Items tagged with Comcast
It goes without saying the coronavirus is claiming lives, wrecking world financial markets, and shutting down amusement parks and sporting events around the country. AT&T has taken the noble stance of removing data caps on its broadband plans -- at least temporarily -- and now Comcast is responding in its own way to make life at home more bearable for those under quarantine, have been forced to work from home, or are out of work during these tumultuous times. In this case, Comcast is making changes to its Internet Essentials program, which is only available to qualifying low-income Americans. The service usually costs $9.95 per month and offers download/upload speeds that are capped...
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It has been officially confirmed that Universal Orlando's next major theme park, known as Epic Universe, will be the home of Super Nintendo World. Comcast Corporation executives confirmed the inclusion of the Nintendo-themed park during its 2019 earnings conference call. Speculation had suggested that the new theme park would be the home of Super Nintendo World, but this is the first official confirmation of that news. Comcast executives have confirmed that the theme park will be part of its "fourth gate" in Orlando. It already operates Universal Studios Florida, Islands of Adventure, and Volcano Bay. Comcast executives have big goals for Super Nintendo World, noting in the conference call that...
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Comcast and other cable companies are in celebration mode after winning a key legal victory against the state of Maine. Had the ruling gone the other way, cable companies would be bound by a recent law requiring them to offer subscribers the option of purchasing access to cable channels or programs on cable channels individually. The law essentially calls for an à la carte offering, whereby customers would not have to pay for bloated cable TV packages that include channels they may not be interested in viewing. it would also be a blow to the practice of including certain desirable channels only into pricier cable cable packages, which can be frustrating for the consumer. Maine introduced...
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Anyone who pays for cable television knows that the low rates that big cable companies advertise aren't the rates you end up paying over the long haul. Cable TV bills commonly get inflated when it comes to the myriad of fees that are tacked on in your billing statement. Thankfully, new legislation has made it past the House and Senate in the U.S. and is now heading to President Trump's desk for his signature. A new bill has been lobbied for by Consumer Reports that's called The Television Viewer Protection Act of 2019. The act was stuffed inside an appropriations bill, but the cable TV industry was aware and was able to pull some last-minute shenanigans and have a key provision in the bill changed....
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Comcast has announced that it has completed an investigation that found there was an error in its billing software that led to customers being incorrectly charged for exceeding their data allotments. Comcast says that the customers who were charged by mistake will be given bill credits and an additional $50 credit. Comcast admitted its wrongdoing after a customer stepped forward and told Ars Technica that even with his modem unplugged overnight, Comcast had recorded 40GB of data use. Comcast says that the data meter was operating correctly, but the numbers passed to its new billing software were incorrect. The cable giant says that it has rolled back to its old billing system and that the issue...
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We've talked about the travails of municipal broadband efforts across the United States on numerous occasions, and the formula is usually the same. Some underserved community pleads with big ISPs like Comcast and Charter to provide their residents with high speed internet, after which the entrenched players refuse. And then when these same municipalities take matters into their own hands by creating their own internet service in response, those big ISPs lobby local governments to shut them down -- sometimes successfully, as in the case of Pinetops, NC. Luckily, we can score a big win for the little guy in the town of Fort Collins, Colorado, which has just launched its Connexion...
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If you’ve been eyeing Comcast’s attractively-priced Xfinity Mobile service, which just so happens to use the Verizon Wireless network, we’ve got some good news to report for those that would like to bring their own device. Up until today, Xfinity Mobile has only supported Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) if you had an unlocked iPhone. However, now Comcast is allowing [limited] support for unlocked Android devices. Comcast is reporting that the following unlocked smartphones can now be brought to Xfinity Mobile, and they’re all from Samsung: Galaxy S8 Galaxy S8+ Galaxy Note 8 Galaxy S9 Galaxy S9+ Galaxy Note 9 Interestingly, official network support has not been announced for...
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Some of you reading this may not find it shocking that Comcast is being fined millions of dollars for running afoul of consumer protections. Comcast is a major ISP, after all, and there are no shortages of customer complaints to be found on the web. But would you be surprised to learn that it broke the law hundreds of thousands of times? That's the finding of a King County Superior Court judge, who ruled that Comcast violated the Consumer Protection Act more than 445,000 times by charging tens of thousands of Washington residents an extra fee for its Service Protection Plan without their consent, according to Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson. "Comcast refused to accept responsibility...
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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...
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A company that was voted the worst in America in a poll (twice, actually) is ceding control of Hulu, the streaming giant that is on a mission to let the world know it has live sports (I can't watch an NBA playoff game without that message being repeatedly hammered home), so that it can join the happiest place on earth. Or put another way, Disney is assuming full operational control of Hulu in a streaming deal reached with Comcast. The move is effective immediately, the company's involved announced today. As part of the deal Comcast is entering in a "put/call" agreement regarding NBCUniversal's 33 percent ownership interest in Hulu, paving the way for Disney to purchase the shares five years from...
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Comcast Spectacor is a big name in the sports world, and it owns the Philadelphia Flyers. The company is set to expand in a major way into gaming with a new stadium that will be the very first meant specifically for eSports gaming. The investment into the stadium, called Fusion Arena, for now, is said to be $50 million. The stadium will break ground this summer and will sit on a 47-acre stadium complex site that Comcast Spectacor currently leases in South Philadelphia. The arena will be smaller than a football or basketball stadium, seating 3,500 people and will be placed on a parking lot next to Xfinity Live! and will be within walking distance of Linc, Citizens Bank Park, and the Wells Fargo...
