PATREONItems tagged with charter
For a long time, cable and satellite TV providers had customers in a vice grip. If someone wanted to watch premium channels, it was cable/satellite TV or bust. Like so many other things, the internet changed the game, and these days an increasing number of people are cutting the cord, as they say. With more streaming options available (and on the horizon), companies like AT&T and Charter Spectrum could feel the squeeze. Netflix and Hulu are the first two that come to mind, though they're far from the only options. CBS All Access is another streaming option, as are Sling TV and YouTube. The field is expanding, too—Disney recently launched it Disney+ service, and Apple rolled out its...
Read more...
For a long time, big cable companies like Charter and Comcast were trying everything to prevent cord cutters from ditching cable TV programming packages and going with internet-only offerings. Those times have passed as the big cable companies, who are also often the only broadband internet providers in an area, have become indifferent on cable subscribers and have stopped offering the discounts customers were previously accustomed to. As the big cable companies are backing off on their discounts for plans, they are also increasing prices on their cable TV subscribers. Bloomberg mentions one subscriber who called Charter when his bill went up $40 monthly. Charter refused to offer any discounts...
Read more...
Charter is not making many friends in high places in New York. Just the opposite, the New York State Public Service Commission announced it has revoked its approval of a 2016 merger between Charter Communications and Time Warner Cable (TWC) due to Charter, doing business as Spectrum, wavering on promises it made, along with "various instances of misconduct." One of the times the Commission noted in its revocation announcement is a 2017 lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman. In the lawsuit, the AG accused Spectrum of throttling Internet speeds for streaming services like Netflix, and online gaming. The lawsuit specifically mentioned Riot Games, with data to show that...
Read more...
Charter Kicked Out Of New York Over Inadequate Spectrum Internet Deployments And Willful Obfuscation
Back in March, we brought you word that Charter was skating on thin icewith the State of New York for allegedly lying about Spectrum broadband deployments, and not living up to its promises to expand rural broadband as part of its 2016 merger with Time Warner Cable. Because of these misdeeds, the New York State Public Service Commission warned Charter that it could face franchise revocation in the state and additional penalties. Apparently, Charter has still failed to live up to its obligations because the Commission announced today they that it revoked its preliminary approval of the merger between Charter and Time Warner Cable in the state. This means that the company can no longer operate...
Read more...
There is a lot of turmoil going on in the cable TV market right now, with plenty of shakeups taking place. The wild swings in the marketplace and rise of companies like Amazon, Google, and Facebook with regards to video delivery is precisely why AT&T is looking to hook up with Time Warner to better compete. Quarterly earnings are in for some of America's top cable providers, and the numbers aren't looking good with respect to subscriber counts. Charter reported that it lost 122,000 video subscribers for its most recently completed quarter. What's interesting is that this figure is far above the 43,000 loss that analysts were predicting. Things weren't much better at Comcast, which lost 96,000...
Read more...
In the latest case of cable companies behaving badly, Charter has come under fire from the New York State Public Service Commission. Charter has been on a mission to expand its nationwide footprint, and to do so, it reached agreements to acquire both Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks earlier decade. In order to gain regulatory approval for the acquisitions, Charter had to meet certain obligations with respect to building out its broadband network. Unfortunately for Charter, the Commission has found that the company has been untruthful about these efforts to expand service. The Commission says that Charter agreed to add 145,000 households and businesses within four years to its network,...
Read more...
With more and more Americans getting fed up with their cable or satellite TV packages creeping up in price month after month, many have decided to cut the cord in favor of over-the-air television, streaming services or “skinny TV” bundles. Charter is testing out a new service called Spectrum Stream for a select group of its existing customer base that only subscribes to internet services. The hope is that it will be able to entice these customers with the promise of local channels and popular cable channels, while at the same time bolstering its bottom line. In this case, the new Spectrum Stream skinny bundle includes 25 live channels that can be streamed via your mobile devices or via a device...
Read more...
The people of New York state are taking Charter to court. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office is suing Charter-owned Spectrum (previously Time Warner Cable) for knowingly failing to live up to its promise of ‘blazing fast’ and ‘super reliable’ service. Schneiderman remarked, “The allegations in today's lawsuits confirm what many of you have long suspected: Spectrum-Time Warner has been ripping you off”. Schneiderman conducted a statewide study in 2015 to measure broadband speeds after receiving thousands of complaints from Time Warner Cable customers. The study discovered that at least 640,000 customers who signed up for high-speed internet received much slower speeds. It was...
