New Scaratings

Just found out that the cable/internet provider Insight was bought out by Time Warner. After talking to co-workers, they informed me that Time Warner limited the download volume on the internet pipe. I did some research, and found a lot of postings around April 2008 that showed Time Warner was going to limit the amount of data you could download per month, and charge $1/gb of volume you go over your limit. However, all these posts were 3-4 years old.

I'm hoping someone out there is a current subscriber to Time Warner internet, and can verify if they do currently cap the amount of data you can download every month, or if it is like my current/soon-to-be-ex provider Insight, that had unlimited volume (just limited the speed). Also, what other options do you think would be available, short of going with Hughes satellite.

Thanks

(This is just an off-the-cuff comment that really doesn't address your question. It is slightly off topic, and I'm thinking it just might get me in trouble.)

These cable/internet providers are the new Robber Barons. (Cellphone communication providers are no better.) The different plans they offer you are often quite complicated, and leave you to guess which one to chose. The people, who advise you at their stores, are primarily sales people, not true advisers. They don't make their bucks on the hardware they sell you, they make it on invisible electrons that travel at the speed of light, and cost them pretty close to nothing. However, they measure those free electrons, and charge you more if you use more of them than the convoluted plan you signed up for allowed you. To charge you an extra dollar for every gigabyte that exceeds your plan's limit is a total rip-off.

If any of these companies cared the least bit about their customers, they would automatically switch you to a more economical plan any time your usage of their service put you into a category, where you would not be charged as much, than the one you guessed at when you signed up. They hope you guess wrong, where they can ding you for your mistake.

Why do I sound so pissed off about this...? Some years ago, when I was using a family plan that Cingular offered for cell phones, my son unknowingly did too much texting, and it cost me over $1,000. When I went in to talk to them about it, their advisers said, "Mr. MacLeod, we have a better plan for you to sign up for now." This is total bullshit. If I had treated my client's at Merrill Lynch this way, after I had been fired, I would have been standing in front of a SEC or NYSE hearing, to find out how much I was going to be fined, and perhaps how many years I was going to prison.

p.s. How many gigabytes of data can you fit into a thimble...? All of them...?

_________________
"The game is afoot."