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In many parts of the country, there are no choices when it comes to broadband internet providers. If you want broadband, and you are in a Comcast area, that is often your only choice. However, there are lots of options when it comes to TV with satellite and streaming providers to choose from in all markets. Since consumers have so many TV offerings to choose from, Comcast has a large number of internet-only subscribers, and it wants a way to squeeze more money out of those customers. To that end, Comcast has announced Xfinity Flex. Xfinity Flex will launch across the country next week for Xfinity internet customers. It's a service packaged with an internet-connected 4K HDR TV device that features...
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Any PIN code is better than no PIN code, right? If you are a Comcast Xfinity Mobile customer, you may want to change your default PIN. Xfinity Mobile’s easy-to-guess default PIN has resulted in the hijacking of several phone numbers and identity theft. Comcast wanted to make it easier for customers to transfer a device to a new carrier. They do not prompt customers to punch in a unique PIN when the customer creates a new account; Instead, they decided that “0000” would be the default PIN for all customers. This plan has quickly backfired. Xfinity Mobile customer Larry Whitted of California reported to the Washington Post that an identity thief had been able to access Whitted’s...
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The cable/satellite industry is finally having to face the music: customers are getting tired of rising TV service prices and are looking for alternative solutions. According to a recent report, Americans are fleeing cable and satellite TV packages at an increasing rate as they flock to OTA local channel broadcasts paired with streaming services like Netflix and Hulu. Comcast is keenly aware of this new dynamic; the company lost 106,000 cable subscribers during its most recent quarter. To help keep customers in the fold, however, CNBC is reporting that the cable giant is working on an aggregate video streaming platform that will run on a set-top box similar to its existing...
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Comcast has laid claim to the title of "nation's largest provider of gigabit broadband" with the announcement that nearly 58 million homes and business have access to its gigabit internet service. Comcast claims its rollout to be the fastest deployment of gigabit speeds to the most locations in the country; Xfinity Gigabit Internet and Comcast Business Gigabit service are available to "nearly all" customers in 39 states and the District of Columbia. Comcast offers faster speeds with multi-gigabit available to business users in Comcast service areas. Comcast notes it has increased speeds 17 times in the last 17 years and that the capacity of its broadband network has doubled every 18-24 months....
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It's beginning to look like wireless carriers have wildly conflicting ideas on what "unlimited" means with regards to their unlimited data plans. The latest of these is Comcast with its Xfinity Mobile MVNO service, which piggybacks on America's largest 4G LTE wireless network: Verizon Wireless. For starters, streaming video on Xfinity Mobile will be capped at 480p, which means that 720p and 1080p video are out of the question -- even if you pay extra for unlimited data. Comcast will provide a paid option later this year that will allow you reenable 720p resolution streaming. That seems rather "convenient" to make customers pay for a feature that was previously free. Comcast says,...
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Mesh routers are all the rage these days, as they allow users to ensure that their whole home is blanketed in Wi-Fi while maintaining peak speeds throughout. Comcast is getting in on the action with the official nationwide launch of its xFi Pods, which are rebranded Plume Wi-Fi extenders with its own special firmware backed in and accompany software. If you recall, Comcast invested in Plume last year, and the xFi Pods are the result of that partnership. The devices are hexagonal in shape and plug-in directly to a free electrical outlet. They are designed to spread Wi-Fi to dead zones in your home, or to simply extend coverage further on your property (i.e. installing a xFi Pod in your garage...
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Over the past week, we've reported quite a bit about the rise of cord-cutting and how big cable and satellite TV companies are adapting to the changing landscape. Comcast in particular lost 96,000 customers last quarter, and is looking for new ways to stop defectors from moving to cheaper alternatives. Last week, Comcast responded by raising internet speeds out of the blue for customers in specific regions of the United States: Houston, Oregon, and Southwest Washington. We don't know if these areas in particular have seen heavy defections from Comcast's TV packages, but customers in these regions are seeing some massive increases in their internet download speeds. What's even more...
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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...
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Comcast is giving its Xfinity xFi customers more control over their home Wi-Fi network and those who access it with convenient, real-time push notifications. The notifications are sent to your smartphone, tablet and/or TV screen to let you know when a new device joins your network (i.e. xFi Advanced Gateway or another compatible xFi Wireless Gateway) or if your Wi-Fi settings have been changed (among other things). These new notifications are in addition to existing Xfinity xFi features like parental controls, and the ability to immediately pause internet activity at the push of a button. The notifications will alert you to the following changes: A new device joins your home network. Once identified...
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TiVo's Rovi Corporation and Comcast are wrapped up in another legal battle with TiVo claiming that Comcast is violating patents that are held by Rovi and related affiliates. The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. In the suits, TiVo alleges that the Comcast X1 platform is infringing on patents that Rovi holds that have to do with the capability for a viewer to pause a show and resume playback on different devices. Rovi also claims that Comcast is infringing on patents that have to do with restarting live programming in progress, advanced DVR recording features and advanced search and...
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Picture this—your parents just moved to a new location, ordered Internet service, and are having trouble setting it up. What do they do? They call you, of course, for help in configuring their fancy new broadband equipment. That is one of the things Comcast set out to change with its new xFi Advanced Gateway, a high-speed DOCSIS 3.1 modem and router built into a single, decorative device that doesn't look nerdy, and doesn't require one to configure it. The most confusing part of the whole deal is not the equipment, but the terms. Let's clear that up. Xfinity xFi is a service Comcast offers that helps users configure and manage their wireless devices. This can be done through an app from...
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