PianoWow

The FCC began an investigation in the cable industry last October, to ensure that cable companies would not take advantage of the over-the-air television broadcasting switch from analog to digital in February.  

As it turns out, their suspicions were correct.  I called Comcast about an unrelated issue recently, and my television lineup became a topic of conversation.  Most government-sponsored ads on TV about the digital switch say that if you have cable, you will not need to make any changes.  But the representitative from Comcast said, “Oh no, everything is changing.”  When asked about the details, he said, “All those TVs you have that aren’t connected to a digital box will lose channels 30 and up.”  They’re moving over half of their analog channels to a digital tier, which requires a Comcast-owned cable box to decompress.  Renting these extra cable boxes will require all customers to pay more money per month, unless they don’t watch any channels above 30.

Comcast freely admitted it was guilty to me.  Probably because I’m just a customer who will be pissed if what he says turns out to be true on February 17.

The FCC investigation has proven difficult.  The cable companies are complaining that the amount of information requested by the FCC simply could not be gathered and presented by the deadline.  I read that as either their entire IT department is incompetent or they don’t want to get caught.  I’m guessing the latter.  Big cable is simply ignoring the FCC.

Most recently, the FCC has fined all of the cable companies under investigation a five figure sum for not complying.  Laughable!  Comcast,  the largest cable provider in the US, is a 30 billion dollar annual revenue generator.  Proportionately, a similar fine would require me to cut a penny into about 30 equal pieces and give one of those to the FCC.

From an Ars Technica article, which summarizes a letter by Kevin Martin, who was the chair of the FCC under the Bush adminstration:

The price for every other service that the FCC regulates has gone down, Martin charges. Wireless down 85 percent, long distance calling by 50 percent, and international calling by almost 90 percent. But not cable, whose prices the FCC’s now ex-chair says have doubled since 1992.

If cable prices continue to grow at a similar rate, I can imagine a very vivid future without cable televsion.  Internet video is growing in quality and popularity every day.

Sprint announced yesterday at the National Press Club in Washington DC that Android wasn’t good enough for sprint.  If that turns out to be the case when my contract comes up for renewal, I’m pretty sure I’ll decide Sprint’s not good enough for me.  If I wasn’t under this contract, I believe I would have switched to T-Mobile, who recently offered the first Android handset, the G1.  

With all the companies committed to bringing Android to the market, you’d think Sprint would want to jump on the bandwagon, for fear of being left behind.  This is almost as bad as Ford deciding it is going to be one of the few motor manufacturers not looking into alternative fuels/technologies.  I smell bad things in both companies futures.

In fairness, Sprint has said it’s committed to bringing an Android product to their lineup eventually.  But the clock is ticking.  They’ll certainly lose me as a customer if they don’t get one out by next fall.  My next phone will most definitely be an Android phone… the only decision to be made is which.

Update: I sent Sprint an email letting them know my stance: Android or die by next year.  They called me back, letting me know why they thought Android wasn’t good enough.  They listed two reasons 1) it doesn’t support WiMax, and 2) it doesn’t support 3G.  This is kind of a ridiculous set of reasons, honestly.  My current phone doesn’t support wireless anything, much less WiMax.  And neither my phone nor the current city I live in have 3G.  So to me, even supporting an older wireless standard such as 802.11b, g or n would be a step up.  So my current phone, the Treo, is just as “bad” as Android, in that it support neither feature, and yet it’s still offered?  I smell BS.

This great new, free website is still in beta, but seems to be a great service, if it works like they say it does.  

Ever since getting my first VOIP phone line with voicemail notifications via email, I’ve always wanted that feature on my cell phone.  Basically, if someone calls me on my home phone (my VOIP line), and leaves a message, I get an email at work saying so.  I can click on a link and the message is played in a browser that I can listen to on any computer with a web connection.

This website, messageSling, promises to do that for cell phone calls also.  No more burning daytime minutes listening to voicemail!  It works like this: you sign up through the website, and they give you a voicemail line, which you can forward your unanswered calls to, and listen to later on the web.  The site emails you or texts you every time you have a new voicemail.  

I was thrilled when I heard about this, and signed up immediately.  However, when I went to forward my unanswered calls to this number they gave me, Sprint let me know how to do it, but said that it would be 20 cents per minute!  That’s ridiculous.  The website is completely free, otherwise.  I would only be paying Sprint.  I would be PAYING Sprint not to use their ancient voicemail system that doesn’t do email notifications.  

Count me out.  I’ll deal with a touch-tone interface if I have to.