Cable companies to offer $9.95 broadband for poor homes

[Sgent]

Source: AP / New Orleans Times-Picayune

Cable companies said Wednesday that they will offer Internet service for $9.95 per month to homes with children that are eligible for free school lunches. The offer will start next summer and is part of an initiative the Federal Communications Commission cobbled together to get more U.S. homes connected to broadband.

One third, or about 35 million homes, don't have broadband. That affects people's ability to educate themselves and find and apply for jobs, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said.

"The broadband adoption gap in the U.S. is very large, and the costs of digital exclusion are high and getting higher," Genachowski said.

The initiative, called Connect-to-Compete, also includes Microsoft Corp., which pledges to sell PCs with its Office software suite for $250 to low-income families. A firm called Redemtech is offering to sell refurbished computers for $150, including shipping.

Read more: http://www.nola.com/business/index.ssf/2011/11/cable_companies_to_offer_995_b.html

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Note that all the large cable companies have signed onto this. Good work FCC.

[Orrex]

1. Great news! And it might bring us into the top 20 industrial nations that offer broadband.

My cynicism notwithstanding, this is an exciting development!

[slay]

20. I think we're like #15 (pretty big drop after 5th though)

no really: (sorry chart is so large)

[JDPriestly]

2. Great. I have a wonderful nephew who will benefit from this.

[slay]

3. "..less than one tenth of average cable speeds"

so 1/3rd the cost but 1/10th the speed? in theory $9.95 broadband sounds good - but the reality of this plan sounds flawed.

"All major cable companies are standing behind the $9.95 offer, which will be valid for two years." - 2 years.. what then?

"The minimum download speed will be 1 megabit per second, less than one tenth of average cable speeds. Brian Dietz, a spokesman for the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, said it will be up to the individual cable companies to decide what speeds they provide." -- up to the companies to decide how fast it will be. something tells me - not very.

"Comcast Corp., the largest cable company and the country's largest Internet service provider, is already offering broadband to $9.95 to low-income families, with a 1.5 megabit per second download speed. It offered to do that to get regulators to approve its acquisition of NBC Universal approved." -- yeah "offer" my ass.

Again, I like the idea, I just hope it doesn't lead to poor people getting fucked over.

[CountAllVotes]

5. from what little I know ...

They were after me recently to switch to something like this for $15.00 a month.

I asked that same question, how long and then what?

It was for one year and after that the cost was $38.95 a month.

That is a rip-off when you figure in the cost of having to purchase perhaps two modems.

:dem:

[BiggJawn]

6. I'm paying $50 a month for "1 Mbps"

Which for the last couple of weeks (since my WISP got bought out) has been only about 590Kbps...
No, they can't figure out what's wrong, either.

Valid for 2 years, eh? Then what? Do they expect you'll use your high-speed intertube to make a fortune on eBay so you can then afford $50 a month for 590Kbps, like me?

[cstanleytech]

8. If your not getting the speed you are paying for have you considered downgrading to a slower plan?

Assuming of course they offer such a plan, if not then what I would do is contact the office of the ceo for the company and complaining.

[BiggJawn]

10. I've called tech support once, just resting up for Round Two.

I'm not letting it lay, it's obscene, having to wait 10 minutes for "Kitty City" to load!

This is the slowest plan they offer.

[christx30]

23. Out of curiosity..

Which ISP are you with? I do tech support for a DSL service. We get a lot of calls for slow speeds.

[BiggJawn]

27. It's a wireless provider

Used to be Fairnet, which was recently bought by Wi-Power.

[cstanleytech]

29. If you have the option then I would consider a different provider then though you could I suppose

try a different wireless card, maybe one with a good external antenna port for you to hook one up.

[BiggJawn]

34. Doesn't work that way.

This is one of the outfits that puts the antenna with all the electronics up on your roof then brings a CAT-6 cable into the house.

I was changing final tubes in AM broadcast transmitters before there was even a DARPANET.

And it's either Wi-Power of the Mark of The Beast(comcast)no other game in town.

I should feel lucky, though, because I'm one of those rural folk FCC Chairman "Orange" Julius Genachowski says he needs to take away the Over-the-Air TV spectrum from broadcasters and "auction" (give-away) to AT&T and Verizon so they can bring me wireless broadband.

Hell, AT&T doesn't even have cell phone coverage here.

[Confusious]

12. Is that 1 MegaBIT or 1 MegaByte?

If you're paying 50 for 1 MegaBIT you're getting ripped off.

I pay 50 for 1.24 MegaBYTE.

bps= bits per second
Bps= bytes per second (1byte=8bits)

I always get them confused, and I'm a computer person.

If my modem wasn't so old, I'd get 24 Mbps. Tomorrow the new one arrives!

[slay]

14. Here it's $30/mo for ~10

sucks you're having to pay that. The USA is way behind (especially Finland, Sweden, and Korea) when it comes to broadband. :(

[lbrtbell]

30. Even at advertised speed, you're getting screwed

I live in a tiny agricultural town, and get 8mbps for $50/month. For the speed you're getting, you might as well be on dial-up. :(

[cstanleytech]

7. 10 bucks for 1mb down isnt bad imo especially if the family do not have the internet right now.

