6 ms·

If I'm reading this correctly, Comcast will charge someone if that have 2 boxes that can watch TV from their account, no matter what kind of boxes they are. Ro

If I'm reading this correctly, Comcast will charge someone if that have 2 boxes that can watch TV from their account, no matter what kind of boxes they are. Roku just happens to now have an app that can act as a cable box. Seems pretty normal to me.

tw04 10y ago
Except the whole idea was that they weren't supposed to be charging people bringing their own box. BYOD was one of many things the cable companies agreed to over the years, that was the whole point. You shouldn't be forced to rent a box from the company just to receive service. That was one of many reasons AT&T got smacked down so hard.
- skywhopper 10y ago
  But now it's pretty unlikely Trump's FCC will call them out on it.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - chimeracoder 10y ago
    > But now it's pretty unlikely Trump's FCC will call them out on it. Maybe at the federal level, but nothing is stopping the states from intervening. When Comcast and Time Warner Cable were planning on merging, New York State hinted that they would consider blocking the merger (within New York) if it went through. Ultimately the deal fell apart before the FCC had a chance to announce their decision, let alone NYS, but it's definitely possible for that to happen here.
  - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
    This is not a Trump issue. This is a symptom of lobbying at the federal level, regardless of party. Obama and Wheeler had proposed a universal cablebox rule, but later decided having a device with an "app" was instead acceptable. The FCC had tried to mandate a universal receiver box in the 1970s.
    - mmanfrin 10y ago
      Obama and Wheeler were trying to enact positive change given the political capital they had; Trumps new appointee is explicitly against that progress. It is a Trump issue.
      - Arizhel 10y ago
        I think it's safe to assume that a greater percentage of Trump voters are cable TV subscribers than non-Trump voters. So I don't see the problem; the Trump supporters are getting what they voted for.
        gm-conspiracy 10y ago
        Are you speaking of voters or the electoral college?
        Arizhel 10y ago
        Voters. Trump was elected (indirectly) by the voters. Nearly half the electorate voted for him. The EC only meant that he didn't need a popular majority nationwide, just majorities in particular states where the EC gives voters more power due to lower populations. As much as many people would have liked it, the EC did not go against the wishes of the voters in their states.
      - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
        If they were really trying to enact change, they would not have capitulated on the universal cable box. Are you telling me an app on a Roku is the equivalent? If we can buy our own DOCSIS modems, why can't we buy our own cablebox? http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-vote-2016-2 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-vote-2016-2 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-new-proposal-apps-2016-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-new-proposal-ap...
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- slg 10y ago
  I think they would argue they are in compliance and actually give you credit for bringing your own box. They are instead charging for an extra endpoint that you can use to watch TV. That would traditionally be an extra $9.99 for an extra box, but will be $7.49 if you are using a Roku.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- Arizhel 10y ago
  If you don't like the way the company treats you as a (potential) customer, then don't subscribe to their service. This isn't like AT&T. For one thing, cable television is a luxury service, not a necessity for modern life like telecommunications (telephones back in AT&T/Ma Bell's days, cellular + internet these days). Secondly, the regulatory environment back then was rather different. These days, the government doesn't really believe in strong regulation, and we've elected a new administration and Congress who greatly oppose regulation, even more than the previous ones. So again, if you don't like it, you don't have to buy it. And if you're mad that the government isn't reining in a monopoly, you can blame your fellow voters for that.
mtgx 10y ago
It only "makes sense" from the perspective that users are not allowed to have zero set top boxes from the provider themselves. And that's because the cable companies fought FCC's proposal to allow any set top box to act as the main set top box. My point is, the same people who now use Roku likely don't want the Comcast box. They want to use Roku as the one and only box, but Comcast charges them "for having two", even though they leave these customers no choice but to use two since the first one is mandatory.
jobu 10y ago
> Seems pretty normal to me. It may be normal for a cable company to nickle and dime their subscribers, but it's still frustrating. The "Comcast TV" app for iOS and Android is basically the same thing as the Roku app and doesn't cost extra.
- johnward 10y ago
  The comcast app blocks streaming to devices like chromecast. This makes me almost mad enough to just cut the cord.
  - mikey_p 10y ago
    The worst offender I've found so far is that Comcast blocks HBO GO on Tivo. I can use HBO GO on one of the smart TVs, and if you have another cable provider you can use HBO GO on the Tivo, but for some reason, Comcast won't authorize HBO GO on Tivo. I'm pretty sure this is because Tivo actually supports Comcast on-demand which includes the full catalog of HBO GO, but it's frustrating because the on-demand app is very basic, and uses one of the tuners on the main system. Because it has to re-encode one of the live tuners, it tends to be a little bit more buggy on the Tivo mini boxes that we have spread around the house. Overall, if it wasn't for Comcast on-demand being supported on Tivo, we'd just switch to FiOS and keep the Tivo system, which works marvelously. As it is on-demand is just too convenient for catching up on recent episodes of a show if you forget to Tivo it.
    - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
      I really don't understand how people are okay with tolerating this. I would overdose on blood pressure meds.
      - trav4225 10y ago
        Or, just don't consume their product. ;-)
    - vvanders 10y ago
fred256 10y ago
Why does it matter to Comcast whether I watch on one, two, or fifteen TVs in my house? It doesn't cost them any more money (aside from the initial in-house cabling and splitters)
- chimeracoder 10y ago
  > Why does it matter to Comcast whether I watch on one, two, or fifteen TVs in my house? It doesn't cost them any more money (aside from the initial in-house cabling and splitters) Because it's something that you value, and they have the ability to charge for it. So they do. It has nothing to do with their own cost function. In an uncompetitive market (which largely describes the residential cable market, at least to a first-order approximation), there is no pressure for the price to converge to the average cost[0] of delivering the service. [0] economic cost - ie, including opportunity costs
  - jandrese 10y ago
    TL;DR: Because they can.

