Funny "Cable Good, Dish Bad" Ad (1 Viewer)

[Dave Schofield]

My local cable company, MediaCom, just ran an ad that ripped on satellite dishes because the subscriber is responsible for the installation. Despite the fact that it isn't true (for the most part) in the first place, they went on to 'complain' about installation fees. Then they play a "refreshing tune" and smile and say that installation is "Guaranteed"... Yes, not free, not fast, but "Guaranteed". No crap, at some point I WILL get my service installed if I call up and order Digital Cable...
My personal favorite ad of theirs right now is the one that claims their service is less expensive than a dish. Uh, no, at least for my service. I pay close to $80/month, whereas I would pay no more than $50/month with DirecTV. I'm so glad I'm going to dish when I move...

 

[Ash Williams]

Cable sucks period. I had it for about 10 years and the picture was always fuzzy and there were only about 30 channels. I got DirecTV when it first came out, 1994 I think, and never went back. The picture quality beat the hell out of my previous cable and there are more then enough channels. Intallation fee? Eh, I did it myself in about an hour.

 

[Mike Lenthol]

Anybody else notice the awful pixilation due to over compression on Dish Network (500)? Seems like it's getting worse everyday.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

I pay $66 (including ALL taxes and fees) a month for Digital Cable including 12 HBOs and 8

Cinemax channels, all the Encores, Sundance, and IFC, plus all the normal 'Choice' stuff I watch like SPEED Channel and BBC America. Last time I priced DirectTV for all this I'd pay MORE after including locals, and I still wouldn't have UPN. Oh, and my picture quality is better than (current, overcompressed) DBS. And I've never had rain fade or an outage in 1.5 years. And they are rolling out HDTV with no additional fees and no need to buy a $400 STB.

Sometimes cable is good, sometimes cable is bad. It depends on where you live.

Cable bashing is stupid.

DBS bashing is stupid.

Everyone should just find the right choice for themselves and be happy.

 

[Carlo_M]

As a long time cable subscriber (and not owning a dish) I can say that I've hated being one all this time. Talk about a ripoff, in my area (west L.A.) it's $50 for just "expanded basic" no premium. But I'm in an apt. so I can't upgrade to dish.

Re: the attack ad by cable, I don't know anyone who likes cable. I liken this to an attack ad by Microsoft.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I am a long time cable subscriber, but not happy about it either. The only reasons I stay with CATV are (1) cable modem Internet service, and (2) we have six TV's spread across three floors attached to cable. DirecTV does not make connecting a bunch of TV's very price competitive.

The same adds are playing in our area for Comcast. The claim that gets me is the one claiming that satellite customers lose their signal a lot. I have lost my cable TV service more times than my parents have lost their DirecTV service in northern Michigan.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Carlo: I gave up on AT&T Broadband--I had both an analog and a "digital" feed. The analog signal looked better, and many stereo broadcasts were mono on the "digital" feed.

After a while, I just got tired of the whole thing. For two months now, I've been living with OTA signals--and the image is better in some cases, especially on the network where I spend nearly 80 percent of all my television-viewing time: PBS.

I'm still planning to migrate to DirecTV, but I'm not that eager. I can hack OTA--at least the non-cable channels don't have station-bug logos that are as annoying as some of the cable sources.

BTW, Carlo, I live in an apartment, but I would be allowed to have the receiver dish mounted on the roof. It's the law. Is your apartment building completely obscured from the southern sky?

 

[Mike Broadman]

I rent the second story of a two floor house (my landlord is on the first floor). The other day, I noticed a satellite dish on the house. I asked my landlord about it- turns out it just came with the house, but he doesn't use it either.

Right now, I'm paying $140 for Digital cable (though I see no benefits from the "digital" part), cable modem, and phone. I am considering getting DirecTV. It may be cheaper since we already have the dish, assuming it works.

 

[MikeAlletto]

Yes it is the law that landlords allow competition for cable and allow a dish to be put up by those renting. It was passed in '97 or '98 I think. A lot of people around my complex have dishes either on polls on their decks or attached to the railings or even screwed into the buildings themselves. The landlord legally cannot stop you from putting a dish up. If they don't want to damage the building itself you can put it on a poll.

