Lol
I’ve only had one ISP with excellent service, and it was a small family-run one. It was pretty expensive, too. The rest have ranged from “ok I guess” to “oh my god, I vow never to deal with these shitcunts again for the rest of my days”.
Besides, logically, if the ISPs really were a pleasure to deal with, then surely making it easy to switch would be welcomed, no? People would see how good your service is then switch to you.
Curious. Almost like they’re chatting complete and utter bollocks.
The reason I haven’t switched is because I have no real alternatives. I could try a wireless service, but it would likely be a downgrade as signal is not the greatest in my area.
Not in NYC. Spectrum is my only option and they are flaky as hell
File fcc complaint.
I’m sure the new orange flavored head will get right on it
“excellent customer service” is a really weird to state “monopolistic practices”
It’s a good way to say, “customer service that blocks the exit,” though!
Well, that is true for me in Canada with Teksavvy.
The reason i don’t switch is because the price is fair enough and i have less connection issues compared the all the others we have available.
All infrastructure should be owned by the government
Or at least community cooperatives. Having no voice or say in how your fixed infrastructure is operated is asking to be exploited
The only reason I take their customer service up my ass is because it always sucks no matter what ISP I use.
The only reason I do it is because I have no other choice. For me it’s either suffering with Comcast or using extremely shitty DSL (which is too slow for me to do my job properly). I live in a suburban area, but for some reason, my neighborhood has only one high speed option. And I know there are plenty of other people all over the country in the same predicament.
I live where there’s 1 isp and 10 mobile/satellite providers
Stares in local duopoly
I was lucky enough to have options after I moved a few years ago, and went with the smaller semi-local isp that offers better speeds for better prices, and no bullshit. The customer service is actually pretty good too. I hope more people get options like that, it felt so good to leave the big guys.
We have 1 choice or nothing. If my ham sandwich suddenly provided bandwidth, id drop my isp in a heartbeat
This is stupid, but I thought I’d opened the discussion for this post, and trying to make sense of your comment within that context was interesting.
Fuck that shit. I switched to Starlink while flipping them off. Going back? Not even once
The same issue is true with starlink though. So many in rural areas, and even some not-so-rural areas, have starlink as their only real option now. I love what starlink has done for rural internet access, as someone who had dial up (yes, not even DSL) up until 2018 when I moved. However, it’s still a monopoly, and that’s concerning. Starlink can essentially charge whatever they want for their service and have a market for their product. That’s sorta scary to me.
I literally couldn’t care less when it is actually cheaper and infinitely better than any option we have here.
Who knows, maybe the other companies will think on the money they lose not being useful to customers and provide a better product, but for now, up to the point that is convenient to me as a customer, Starlink is fucking awesome 😎
Bluntly: If you’re fortunate, you’ll have two options for internet. DSL and cable. Sometimes there’s other “options” like a WISP or starlink, or even a dual up provider, but the speed comparison is not even close, so I usually discard most of those as viable either on ping time or bandwidth.
It’s extremely likely that only one provider services your residence with DSL, and one provider does cable. Two providers. All other options are basically a wholesale or resale of these two providers, meaning you still get service from one of those two.
If you’re extremely lucky, you’ll also have the option of fiber. And IMO, that is the only time you really get three options.
If you go with a third party ISP, the last mile is still one of the two that actually come into your residence.
So the only real options you have are: do you want to buy internet direct from the ISP that owns the line to your house, or do you want to buy internet from someone who will contact that company to give you internet? If you don’t like the DSL provider, and you don’t like the cable provider, you’re completely fucked. Gg everyone.
Depends on where you live. In the USA, I’ve got one cable (coax) option and three fiber options. My area has overhead power + utility cables rather than underground, so it was easy for ISPs to run extra fiber lines. In Australia, there’s one network (the NBN - National Broadband Network) that the ISPs resell.
I’m in Canada, fiber is fairly rare right now. Some big cities are getting it pushed into neighborhoods, and new condos generally only have fiber, but any home or residence that’s over 5 years old probably still has CATV/coax and an analog telephone hookup.
So with few exceptions, the majority of Canadians have the option of DSL, usually from Bell, which is still mostly dominating Canada for ownership of the PSTN wireline services (though some provinces are other companies, like Telus on the west coast, and SaskTel… In Saskatchewan). Even if you buy from another DSL ISP, the last mile is still Bell owned connections.
Cable is a bit more diversified from area to area from what I’ve seen, one of the bigger providers is Rogers. Different areas can be other providers, Cogeco is pretty prevalent in the Niagara region near me; but the story is unchanged. If you go with another ISP for cable service at your residence, the local cable provider is delivering the last mile connection.
In my area, there’s a regional fiber provider, we have overhead lines, and I contacted that provider about getting service, and my home is not serviced by them. Interestingly, the addressees across the damn street (where the utility poles are located) are serviced by the local fiber provider.
The local cable ISP, who I ended up getting service from, was able to quite easily run a cable over the road from the utility post to my residence without issue. Why the fiber provider can’t, is beyond me.
I’m lucky that there’s even active fiber on my street that I could tap into if the company would run it over the road. Many places I’ve lived have either cable or DSL as the only options.
I know many others are in a similar spot.
I mean yeah, Virgin has been pretty solid in that regard for the 20 years I’ve used them, and their service has been solid too.
I’d be wary of switching to another company that doesn’t have such a good proven track record, though due to prices I’m considering swapping to Brsk for a bit to see how they hold up, given that they have symmetric gigabit fibre to the house with static IP for a very nice low price.
