 percent of eligible households in California were getting the discount Internet service because of how difficult it is to sign up.

....

One provision requires improvements to customer service and would prevent Comcast from pressuring customers not to cancel subscriptions.

....

"Comcast shall take action to improve customer service including respecting customer choice and competitive choices, and meet the Commission’s minimum service quality standards... related to voice service installation intervals and service orders completed, and complete installations, including broadband installations, in a time frame no longer than Time Warner’s average service prior to the merger," the proposed condition states. "Comcast shall report to the Commission within six months of the effective date of the parent company merger any complaints about customer service for voice and broadband customers, including, but not limited to, complaints about Comcast employee rudeness or slow action to allow customers to change or drop Comcast services. Comcast shall not contest Commission jurisdiction regarding any customer service, slamming, cramming or service quality is sues for its California voice customers."

 

Comcast must also not try to block cities and towns from building their own broadband networks. "Comcast shall for a period of five years following the effective date of the parent company merger neither oppose, directly or indirectly, nor fund opposition to, any municipal broadband development plan in California," the proposed condition says.

Other requirements include:

    Offer Lifeline phone service for the poor.
    Achieve diversity goals.
    Offer free backup batteries for phones.
    Improve accessibility of communications with disabled people.
    Maintain Time Warner's compatibility with Roku and other third-party video programming platforms.
    Offer broadband in areas that currently have only video service.
    Offer speeds of 25Mbps downstream and 3Mbps upstream throughout the service territory within five years.
    Offer standalone broadband service for five years at prices not exceeding those charged by Time Warner.
    Protect customer privacy.
    Improve reliability of phone and broadband service, and ensure adequate 911 support.

 

The Comcast/TWC merger will still need FCC approval before they can merge, however this gets them that much closer and lets them claim they have state and local approval when presenting their case to the FCC. Although some of these conditions are good, they should already be required of ISPs. Letting Comcast merge will not solve these problems and, as they have already pointed out, they think these conditions are unattainable. This merger will create a monopoly that will not favor the consumer.

 

Source: arstechnica

[SpaceCore]

It's ok. they will not meet these requirements. and if they do, it will be under the pressure of companies like Google.

[Octavialicious]

In some parts of California we have an ISP called "Cox" (what a name)

 

I'm super satisfied with them. I get 120 down, 20 up and the service is extremely reliable 

[projectmayhem]

In some parts of California we have "Cox"

 

I'm super satisfied with them. I get 120 down, 20 up and they never go down

So would you say that Cox satisfies you? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Prastupok]

-snip-

 

I'd like to say... when the two worst rated companies get together.. it will probably be worse.

 

It's kind of like vram in that way... 4gb per card x 2 still turns out 4gb... 40% rating with 38% rating... what do people think is going to happen?

 

More of the same will keep going on and honestly, it's quite bull. The only reason I have Comcast is because they are the one provider that can give me over 100mbit/s speed (and a lot of the time, I get less than that). I have yet to experience a knowledgeable customer support/tech support employee. I've seen it all.

 

Using my own router at which I always have over 100mbit/s wireless link... they told me once that I'm wrong because wireless speeds don't go that high......

 

This is bad, and it will be bad for even more people now. The bad parts from both companies will probably seep into the other one, and turn it into an even larger pile of shit.

 

I hope this doesn't get approved. We don't need it. Google Fiber, save us all.

[Octavialicious]

So would you say that Cox satisfies you? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Derangel]

Even if Comcast agrees to these demands it's not like they'll care if they don't meet them. What will California do? Comcast won't give a damn about a few million in fines that Cali would level at them. Comcast would make some half-hearted "effort" to meet the demands then either ignore complaints or pay off the right people so that their piss poor "attempts" are considered good enough. Kind of like what they've done since being allowed to buy NBC Universal.

[Ashley]

I'd like to say... when the two worst rated companies get together.. it will probably be worse.

 

It's kind of like vram in that way... 4gb per card x 2 still turns out 4gb... 40% rating with 38% rating... what do people think is going to happen?

 

More of the same will keep going on and honestly, it's quite bull. The only reason I have Comcast is because they are the one provider that can give me over 100mbit/s speed (and a lot of the time, I get less than that). I have yet to experience a knowledgeable customer support/tech support employee. I've seen it all.