 

[Ryan L B]

go for cable.

 

[Eric Kahn]

I live in a worthless warner city so I have dish network, pay $40 a month for more than I got with the $55 a month digital cable that had noise in the socalled ''CD quality'' audio channels (noise comes through really great on Klipsch speakers)

digital cable here had same problem is satilite TV, they charge extra for each Box so you can have more than one tv on more than one channel

my Internet is by DSL phone connection

 

[Carlo_M]

Jack,
I actually have a perfect south facing apartment, and my landlord wouldn't mind me setting up. My hesitation is: in west L.A. and the ever-increasing rents, I'm not sure when I'm going to have to move. I've been lucky the last year or so, my rent has been stable, but if it jumps up like some friends who live less than a mile away, I may have to leave. Just don't want another hassle of something to disconnect and move, etc.
Plus I do 50% DVD, 35% sports & 15% other viewing, so I'm not going to take full advantage of added dish coverage, since cable carries my fave teams.
Oh, and I have cable modem through ATTB so it all is "easy" for me since it comes on one bill.
If/when I move into a condo/house, it's sayonara cable, that's for sure. I just have this hatred built up since I went to college at UCLA - I've been paying $50 for "expanded basic" for ten years now and it just pisses me off. Don't get me started when our local cable company wouldn't carry FSW2 which carries...UCLA games!!!

 

[Keith Mickunas]

Apartment buildings, condos, etc. still have some capability to limit you on satelite installs. They don't have to let you attach it to their building at all, and they don't have to let you drill through their walls for the cable. I found this a while back on the FCC web site while checking my rights in my apartment. If you have a south facing apartment and a deck or patio that you can put the dish on without damaging their property, you can install it. Unfortunately that's all the law forces them to allow.

Fortunately my apartment company is nice about it since I don't really have any place to put it, so I've got it on a tripod in front of my place. I'm much happier with it than with the digital cable I had. I've noticed some quality degradation with Dish recently, I think its due to the recent addition of hundreds of locals. I think they may be putting up a new satelite in the future that will alleviate some of that. Its still better and more reliable than cable.

 

[Pamela]

I have digital cable w/ a cable modem and my service SUCKS (Charter). I pay $130 a month and get the worst service. I also live in an apartment and can't put up a dish.
At one point I was having a three month go-round with them. My signal was terrible. Picture was awful and cable modem didn't work half the time. I was constantly on the phone with them. I won't go into the whole sordid story, but needless to say, the level of incompetence and poor customer services skills of the Charter employees was unbelievable. All over a stupid outside amplifier that needed replaced.
At the time this was going on, I had not smoked in three years. After one particularly frustrating phone encounter with Charter, I marched across the street to the 7-Eleven and bought a pack of cigarettes. Started smoking like a chimney.
Cable good? Nope, not in my case.

 

[Derek Miner]

Well, I guess I'll chime in as one of the (evidently few) people out there who loves my cable. I live in the Tampa Bay area of Florida, where Verizon has a digital cable service in competition with Time Warner.

I have excellent reception on all of my basic cable services. Many of the digital cable services look great. A few of the digital tier channels have soft picture, and I get occasional compression artifacts on the premium movie services.

I also know someone who has had Dish Network for over five years. Every time I went to his home and watched something from the dish, the compression artifacts drove me batty. Now some people here say it's getting worse?

Now I realize I might be more sensitive to the picture quality issues than some viewers. I get very picky, since I spend my working hours looking at video from Digital Betacam tapes on calibrated professional monitors. It's hard to accept lossy picture when you're used to looking at the upper limit of what NTSC can be.

I have had bad cable systems, and I'm sure many people are forced to accept lacking quality through their local providers. I realize that I'm very lucky to be in a larger area where the cable company seems to "get it."

In another part of town, one apartment complex allows a small independent company to provide service on-property, and it's dreadfully bad and expensive. And the tenants have no way of getting an outside company to provide service, unless they go Dish. And there's no recourse with the FCC or the cable regulators because it's all on the apartment complex's property. If I were in that situation, I would probably go Dish, too.

