That's basically what it boils down to. The constant bundling makes a level of service you can buy today cheaper than that same level of service that you could buy 10 years go, but your options are much much fewer.
If you examine it on the flipside, you get to pay much more for the same level of service if all the new editions don't matter to you. I was just thinking about how to get the same channels I got with AT&T Broadband before comcast took them over now with comcast, it would cost over $20/month more. That represents an over 50% rate increase from a combination of base level of service increases and re-bundling of channels to higher tiers. Granted in that timeframe they've added quite a few obscure digital stations in those upper tiers and added OnDemand, but if all you wanted was a selection of the most popular broadcast and cable networks, you are STUCK paying much much more.
I would also like to know why it is that only cable seems to be affected by these network policies of new stations and increased costs. I heard it all the time that "Your rates are going up because they are charging us more for the stations." Why is it then that my sister's Dish Network rates have been rock solid for the past few years and she's managed to get even more stations for that same rate while not being on some sort of promotional rate period?
The big difference is, companies like Echostar actually go to bat for their customers and negotiate with the networks to keep rates sane and push down their bundling requirements while Comcast just passes the rates on to the customer (while inflating the increase to give themselves a nice cut as well).
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
bull3964 @ Nov 5th 2008 12:21PM
That's basically what it boils down to. The constant bundling makes a level of service you can buy today cheaper than that same level of service that you could buy 10 years go, but your options are much much fewer.
If you examine it on the flipside, you get to pay much more for the same level of service if all the new editions don't matter to you. I was just thinking about how to get the same channels I got with AT&T Broadband before comcast took them over now with comcast, it would cost over $20/month more. That represents an over 50% rate increase from a combination of base level of service increases and re-bundling of channels to higher tiers. Granted in that timeframe they've added quite a few obscure digital stations in those upper tiers and added OnDemand, but if all you wanted was a selection of the most popular broadcast and cable networks, you are STUCK paying much much more.
I would also like to know why it is that only cable seems to be affected by these network policies of new stations and increased costs. I heard it all the time that "Your rates are going up because they are charging us more for the stations." Why is it then that my sister's Dish Network rates have been rock solid for the past few years and she's managed to get even more stations for that same rate while not being on some sort of promotional rate period?
The big difference is, companies like Echostar actually go to bat for their customers and negotiate with the networks to keep rates sane and push down their bundling requirements while Comcast just passes the rates on to the customer (while inflating the increase to give themselves a nice cut as well).