Road Runner Turbo is getting a makeover in Indianapolis.  Faster speeds are forthcoming, but at a higher price.

Bright House Networks currently provides Road Runner Standard customers with 7Mbps/512kbps.  Getting better speed requires the purchase of Road Runner Turbo at a new price of $15 per month.  In return, Bright House is boosting Turbo speed customers to 20/2Mbps service, with PowerBoost temporarily accelerating downstream speeds up to 30Mbps.

In most markets, Road Runner Turbo is priced at $9.95 per month, but it’s five dollars more in Indianapolis.

Bright House headquarters in Indianapolis

Will the increased price for Turbo become a trend in return for faster speeds in other markets?

Ironically, the associated public relations campaign sells customers on signing up for Turbo to enjoy a better online video experience.

“Building the excitement toward the opening games of the Olympics, we’re able to add to the enjoyment of and access to entertainment and information with these exclusive new products and features,” said Wayde Klein, vice president of marketing and customer operations for Bright House Networks Indiana. “With our speed boost to Road Runner Turbo, customers will be able to take advantage of some of the highest Internet speeds available, making video viewing over the Internet an even better, real-time experience.”

The upgrade in broadband service is part of Bright House’s effort to improve service in central Indiana.  The cable operator is also adding several new high definition networks and introducing the “Start Over” feature allowing viewers to return to the start of a program in progress.

Bright House is licensed to provide Road Runner service, a brand more commonly associated with Time Warner Cable.

Road Runner Turbo customers in south Texas can expect to receive more speed for their money soon.

Time Warner Cable is boosting speeds for Turbo customers in Corpus Christi, Del Rio, Eagle Pass, Laredo, the Rio Grande Valley and Uvalde.

“We are very excited to offer this upgrade and time-saving feature to our Road Runner customers,” said Gavino Ramos, vice president of communications for Time Warner Cable South Texas.

Downstream speeds increase from 10 to 15Mbps and upstream speeds are doubled from 1Mbps to 2Mbps.

The price for Turbo service remains unchanged.

Although the exact date for the upgrade is unclear, customers can check if the upgrade is completed in their area by following this company-recommended procedure:

1. Unplug the cable modem and wait 60 seconds.
2. Plug the cable modem back in. The lights will flash as it reconnects to the network.
3. When the modem lights are solid again, restart your computer and experience the new faster speed.

Cable ONE intentionally eavesdropped on what its customers did online in order to profit from targeted advertising.  That is the allegation contained within a class action lawsuit filed Wednesday in the Alabama Northern District Court.

The suit alleges the cable operator installed network monitoring software from NebuAd, an advertising provider, which monitored and profiled customers for the purpose of delivering customized, targeted advertising.

Cable ONE is named as defendant in the suit because the company did not inform customers that such profiling was taking place, and never gave customers an opportunity to opt out, according to the complaint.  NebuAd itself has not being named in the suit.

Customer Samuel Green claims NebuAd paid the cable company a “price per customer, per month” and placed tracking cookies on his computer to follow his online activities.  He accused the company of violating his privacy.  The lawsuit establishes a class action case opening the door for a settlement with every customer, potentially nationwide.

The suit asks for damages of $100 per day for the period Cable ONE utilized the tracking services of NebuAd.  It also demands the company destroy all of the data the suit alleges was wrongfully obtained.

The case is being handled by Florence attorney Joey K. James.

Source: Trefis

At a time when digital cable revenues are anemic, and rate hikes are among the most important factors for keeping average revenue per customer as high as possible, Time Warner Cable’s broadband division is just a percentage point or two from becoming the most important service on offer from the nation’s second largest cable provider, at least as far as the stock price is concerned.

Trefis, a forward looking valuation analyst, says future growth at Time Warner Cable will largely come from consumers looking for broadband connectivity. While the company’s digital cable division still constitutes the majority of its stock price estimate, 36 percent, the broadband division has now achieved a close second — 35.1 percent, according to Trefis.

Time Warner Cable maintains an 11 percent share of America’s broadband market, a number expected to grow to 13 percent over the course of the next few years.  Trefis predicts a corresponding increase in the stock price as consumers continue to be driven to the cable operator, particularly from less robust DSL service sold by telephone companies.

Trefis notes the need for speed is a driving factor, and the company can expect to also benefit from customers bundling multiple services together when signing up.

[Update 4:50pm EST: Verizon Wireless issued this statement: “Our network security system found traffic from some 4Chan Web sites that had strong potential to disrupt the Verizon Wireless network, affecting our customers’ use of their services. With continuing investigation, and ensuring no current risk of harm, we are giving the green-light to all 4Chan traffic. We will continue to monitor for any possibility of network harm.”  That “harm” was likely from another denial of service attack, and does not necessarily come from 4Chan themselves.  Malicious attackers can use false identifying information.  You can expect that company officials would strenuously avoid anything that could smack of a Net Neutrality violation at a time the issue remains a hot topic in DC.]

Last year, AT&T got itself into a political pickle over accusations that the provider had blocked access to 4Chan, an often controversial no-holds-barred imageboard.  With Net Neutrality a front burner topic, the accusation ran away in the press and heralded considerable finger-pointing about a major provider blocking access to a website they supposedly didn’t like.

Now it’s Verizon Wireless’ turn.  Over the weekend, 4Chan’s founder, Christopher Poole, claimed the wireless company was blocking access to the site:

Over the past 72 hours, we’ve been receiving reports from Verizon Wireless customers having difficulty accessing the image boards. After investigating, we found that Verizon is dropping traffic to/from boards.4chan.org, only on port 80 (HTTP). No other subdomain/IP/port is affected, which leads us to believe this block is intentional. A call was placed to their support staff last night, and we were told that the ticket would not be looked at until Monday at the earliest, and: “You’ll need the customer to call to request it be unblocked…”

Note: Users with mobile browsers that proxy (BlackBerry, Opera) won’t necessarily have issues accessing the boards.

Late Sunday evening, Poole claims he confirmed Verizon is intentionally blocking 4Chan:

After an hour and a half on the phone, we’ve received confirmation from Verizon’s Network Repair Bureau (NRB) that we are “explicitly blocked.”

Poole’s notice included Verizon’s phone numbers, giving members of the 4Chan community a place to vent, and that is precisely what has been happening all morning.  The Network Repair Bureau’s phone lines melted down, and the company claims it has not discovered precisely why the site is being blocked.

Before the inevitable outrage against Verizon Wireless commences, a few points to consider:

1. The AT&T incident a year ago was not an effort to block 4Chan’s site, just stop a denial of service attack originating from IP addresses connected to img.4chan.org.
2. A “block” does not necessarily mean an executive at Verizon Wireless specifically ordered the company to stop providing access to a particular site.  Blocks can be an automatic network management technique to control a traffic problem or denial of service attack, a technical error, or a problem external to Verizon itself.
3. I am a Verizon Wireless customer and have no problem reaching boards.4chan.com on my LG Chocolate phone.
4. Customers of Verizon FiOS or Verizon DSL are not blocked.

It seems prudent to wait a few hours to learn whether this is a poster child for Net Neutrality, or simply a technical issue.