Recent Headlines
October 2, 2009
Be Sure to Read Part One: Astroturf Overload — Broadband for America = One Giant Industry Front Group for an important introduction to what this super-sized industry front group is all about. Members of Broadband for America Red: A company or group actively engaging in anti-consumer lobbying, opposes Net Neutrality, supports Internet Overcharging, belongs to […]
October 2, 2009
Astroturf: One of the underhanded tactics increasingly being used by telecom companies is “Astroturf lobbying” – creating front groups that try to mimic true grassroots, but that are all about corporate money, not citizen power. Astroturf lobbying is hardly a new approach. Senator Lloyd Bentsen is credited with coining the term in the 1980s to […]
September 27, 2009
Hong Kong remains bullish on broadband. Despite the economic downturn, City Telecom continues to invest millions in constructing one of Hong Kong’s largest fiber optic broadband networks, providing fiber to the home connections to residents. City Telecom’s HK Broadband service relies on an all-fiber optic network, and has been dubbed “the Verizon FiOS of Hong […]
September 23, 2009
BendBroadband, a small provider serving central Oregon, breathlessly announced the imminent launch of new higher speed broadband service for its customers after completing an upgrade to DOCSIS 3. Along with the launch announcement came a new logo of a sprinting dog the company attaches its new tagline to: “We’re the local dog. We better be […]
September 23, 2009
Stop the Cap! reader Rick has been educating me about some of the new-found aggression by Shaw Communications, one of western Canada’s largest telecommunications companies, in expanding its business reach across Canada. Woe to those who get in the way. Novus Entertainment is already familiar with this story. As Stop the Cap! reported previously, Shaw […]
September 22, 2009
The Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission, the Canadian equivalent of the Federal Communications Commission in Washington, may be forced to consider American broadband policy before defining Net Neutrality and its role in Canadian broadband, according to an article published today in The Globe & Mail. [FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s] proposal – to codify and enforce some […]
September 21, 2009
In March 2000, two cable magnates sat down for the cable industry equivalent of My Dinner With Andre. Fine wine, beautiful table linens, an exquisite meal, and a Monopoly board with pieces swapped back and forth representing hundreds of thousands of Canadian consumers. Ted Rogers and Jim Shaw drew a line on the western Ontario […]
September 11, 2009
Just like FairPoint Communications, the Towering Inferno of phone companies haunting New England, Frontier Communications is making a whole lot of promises to state regulators and consumers, if they’ll only support the deal to transfer ownership of phone service from Verizon to them. This time, Frontier is issuing a self-serving press release touting their investment […]
September 7, 2009
I see it took all of five minutes for George Ou and his friends at Digital Society to be swayed by the tunnel vision myopia of last week’s latest effort to justify Internet Overcharging schemes. Until recently, I’ve always rationalized my distain for smaller usage caps by ignoring the fact that I’m being subsidized by […]
September 1, 2009
In 2007, we took our first major trip away from western New York in 20 years and spent two weeks an hour away from Calgary, Alberta. After two weeks in Kananaskis Country, Banff, Calgary, and other spots all over southern Alberta, we came away with the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: The Good Alberta […]
August 31, 2009
A federal appeals court in Washington has struck down, for a second time, a rulemaking by the Federal Communications Commission to limit the size of the nation’s largest cable operators to 30% of the nation’s pay television marketplace, calling the rule “arbitrary and capricious.” The 30% rule, designed to keep no single company from controlling […]
August 27, 2009
Less than half of Americans surveyed by PC Magazine report they are very satisfied with the broadband speed delivered by their Internet service provider. PC Magazine released a comprehensive study this month on speed, provider satisfaction, and consumer opinions about the state of broadband in their community. The publisher sampled more than 17,000 participants, checking […]
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Sadly this ploy will likely soften TW’s historic stupidity in some people’s eyes…
I’ve noticed my ping-time has decreased recently from ~44ms to ~25-30ms… I check it regularly in case of lag. /sighs. I’m still irked at them. Only way Time Warner Cable will get my trust back is if they put, in writing, that they will do away with caps now and forever. As it is, I’m still ready to leap off TWC at a moment’s notice.
Ah powerboost so I can hit the caps that are coming even faster!
No kidding. Give something for free to everyone, and those paying for it are probably stuck with their current increased price for something extra they no longer have over other people, and in the long run when they put out caps, then you will in fact hit the faster. I wonder if anyone thought about the fact that increasing the speed may prevent congestion? I mean if one person is downloading a 2 gig video from CBS.com or something and having to take longer to get it the lines will see that over a longer period of time, but the… Read more »
So do I get a Turbo refund? Can u provide printed proof they did this so when I complain, I have something to back it up? Thanks!
I need to get my powerboost cancelled… It only comes in handy when I upload to my friends servers or xfer to work… but I use it lots of times… An official link would be nice… 🙂
Powerboost? I really don’t care too much whether it’s implemented or not. If it doesn’t increase my speed throughout a download, but only at the beginning, I don’t see the point.
These reports were based on audio from this morning’s investor conference call. I am working on posting some audio clips, which is good as it’s going to get I’m afraid.
Also, Powerboost is a gimmick. Turbo tier customers also get extra upload and download speed that remains persistent, unlike Powerboost.
I just got off online chat with TW support and they told me I am no being charged for powerboost…
“> You were charged for the Roadrunner Turbo service.”
“>You were not charged for the Powerboost service.”
more info…..
“> From March 25, 2009, it is available to Road Runner Standard customers. Existing customers must reset their modem or wait for the 30-day modem reboot to receive the new speed.”
Powerboost is never charged for as a standalone item.
Formerly, it accompanied the Turbo tier (which you pay usually around $10 a month extra for each month). Now, it will be a part of all tiers. Nobody was charged specifically for Powerboost – it just wasn’t available to standard customers before.
All tiers? I doubt it will be available for RR Lite customers but we’ll see. It would help give a jump-start on security updates anyway. 🙂
I have cleared this up. You are right. It is an expansion for standard service customers. Lite customers will probably not see it.
Are there really that many lite users anyways? I think most of us have seen how difficult TW makes it for users to find information regarding lite, almost as if to limit people from asking about it, at least those that would want it.
Powerboost is a joke. When I was with TWC, all it did was boost my download speed for 3 seconds, whoopteedo.
I agree that Powerboost is a joke and just a gimmick that we do not need. What we need is good, reliable, uncapped service and more upload speed ! 384 kb/sec on the upload is ridiculous. I can live with a steady 10 meg down uncapped service just fine, thank you. Would be awfully nice if the local TW boys could give us standard tier users at least 1 meg on the upload speed.
@Jeremy. At two separate times, we received information either with our bill or a promotional mailing from TWC that included RR Lite. When we received the first offer, I wasn’t in a position to move to it but was able to go with the second offer last year.
Pretty sure that this has in fact been stopped. I do not see the gains I saw last week. What a nice little promo they ran here…Now back to watch commercials for the $4.95 upgrade gimmick. :rolleyes:
Powerboost on standard service is still on in Rochester. I speed tested this morning.