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Direct TV vs. Viacom

July 13th, 2012

Well, here we are again. It was only a couple of summers ago that I was writing about the standoff between cable company Suddenlink, and media giant Viacom. Well, the boys who brought you the annoying,walking and talking sponge are at it again. As I understand it, Viacom is demanding a thirty percent rate increase from Direct TV, for the privilege of providing its list of cable channels like MTV, Nick and Nick Jr., TV Land and quite a few others; this despite sinking ratings.

The Satellite provider has refused the higher rates and has stopped broadcasting the extra networks until such a time as a deal can be struck, but its not going well. Neither side is willing to budge. Now I am not necessarily an opponent of big companies. The person or group who provides goods and services has the perfect right to ask what they want for those goods and services. I’m fine with media, cable and satellite providers making money.

A rising tide lifts all boats. I get it. But I’m increasingly opposed to what I see as Viacom’s shakedowns of every cable and satellite company who carries their channels. The fact is the network giant does the same thing to the carriers as they do to us. They sell their networks in packages, forcing them to pay for unpopular, low rated channels and programming in order to obtain programs that actually sell. Thus, we as customers can’t pick and choose our own lineups.

Now I should say that this is all perfectly legal, however, I read a few different articles in order to better understand the issue, and numerous authors cite the probability that the loss of channels will drive more customers to the likes of Netflix or Hulu where they can not only pick their networks but their individual programs. I’m certainly no expert on how these markets operate, but it seems to me that Viacom is working hard to get as much milk as possible from a dying cash cow, before she finally expires. The company would do better (in my humble opinion) to find a way to give as much choice to the consumer as possible before they go somewhere else entirely.

AT&T Cell Phone Service in Tyler Texas

September 10th, 2010

AT&T Cell Phone Company

Website: www.att.com

6004 S Broadway, Suite 100, Tyler – (903) 561-9393

5393 S Broadway Ave, Tyler – (903) 324-1117

4601 South Broadway Avenue, Tyler – (903) 939-1808

We have been having so many problems communicating with AT&T. Our cell phone bills in Tyler Texas have been higher than they should be. We decided that we should go up to the store and talk to them about lowering our bill. When we had gone up to the store we had explained that we are thinking about cancelling one of your phones. After we had expressed that the bills were more expensive than we had originally agreed on, they told us that we only had to pay less than half of what was on the bill. They had also told us that we would be getting $150 back on our next bill.

When we got our next month’s bill it was twice as much as the month before, and it stated that we had not paid the month before. We have been having a lot of issues like this one. The issues started to happen when we got the package deal. We got internet, direct TV, and two cell phones on one bill. Although this deal saves some money, it is really stressful that AT&T keeps on messing up our bills. It is really frustrating that when we go to the store they tell us one thing but then when we get our bill in the mail it states something completely different.

When we bought our phones we had got them from the Tyler Wal-Mart. We went up to the Wal-Mart phone section and talked to the guy that worked for the electronics. We had told him that we wanted to cancel our phone. He told us that soon AT&T will not be offering the unlimited internet package and that if we decide to cancel or switch phones we will lose the unlimited internet. He explained to us that soon other companies that Tyler Wal-Mart sells phones for are soon going to offer unlimited internet, text messaging, and phone calls. Soon we will be moving our cell phone service over to this smart phone, because we are tired of having to talk to so many different confused people about the problems on our phone bills.

Facebook Places set to Skyrocket past Foursquare

August 19th, 2010

So I have been thinking about this Facebook Places feature on Facebook. This thing is about to get my friends and family doing what I have been doing for months now on Foursquare. What is this I talk about?

I’m talking about a social app that let’s you check in and geo locate your position using GPS or cellular triangulation on the IPhone or Android.

Although many people use these types of services like Gowalla and Foursquare Facebook is playing the all too successful wait and copy game.

We saw the wait and copy happen with TiVo when Dish and Direct TV network and cable TV basically stole the idea but made it much better with what everybody now knows to be DVR.

So Facebook Places vrs Foursquare and Gowalla, who will win?

We all know Facebook Places will skyrocket past Foursquare literally overnight even though Foursquare is huge itself.

An interesting development may be the need for Foursquare to have to become a more broad social network like Facebook to compete.

Also it is rumored that Gowalla partnered with Facebook on their Facebook Places. With no mention of a “powered by Gowalla” anywhere it would seem that Facebook may have eaten Gowalla for lunch and spit out the bones.

I for one am looking forward to more Facebook friends and family geo tagging their favorite places. I will be more likely to go somewhere upon hearing about via a Places status update from a friend.

This my friends is going to be huge. Basically no restaurants and bars in
my small town of Tyler Texas have encouraged people to login to Foursquare and post their review of the food and simply that they ate there.

This will all soon be changing and Facebook will now be much
more about what we have been trying to do with local Tyler business already through our reviews and posts submitted on Facebook. Now however it won’t just be me and a few other people but thousands of Tylerites.

Facebook Places has officially gone live although I can only see it on the IPhone app after deleting the app and re-adding it. Once the IPhone Facebook application was reinstalled I was able to see the “Places” feature.

It is not working here in Tyler Texas yet and has a message that it will soon be rolled out in our area.

Facebook is trying to do it in phases to not overload the system.

I can no longer see the need of Foursquare when this goes live? Am I missing something that Foursquare will do for me to make me want to log in to two different check in apps?