 

Using my own router at which I always have over 100mbit/s wireless link... they told me once that I'm wrong because wireless speeds don't go that high......

 

This is bad, and it will be bad for even more people now. The bad parts from both companies will probably seep into the other one, and turn it into an even larger pile of shit.

 

I hope this doesn't get approved. We don't need it. Google Fiber, save us all.

I had an issue with intermittent ping issues with Comcast and trying to explain that to the phone rep was... Difficult to say the least.

[jaggysnake57]

I'd like to say... when the two worst rated companies get together.. it will probably be worse.

 

It's kind of like vram in that way... 4gb per card x 2 still turns out 4gb... 40% rating with 38% rating... what do people think is going to happen?

 

More of the same will keep going on and honestly, it's quite bull. The only reason I have Comcast is because they are the one provider that can give me over 100mbit/s speed (and a lot of the time, I get less than that). I have yet to experience a knowledgeable customer support/tech support employee. I've seen it all.

 

Using my own router at which I always have over 100mbit/s wireless link... they told me once that I'm wrong because wireless speeds don't go that high......

 

This is bad, and it will be bad for even more people now. The bad parts from both companies will probably seep into the other one, and turn it into an even larger pile of shit.

 

I hope this doesn't get approved. We don't need it. Google Fiber, save us all.

 

with title 2 looking more and more likely i dont think this means a fat lot.  competition should open up and force companies like this to get there shit sorted, move with the times or GTFO.  i look at my country sometimes and almost feel ashamed of the piss poor job it does.....then i look at the us and suddenly a warm feeling comes over me and i think "it could be worse"

[colonel_mortis]

Those conditions sound pretty fair (though it doesn't seem to do anything to address monopoly pricing, which could potentially be an issue). The problem is that I can see comcast accepting the conditions, then just ignoring them, like all the ISPs are alleged to have done with money given to them to upgrade their networks.

[rockking1379]

5 years to make it to FCC broadband spec? thats preposterous. shake the fucking company down will ya california. tell them they got 30 days to have those speeds reached or they can fucking shove off in their dingy ship out of the nearest sail port into the distant sunset and go ruin china for all i care.

[Derangel]

5 years to make it to FCC broadband spec? thats preposterous. shake the fucking company down will ya california. tell them they got 30 days to have those speeds reached or they can fucking shove off in their dingy ship out of the nearest sail port into the distant sunset and go ruin china for all i care.

 

5 years is actually fairly reasonable. It's not a simple matter of pushing a "faster speed" button. Several nodes would need updated, a bunch of customers would probably need new modems, data lines in general would need updating, several bits of back-end equipment would likely need serious upgrades to handle all the increased bandwidth, etc. This is also on top of them improving general reliability and without raising prices. It would be an expensive and long undertaking for Comcast. That is of course assuming Comcast would actually bother paying attention to the requirement and instead just spend the same amount of money, or more, bribing officials to get them to back off.

[rockking1379]

5 years is actually fairly reasonable. It's not a simple matter of pushing a "faster speed" button. Several nodes would need updated, a bunch of customers would probably need new modems, data lines in general would need updating, several bits of back-end equipment would likely need serious upgrades to handle all the increased bandwidth, etc. This is also on top of them improving general reliability and without raising prices. It would be an expensive and long undertaking for Comcast. That is of course assuming Comcast would actually bother paying attention to the requirement and instead just spend the same amount of money, or more, bribing officials to get them to back off.

them fixing netflix was as simple as pushing a "faster speed" button. so....yeah it probably is that simple for them

[Derangel]

them fixing netflix was as simple as pushing a "faster speed" button. so....yeah it probably is that simple for them

 

That is not remotely the same.

[Skrizzles]

"And that’s after we’ve spent billions marketing and advertising those services."

 - billions which could have been spent improving infrastructure, customer service, etc.