Not that I trust the cable companies.

[TheWraith]

9. It's not "one tenth." That's horseshit. $10 for 1 megabit is a pretty good deal.

REAL WORLD cable speeds are more like $50 a month for 5 megabits. 10 megabits might be available in some upper class suburbs, but not a lot of other places. I'm paying around $70 for 5 megabit DSL.

[Blue_Tires]

17. yeah, this just reeks of a quick-buck predatory scam

oh, so now all of a sudden cable companies are friends of the downtrodden classes?

[TheeHazelnut]

21. looks like you found the explanation

two years and then it ends in order to get approval of a merger that lasts forever... more of that tough negotiation on behalf of the American people

[NickB79]

33. That's typical DSL speed. I'd kill to pay only $10/mo

Right now we pay $50/mo, and since we're in a rural area that's it for our options. There are still dial-up providers charging $10/mo for 56K!

1-1.5 Mbs is perfectly suitable for most home Internet applications. We stream Netflix, watch Hulu and Youtube, Skype, surf the net, post on DU, check email, etc, all on 1 Mbs. Granted, you don't want to do this with more than two computers at once, but for the most part we make it work fine.

About the only thing that would suck at that speed would be online gaming through a PS3 or Xbox360.

[BiggJawn]

4. Wonder how much my bill will be going up to pay for this?

I don't really mind, not for a good program like this, (gawd, did I just give props to Orange Julius?) but the WISP's are not going to sacrifice a nickel's profit over this.

And is that a REAL install of MS Office? Not the "launch me 99 times then I disable myself" crippleware?

[DissedByBush]

11. They have to do this

It was part of the Comcast/NBC merger deal to get government approval.

[No Elephants]

13. Government could have nixed the merger--and probably should have.

Our information comes from too few sources as it is.

[Sherman A1]

22. Agreed & Well Said

[Sgent]

16. That's only for comcast

this is for every major cable provider nationwide.

[DissedByBush]

37. They see the writing on the wall n/t

[walerosco]

15. I dunno about doing this for students

If I can draw from personal experience, internet connection lowered my GPA. I started using short cuts i.e trying to plagiarize and spend the rest of the time playing games and trying to view free porn.

This might actually be a curse and not a benefit to our struggling students. Lets just hope these companies will finance this program from their profits and try to avoid any increase in rates

[slay]

19. Guess it would depend on the student

and the parents. I know I did a lot better in school once I got a computer and internet access - but I can see how for some it might not be that way. Then again - beats the hell out of an XBOX - at least there is potential for education.

[obxhead]

18. I wonder how many free school lunch kids have computers to connect

to this 1/10th speed "broadband" they will offer.

I wonder how many benefits or future considerations these mega corporations are going to get for this "gift" to the poor.

[Luciferous]

31. That's exactly what I thought when I read this article.

[Kolesar]

24. Cable corporate lobbyists organize to quash municipal Wi-fi services

They launch the usual campaigns full of white lies and half truths and convince council members or state governments to kill the municipal programs. Watch for B/S reports from RW think tanks like Heritage Foundation or whomever.

Municipal Wi-fi would make broadband internet available to "everybody" for a modest price, also.

[TexasProgresive]

25. That's great-now when will they start serving rural people. n/t

[Betty88]

26. I think they should include seniors in on this

It would be great for people like my mom on a fixed income. Plus since they link internet to phone service it might make their packages more available to lower income people.

[RebelOne]

35. I think so too. I am a senior and am paying $159 per month

for cable, phone and Internet. It would be nice to get a cheaper rate on Internet.

[Trillo]

28. Great news! 7 Billion + people worldwide

and yet another procreation subsidy.

[hunter]

32. We could have free wifi on every streetlight if we wanted to.

But the big cable, phone, and broadcast industries wouldn't stand for it.

This is their pitiful offer of compromise. Oh, we'll give the poor little waifs some gruel...

The FCC is totally owned by these shit heads.

wikipedia

Please, sir, I want some more...

[totodeinhere]

36. Unfortunately there are a lot of restrictions on who will qualify.

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Comcasts-10-Broadband-Has-a-Few-Catches-115570

We already noted a few restrictions on the offer, such as the fact users have to be getting free lunches under the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), and that Comcast will only be doing this a few years. An employee writes in to note there's a few additional hurdles if you were interested: users can't currently be subscriber to Comcast service or have had service in the past 90 days, and the household can't have a past due bill or non-returned equipment. "Number 2 is catching a lot of those interested," says our source.

Once you've eliminated those who don't qualify for the school lunch program, eliminated those who already have service (not uncommon even in poor homes), and eliminate those who also owe Comcast money (also obviously not uncommon in poor homes), how many customers will Comcast actually wind up having to serve at the $10 price point? Even then, they'll only have to offer it for a few years, making it significantly less of a difficult merger condition than it might originally appear.