An interesting note is that Facebook Places currently has made their logo a square with the number 4 in it? Wow!!, What a blatant rip off of the Foursquare brand? I thought Facebook was a big enough company to not stoop so low to do something like this.

Facebook Places has basically made something way better than Foursquare, effectively body slamming them on the ground and has then stomped on their face while they have them down with the whole logo rip-off.

Suddenlink Internet Service in Tyler Texas

May 4th, 2010



Not long ago I wrote an article about my transition from Direct TV to Suddenlink Cable and Internet. It was a difficult and emotional decision, but one that required a practical solution rather than a comfortable one. At the time my article first appeared I was satisfied with the customer service I had received. While my television picture was not what I was used to, I was prepared to live with the difference for the time being… that is until receiving a call from the Suddenlink promotions department about a week into my new subscription. The magical disembodied voice on the other end of the cellular call offered me all of my hearts digital desires, five plus movie channels, digital HD boxes, a digital recorder, ten meg internet and an overall more fulfilling life, all for about the same price or only slightly higher than what I was currently paying. After an extensive interview, I settled, not on the full movie channel option, (my lifestyle does not allow for my becoming a professional shut-in), but instead on the advance tier option, (supposedly around two hundred channels if I understood the voice correctly), a new digital cable box and the ten meg internet. I was pleased beyond words. I had essentially added a service to my home while paying less money for it! My monthly rate had just gone from ninety one dollars, to eighty four dollars. The installer was scheduled to arrive on Tuesday morning with my digital box and all my missing channels. Little did I realize that in a few short days the corporate machine would put the skids on my new found enthusiasm.

Saturday morning while participating in an annual school fund raiser, I was interrupted by a call from my new television and internet provider, advising me that the wealth of services the voice had promised me a mere four days previous could not be provided, for reasons that were murky at best. “What? I don’t understand!” I protested. “Your office called me!” A long and painful series of negotiations and holding periods followed. At the end of the call most of my promised goodies were restored but only at a significant rate increase. My eighty four dollar a month rate had just gone up to ninety seven dollars! I determined then and there to carry my fight to the cable giant’s corporate office!

On my way home that afternoon, I called back. I informed the customer service rep that he would not be able to solve my problem and that he should immediately transfer my call to his supervisor. He evidently did not believe me because he first attempted to explain the charges on my account… unsuccessfully I should add. I finally broke in “Would you just transfer me please?!” When “Sarah” in the Minneapolis office finally picked up, I did my level best to suppress my frustration, and explained the situation for at least the fourth time. After looking at my account Sarah assured me that the local office had made a mistake and that I did indeed qualify for the eighty four dollar rate, with one proviso. I would have to scale back my internet from ten megs to eight. After consulting with my tech-y friends, (including Donny Eisenbach), I agreed to the small concession. When I arrived home from school I called the number Sarah had given me.

I have now had Tyler TX Suddenlink’s services for nearly three weeks. I have spent four hours on the phone with the company’s reps, have been through a series of rate changes and have yet make a single payment. When I called the customer service number one last time to request the change in my internet service, I was informed that the company was no longer offering the eight meg service. Furthermore, the representative informed me that I was due to receive my digital box Tuesday morning, and that my monthly bill would be ninety one dollars a month. I have come full circle. Like a character in some great epic I have fought my way through. Now I find myself asking, “What was it all for?” The fact is, no one knows, not the company’s local office, not the mysterious voice that promised me the world, not Sarah in Minneapolis and certainly not the Suddenlink corporate center. All I know is Tuesday afternoon I’m back to digital TV at the original rate of ninety one dollars a month.

For more information on Suddenlink, see their websites at www.suddenlink.com.

Direct TV or Suddenlink, Which One, Hard to Decide Hmmm?

April 23rd, 2010

Well, I recently did something I didn’t want to do. I moved from Direct TV Call Now: 888-652-1609 (a service I am very fond of), back to Suddenlink Cable.  It was a difficult decision, but one I had to make as a grown adult, rather than a very, post adolescent television addict, (I confess I may be walking a fine line on that last one). My leaving the former was less the fault of Direct TV and due more to the fact that AT&T has failed to supply my residence with an internet option. When I say my residence I’m not misspeaking. There are actually those in my west Tyler suburban neighborhood, who do have AT&T as their internet provider, but for some unknown reason the company has been unable to supply me with bandwidth, lo these many years.

So what am I to do? With two writing jobs, a teaching career that is increasingly relying on an internet component, and a very active young son, I simply can’t run out in search of a hot spot every time I have to submit an article or enter a test grade into my grade book. This brings me to Suddenlink Cable. Their DSL internet is terrific! But I simply don’t want to pay for both Direct TV’s and Suddenlink’s services, not on a private school teacher’s salary.  So I made a grown up decision. I filled the DVR with my son’s favorite shows and cancelled my much beloved TiVo and my familiar satellite service, and subscribed instead cable and DSL.

The folks at Suddenlink where actually very helpful. The gentleman who set up my account was gracious enough to finagle the best deal for me; the installers were right on time, and did a fine job. So am I happy with my new arrangement? For now yeah I’ll get used to it. I can’t promise it will be a permanent solution, but it filled a more pragmatic purpose than my old situation did without really affecting my quality of life. At the end of the day however, I’m still morning the loss my TiVo subscription.  I just hope that time does indeed heal all wounds.

For more information on either Suddenlink or Direct TV, see their websites and phone numbers www.suddenlink.com or Direct TV. Then make the choice you find best meets your personal requirements.