 

5 years is actually fairly reasonable. It's not a simple matter of pushing a "faster speed" button. Several nodes would need updated, a bunch of customers would probably need new modems, data lines in general would need updating, several bits of back-end equipment would likely need serious upgrades to handle all the increased bandwidth, etc. This is also on top of them improving general reliability and without raising prices. It would be an expensive and long undertaking for Comcast. That is of course assuming Comcast would actually bother paying attention to the requirement and instead just spend the same amount of money, or more, bribing officials to get them to back off.

Here's the problem: They'll say "ok" just to get the deal done... And 5 years down the road people will end up screwed, and the State of California won't have any of what was agreed to. This won't work without some kind of repercussions written into it. I recommend a GINORMOUS fine(billions) PLUS complete and total forfeiture of all investments in the area, should they fail to meet requirements. Those assets could then be used to build public utility broadband networks for cities and towns which could be continually funded through peoples taxes, same as trash and water treatment. This would serve as a deterrent for this POS company to operate in California anyway.

[Daegun]

Comcast told to do its job. Comcast says no.

Did anyone else expect a different outcome from this? Because I sure didn't.

[rockking1379]

"And that’s after we’ve spent billions marketing and advertising those services."

 - billions which could have been spent improving infrastructure, customer service, etc.

 

Here's the problem: They'll say "ok" just to get the deal done... And 5 years down the road people will end up screwed, and the State of California won't have any of what was agreed to. This won't work without some kind of repercussions written into it. I recommend a GINORMOUS fine(billions) PLUS complete and total forfeiture of all investments in the area, should they fail to meet requirements. Those assets could then be used to build public utility broadband networks for cities and towns which could be continually funded through peoples taxes, same as trash and water treatment. This would serve as a deterrent for this POS company to operate in California anyway.

i like the forfeiture of all investment in the area. but 5 years is still to long. they have had decades to get this shit done. 30 days get it fucking where it should be or your asses will lose what essentially was already paid for by the tax payers

[euniqe]

Fuck me what a terrible backwards-ass company. All I took from the statement was "we're the worst-managed company ever and we can't acheive anything we set out to do - wether we choose to or not"

 

Looking forward to hearing about their bankruptcy application in the news in the next half-decade.

[KungPaoChino]

Oh well... I'm already stuck with TimeWarner Internet. Waiting for FCC to reclassify isps under title 2. Still waiting for Google to feed me some fiber goodness. 

[rockking1379]

Fuck me what a terrible backwards-ass company. All I took from the statement was "we're the worst-managed company ever and we can't acheive anything we set out to do - wether we choose to or not"

 

Looking forward to hearing about their bankruptcy application in the news in the next half-decade.

so bassackwards

[KungPaoChino]

Looking forward to hearing about their bankruptcy application in the news in the next half-decade.

In your dreams

-From yours truly... Greedy ass ISP

[zacRupnow]

Southern California natives arise! Fight for separation from the government cunts of the North! Such villainous morons who would approve the merger of two monopolies!

[Equlix]

In some parts of California we have an ISP called "Cox" (what a name)

 

I'm super satisfied with them. I get 120 down, 20 up and the service is extremely reliable 

I had them in Phoenix. one of the best ISPs I've  ever had.

[Trik'Stari]

Someone needs to stop these fuckers.

[MageTank]

Someone needs to stop these fuckers.

 

I'll get right on it  B)

 

@Topic: 

 

There will come a day when both TWC and CC are faced with an ultimatum by multiple budding ISP's. If the FCC follows up on their initial push, we could see some serious competition that will put a serious hurt on these antiquated giants, and i cannot wait for that day to come. The customer support of TWC is god awful. The only time you can seriously get service, is by threatening to change ISP's, and even then, its half-assed at best. Asking to be transferred to their highest tier support, is like going from speaking to a 3rd grader, to a 5th grader. It took TWC 14 months to fix the T3 time-outs in my area, coming from someone else on the same node. Then there was the time when TWC switched my splitters to their "approved splitters" and caused the power levels to exceed optimal levels, resulting in a terrible experience for both ends. 

 

I have not had the misfortune of using Comcast yet, but the horror stories i hear from them sound all too alike to the experience I, and plenty of my family go through with TWC. If i had another option other than WOW, i would seriously consider switching. It is bad when Frontier's Bonded ADSL has a far greater ping than my "roadrunner high speed internet" lol.