 

[Carlo_M]

]where Verizon has a digital cable service in competition with Time Warner

I think that's where you're better off, Derek. Competition usually brings out the best results for consumers. Unfortunately where I live (and in most of L.A.) we are stuck with one cable company, and the option to do dish if we can. And quite a lot of L.A. is apartments so they are less likely to go dish because of moving, etc. So the fat-cat cable companies can pretty much screw us (like charging $50/mo. for "expanded basic" analog cable) and not really fear us leaving them for a competitor...since there are none. :frowning:

 

[MikeAlletto]

There is a federal law since 1999 that says your landlord cannot stop you from putting up a little dish:
http://www.fcc.gov/csb/facts/otard.html
http://www.rentals.com/owner/content...ticle_038.html

The rule is cited as 47 C.F.R. Section 1.4000 and has been in effect since October 14, 1996. It prohibits restrictions that impair the installation, maintenance or use of antennas used to receive video programming. The rule applies to video antennas including direct-to- home satellite dishes that are less than one meter (39.37") in diameter (or of any size in Alaska), TV antennas, and wireless cable antennas. The rule prohibits most restrictions that: (1) unreasonably delay or prevent installation, maintenance or use; (2) unreasonably increase the cost of installation, maintenance or use; or (3) preclude reception of an acceptable quality signal.
Effective January 22, 1999, the Commission amended the rule so that it also applies to rental property where the renter has an exclusive use area, such as a balcony or patio.

I remember when this passed. I had first moved into my apartment and there was a strict no dish rule. Then one day just about every building had at least 1 dish on a balcony. It only applies though if you have a balcony or patio that is part of your apartment. You can't strap it on the roof or in a hallway.

 

[Tim Kilbride]

Down here in New Orleans, we have Cox Communications for our cable provider. I was a customer for years until DirecTV went online. I switched to satellite and never looked back. I do use Cox for internet though. When I first went online with them, '@home' was the service provider. The service, as well as the customer service, was excellent. The reason being is that '@home' leased bandwith on the Cox system. Cox had NOTHING to do with the internet service. Since '@home' went belly up, Cox is now administering the internet, and it seems to be back to the cable standards...irregular service, no costumer service, unknowledgable techs...it's the worst. I'm seriously considering switching to Bellsouth ADSL. I just don't want to give up speed. In this area, Cox is almost twice as fast as Bellsouth (when it works).

My .02

TK-

 

[Scott Merryfield]

Competition usually brings out the best results for consumers

I used to think so, but I'm not so sure anymore. In our area, we have had a choice of two cable providers for several years. They used to be MediaOne and AmeriCast (a division of the former baby Bell Ameritech). MediaOne provided good service and offered some nice package pricing to keep their customers.

In the past year, Comcast has purchased MediaOne and Wide Open West has purchased AmeriCast. Since then, Comcast has (1) discontinued MediaOne's program of providing free HBO in exchange for one year commitments, (2) raised basic cable rates, (3) converted our Internet service from Road Runner to Comcast's own slower service, and (4) started charging an additional $5 per month cable modem rental fee.

I just think that some cable companies are poor service providers. Comcast is proving it here in Metro Detroit. My cable and Internet rates have increased by about 18% and yet I no longer get the premium channel HBO and have an inferior Internet service. What a deal.

BTW, Comcast cannot even claim that the rate increases are to upgrade the service. MediaOne had already installed a new fiber optic network, and Comcast is saving about $20 million a month by no longer paying a monthly fee to Road Runner and @Home for their services.

 

[CraigL]

So I just moved into a new apartment complex. I live on the top floor of a corner apartment. I haven't talked to the landlord yet about my DirecTV but I would REALLY like to keep it. I don't see any reason why he wouldn't let me other than the fact that "if I let you have it, I have to let everyone else." Is there any way of getting around this? I know I don't have access to my roof so i'd have to get permission for that. What about the side of the building? Right now I just have the regular networks because i've hooked up the cable to my TV. I wanted to cry when I saw the regular cable picture. I need my DirecTV back!!!!