Read more...
In the city of Nashville, Tennessee, Google Fiber is running into trouble with incumbents who are trying to slow its rollout of gigabit internet service. Google Fiber has limited service within the city, and is dependent on gaining access to utility poles to expand its footprint. However, Comcast and AT&T are making that process incredibly difficult. Google Fiber is butting up against an even more peculiar problem in the city of Louisville, Kentucky. Charter Communications has sued the city for giving what it considers preferential treatment to not only Google Fiber, but also rival AT&T. Charter claims that both Google Fiber and AT&T are signing up for new sweetheart franchise deals...
Read more...
New York customers are not satisfied with their internet service. Thousands of Time Warner Cable's customers have written to the New York Attorney General insisting that they are not receiving the download speeds they paid for. As a response, New York AG Eric Schneiderman is working on an investigation regarding the company's advertised internet speeds. Former Columbia University law professor Tim Wu is leading the investigation. Wu coined the term “net neutrality” and ran for lieutenant governor of New York in 2014. Wu’s platform attacked large business, particularly those in the telecom and cable industries. Schneiderman’s letter stated, “In advertisement after advertisement, Time Warner...
Read more...
It might be just a tad early for Charter Communications to pop the champagne, but it can certainly have an intern fetch the bubbly in preparation of a celebration. The U.S. Department of Justice laid out settlement terms of an antitrust suit that would allow Charter to forge ahead with its proposed acquisitions of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks. The Department of Justice attached several conditions to its settlement, the biggest being that Charter would not be allowed to enter into or enforce agreements that would make it more difficult for online video services like Netflix and Hulu to purchase video content from programmers. It's a tactic the agency feared Charter would be in a...
Read more...
In a letter sent to customers, Time Warner Cable (TWC) announced a series of price hikes for its various TV programming and Internet services. Perhaps ill timed, the price increases come less than two weeks after New York regulators approved TWC's proposed merger with Charter Communications.Charter confirmed back in May of last year that it agreed to buy TWC for $195.71 per share, valuing the deal at $55.76 billion. If factoring in TWC's long term debt of $22.64 billion, the value of the deal jumps to over $78 billion. Either way, it's a major move in the making, and it came one step closer to reality when New York officials gave it their thumbs up.According to the letter being sent out to customers,...
Read more...
A Bloomberg report that came out on Memorial Day was right on the money when it came to Charter’s ambitions to take on cable juggernaut Comcast. Bloomberg learned that Charter would scoop up Time Warner Cable (TWC) for $195 per share, valuing the transaction at roughly $55 billion. Charter confirmed the acquisition this morning, valuing each TWC share at approximately $195.71. The transaction has an equity value of $55.76 billion, but TWC has long-term debt of $22.64 billion which value the entire whole shebang at over $78 billion. The TWC acquisition will vault Charter from fourth place in the U.S. cable market to second place, right behind Comcast. The combined companies will have an estimated...
Read more...
Comcast came up as the biggest loser in its failed bit to acquire rival Time Warner Cable (TWC) for $45 billion. Comcast wasted over $30 million on lobbying and tucked its tail between it legs once it became clear that U.S. regulatory agencies would not approve the merger. Comcast’s loss is now Charter’s gain according to a fresh report from Bloomberg. We first heard of Charters inklings to cozy up with TWC back in late April, but it appears that the relationship has gotten especially serious in recent days. The news agency has learned that Charter is willing to pay around $195 per share (a 14 premium over TWC’s last closing price). The stock and cash deal is estimated to be worth $55.1 billion,...
Read more...
It's nice to feel wanted, isn't it? Time Warner Cable knows the feeling. The cable company has been courted by numerous bidders in recent months, and though a $45 billion merger with Comcast ultimately fell apart due to regulatory concerns, it would be surprising if a deal didn't happen. In addition to Charter and Cablevision showing interest, we can now add Altice SA to what seems like a growing list of suitors.According to Reuters, the French telecommunications group has been in talks to buy TWC and is also close to acquiring Suddenlink. Altice SA wants desperately to move into the U.S. cable market, and buying out existing players would be the quickest way to do that. It's also an expensive...