tw04 10y ago

Except the whole idea was that they weren't supposed to be charging people bringing their own box. BYOD was one of many things the cable companies agreed to over the years, that was the whole point. You shouldn't be forced to rent a box from the company just to receive service. That was one of many reasons AT&T got smacked down so hard.

skywhopper 10y ago
But now it's pretty unlikely Trump's FCC will call them out on it.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- chimeracoder 10y ago
  > But now it's pretty unlikely Trump's FCC will call them out on it. Maybe at the federal level, but nothing is stopping the states from intervening. When Comcast and Time Warner Cable were planning on merging, New York State hinted that they would consider blocking the merger (within New York) if it went through. Ultimately the deal fell apart before the FCC had a chance to announce their decision, let alone NYS, but it's definitely possible for that to happen here.
- gm-conspiracy 10y ago
  This is not a Trump issue. This is a symptom of lobbying at the federal level, regardless of party. Obama and Wheeler had proposed a universal cablebox rule, but later decided having a device with an "app" was instead acceptable. The FCC had tried to mandate a universal receiver box in the 1970s.
  - mmanfrin 10y ago
    Obama and Wheeler were trying to enact positive change given the political capital they had; Trumps new appointee is explicitly against that progress. It is a Trump issue.
    - Arizhel 10y ago
      I think it's safe to assume that a greater percentage of Trump voters are cable TV subscribers than non-Trump voters. So I don't see the problem; the Trump supporters are getting what they voted for.
      - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
        Are you speaking of voters or the electoral college?
        Arizhel 10y ago
        Voters. Trump was elected (indirectly) by the voters. Nearly half the electorate voted for him. The EC only meant that he didn't need a popular majority nationwide, just majorities in particular states where the EC gives voters more power due to lower populations. As much as many people would have liked it, the EC did not go against the wishes of the voters in their states.
    - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
      If they were really trying to enact change, they would not have capitulated on the universal cable box. Are you telling me an app on a Roku is the equivalent? If we can buy our own DOCSIS modems, why can't we buy our own cablebox? http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-vote-2016-2 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-vote-2016-2 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-new-proposal-apps-2016-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/fcc-cable-box-new-proposal-ap...
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
slg 10y ago
I think they would argue they are in compliance and actually give you credit for bringing your own box. They are instead charging for an extra endpoint that you can use to watch TV. That would traditionally be an extra $9.99 for an extra box, but will be $7.49 if you are using a Roku.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
Arizhel 10y ago
If you don't like the way the company treats you as a (potential) customer, then don't subscribe to their service. This isn't like AT&T. For one thing, cable television is a luxury service, not a necessity for modern life like telecommunications (telephones back in AT&T/Ma Bell's days, cellular + internet these days). Secondly, the regulatory environment back then was rather different. These days, the government doesn't really believe in strong regulation, and we've elected a new administration and Congress who greatly oppose regulation, even more than the previous ones. So again, if you don't like it, you don't have to buy it. And if you're mad that the government isn't reining in a monopoly, you can blame your fellow voters for that.

mtgx 10y ago

It only "makes sense" from the perspective that users are not allowed to have zero set top boxes from the provider themselves. And that's because the cable companies fought FCC's proposal to allow any set top box to act as the main set top box. My point is, the same people who now use Roku likely don't want the Comcast box. They want to use Roku as the one and only box, but Comcast charges them "for having two", even though they leave these customers no choice but to use two since the first one is mandatory.

jobu 10y ago

> Seems pretty normal to me. It may be normal for a cable company to nickle and dime their subscribers, but it's still frustrating. The "Comcast TV" app for iOS and Android is basically the same thing as the Roku app and doesn't cost extra.

johnward 10y ago
The comcast app blocks streaming to devices like chromecast. This makes me almost mad enough to just cut the cord.
- mikey_p 10y ago
  The worst offender I've found so far is that Comcast blocks HBO GO on Tivo. I can use HBO GO on one of the smart TVs, and if you have another cable provider you can use HBO GO on the Tivo, but for some reason, Comcast won't authorize HBO GO on Tivo. I'm pretty sure this is because Tivo actually supports Comcast on-demand which includes the full catalog of HBO GO, but it's frustrating because the on-demand app is very basic, and uses one of the tuners on the main system. Because it has to re-encode one of the live tuners, it tends to be a little bit more buggy on the Tivo mini boxes that we have spread around the house. Overall, if it wasn't for Comcast on-demand being supported on Tivo, we'd just switch to FiOS and keep the Tivo system, which works marvelously. As it is on-demand is just too convenient for catching up on recent episodes of a show if you forget to Tivo it.
  - gm-conspiracy 10y ago
    I really don't understand how people are okay with tolerating this. I would overdose on blood pressure meds.
    - trav4225 10y ago
      Or, just don't consume their product. ;-)
  - vvanders 10y ago

fred256 10y ago

Why does it matter to Comcast whether I watch on one, two, or fifteen TVs in my house? It doesn't cost them any more money (aside from the initial in-house cabling and splitters)

chimeracoder 10y ago
> Why does it matter to Comcast whether I watch on one, two, or fifteen TVs in my house? It doesn't cost them any more money (aside from the initial in-house cabling and splitters) Because it's something that you value, and they have the ability to charge for it. So they do. It has nothing to do with their own cost function. In an uncompetitive market (which largely describes the residential cable market, at least to a first-order approximation), there is no pressure for the price to converge to the average cost[0] of delivering the service. [0] economic cost - ie, including opportunity costs
- jandrese 10y ago
  TL;DR: Because they can.