Read more...
Federal regulators put into a motion a legal process that would have made it very difficult for Comcast to proceed with its blockbuster plan to acquire Time Warner Cable (TWC) for $45 billion, and as a result of Comcast pulling out of the proposed buyout, Bright House Networks has abandoned its own plans of merging with Charter.The deals were intertwined in hopes of appeasing antitrust concerns. As constructed, if Comcast received approval to buy TWC, it would sell 1.4 million subscribers to Charter for $7.3 billion. Comcast would also divest 2.5 million subscribers as part of a spinoff into a new cable company called GreatLand Connections, of which Charter would own a stake.Image Source: Flickr...
Read more...
Comcast's proposed $45.2 billion acquisition of Time Warner Cable hit a brick wall when the Federal Communications Commission recommended what's called a "hearing designation order," a procedural move that tasks an administrative law judge to determine if a merger would be in the best interest of the people. Rather than go down that road, Comcast bailed on the deal, taking a $32 million hit in the process. As to Time Warner Cable, it looks as though Charter may make a run at the cable company.There are multiple reports that Charter is formulating a plan to bid on TWC, and if accepted, it would create a cable giant with 15.6 million video subscribers and 16.4 million broadband customers. For the...
Read more...
Charter Communications this week said it's planning to acquire Bright House Networks, the sixth largest cable company in the U.S., for $10.4 billion. However, there are several contingencies, one of the biggest of which is government approval for rival Comcast to acquire Time Warner Cable, as Charter has a vested interest in the side deal. If Comcast is able to buy TWC, it has agreed to shed 1.4 million subscribers to Charter in exchange for $7.3 billion to help nudge regulators to approve the deal. Comcast said it would also divest 2.5 million subscribers as part of a spinoff into a new cable company called GreatLand Connections, of which Charter would own a stake. Should all of this...
Read more...
Was your high-speed Internet service acting wonky yesterday? Are you a Charter customer? If you answered 'yes' to both questions, you're not alone. It appears that Charter, the nation's fourth largest cable operator, suffered a widespread outage in broadband Internet service starting on late Saturday afternoon and continuing into the night. This editor happens to reside in southwest Michigan and was affected by the outage, as were residents of Minnesota, North Carolina, South Carolina, and several other states. According to Charter spokeswoman Kim Haas, the service disruptions were "intermittent across parts of our footprint." Charter offers fast Internet service, but last night, a widespread...
Read more...
Comcast is highly motivated to complete a $45 billion deal to acquire Time Warner Cable. So much, in fact, that Comcast has come to a separate agreement with Charter Communications to get rid of 3.9 million of subscribers, which is contingent on the TWC merger taking place. It's Comcast's hope that divesting itself of subscribers will be enough to ease regulatory concerns over its deal with TWC. According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, Comcast agreed to sell 1.4 million existing TWC customers to Charter for around $7.3 billion in cash. In addition, Comcast would create a new publicly traded company made up of another 2.5 million existing Comcast subscribers. The new cable company would...
Read more...
Got Charter for internet? Good news! The speed at which you're reading this very post is probably improved. The company has announced that they're bumping up internet speeds across the board, with download rates reaching 100Mbps for home customers. In markets where Charter has deployed DOCSIS 3.0 technology, or approximately 95 percent of its Internet service area, the company is increasing Charter Internet Express download speeds from 12 megabits per second (Mbps) to up to 15 Mbps, and increasing upload speeds from 1 Mbps to up to 3 Mbps. Charter Internet Plus download speeds are being increased from 18 Mbps to up to 30 Mbps, and upload speeds are being increased from 2 Mbps to up to 4 Mbps....
Read more...
According to an article from Engadget, Europe and South Korea are developing a "Robot Ethics Charter" in order to govern the manufacturing and use of robots to including ethical standards. If this wasn't already sci-fi enough, guess where the a great deal of inspiration for the charter is being found? Isaac Asimov's "three principles", a concept from his 1942 book I Robot, is being used as inspiration for both Europe and S. Korea's charters. In the end, when the robots rise, it won't be a cool slathering of mud spread across your thermally trackable meat sack which saves you; it'll be a manifesto. Europe's version is expected next month,...
Read more...
