Late Night Grub

Letter to Time Warner Cable regarding conflicting statements on costs

Preface: This is a copy of the letter I just sent to realideas@twcable.com requesting comment on the contradictory statements being made, telling consumers that costs are increasing, and telling shareholders that they are decreasing.

To whom it may concern:

Several reports have recently come to light that your SEC filings show
costs are decreasing and your profits and subscriber base are rising.

http://stopthecap.com/2009/04/10/why-is-time-warner-saying-costs-increasing-to-consumers-but-decreasing-to-stockholders/

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r22213854-

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/08/time-warner-cable-profits-on-broadband-are-great-and-will-grow-because-of-caps/#more-6067

http://blog.wired.com/business/2009/04/time-warner-cab.html

In the face of this evidence, which you yourself have provided, how can Mr.
Hobbs continue to put forth the argument that your costs are increasing? In
his most recent statement, Mr. Hobbs asserts:

“With the ever-increasing flood of content on the Internet, bandwidth
consumption is growing exponentially. That’s a good thing; however, there
are costs associated with this increased Internet usage. Here at Time
Warner Cable, consumption among our high-speed Internet subscribers is
increasing by about 40% a year. As a facilities based provider, we’ve
built a network that must be maintained and upgraded. We have increasing
variable costs and we have to continue to invest in the network itself.”

Mr. Hobbs strongly implies that your “increasing variable costs” amount to
40% a year, correlating with consumption. Let’s set aside the fact that you
have told your shareholders that costs are DECREASING; we’ll come back to
that later.

Not only do several independent sources cited in the above articles debunk
the idea that cost correlates with consumption in any meaningful way. Most
all costs are overhead, and extra transfer is minuscule in cost. This DOES
support your idea that heavier users should bear the brunt of
infrastructure and equipment to handle the load they require, but it also
indicates that modeling pricing based on amount consumed is not logical.
What is wrong with the existing model of charging based on the user’s
desired theoretical maximum throughput? It seems to be making you plenty of
money right now, and those profits are growing.

You’ll probably key on the fact that I said “right now” and reemphasize
that you predict that at the rate we’re going, we’ll have “brown outs” or
something in 2012. Well, any study done by real scientists
(http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/99302) rather than “corporate-funded
think tanks, the investment community, incumbent policy groups, lobbyists
and executives”
(http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Time-Warner-Cable-Offers-Weak-Concessions-101838)
exposes this to be nothing more than a myth, perpetrated by your industry,
to justify increasing our bills. The study linked by Jeff Simmermon on
Twitter following the first statement from Mr. Hobbs
(http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Time-Warner-Cable-Offers-Weak-Concessions-101838)
was shown to be funded by AT&T, and industry player who is also trying to
advance the cause of consumption-based billing.

So, in short, we don’t buy it.

I have a lot more issues with the proposed consumption-based billing (see
how I’m not calling it “caps”?), but I’d like to see if I can first get a
response to this simple question:

Why do you continue to put forth the idea that your costs are rising, when
your statements to your shareholders not only directly contradict that,
they show that your profits are rising, as is your subscriber base?

You don’t have to answer my question, and you can “decline comment” for
written news articles, but myself and many others are disseminating the
facts on this issue, and mark my words, you will get asked this on tape by
a reporter, and for your sake, I hope you come up with a good answer that
won’t add to the embarrassment your company is already suffering.

Regards,
Scott Cranfill
TWC Rochester Account # [redacted]

To: Time Warner Cable

Preface: Feel free to appropriate this letter to send to your local Time Warner Cable representatives (and don’t forget adudley@twcable.com, twc.cotp@twcable.com, and realideas@twcable.com). If you’re not in Rochester, make sure to change the location. It is also good if you put the points of this letter in your own words, but not strictly necessary. Always be polite and courteous when communicating with TWC employees. Remember that they are humans, and have not likely had any personal voice in making this decision. The important thing is to communicate to them that they will lose your business if this goes through.

To Whom It May Concern: (use a real name if you have it)

This letter is to politely inform you that, should your company’s intended bandwidth capping plan roll out with its currently announced pricing structure in Rochester, New York, I will cease all business with your company.

Furthermore, I believe this to be both anti-competitive to other content providers, such as Hulu, iTunes, Netflix, etc., and the overage charge is tantamount to price gouging, when your wholesale price of a gigabyte of bandwidth is known to be less than 10 cents. It is also readily apparent that Time Warner is only “testing” such a plan in cities that do not have significant competition in the broadband ISP sector. Rochester and those other cities are being unfairly singled out because Time Warner knows their customers have nowhere to turn for comparable service. I have stated this opinion the New York State Attorney General, will encourage others to do so, and will look for other official entities that may have the power to shut this down, such as the FCC.

I would like to note, however, that I am not opposed to the simple principle of metered pricing. There is nothing inherently wrong with that, and it is in some ways much fairer than a flat-rate pricing method. However, the proposed cap tiers, and the amount being charged for overage, are just unacceptable.

I have already been encouraged by one Time Warner Cable employee to “consider staying to see if the new plans even impact you,” but, to be frank, it does not matter whether or not they would impact me. Per my second paragraph, I find the business practice as it’s laid out to be unethical and possibly illegal (specifically with regard to the pricing, not the methodology). I will cease business with Time Warner on principle.

Regards,
Scott Cranfill

Distasteful

While I was at AT&T yesterday picking up my new phone (full slate of impressions on that coming at a later date), I picked up a little scannable card that would donate $10, matched by AT&T, to give phonecards to deployed military personnel for the holidays. I thought it seemed like a good idea, so I added it to my order.

After scanning it, the AT&T associate tore off a perforated portion of the card which I hadn’t previously noticed. It had a small hole in it, and on one side, it read, “I’m helping to keep our troops connected to home this holiday season.” On the other side, it read, “Display this tag proudly on a key ring, luggage tag, or anywhere else you want to show your pride!”

Really, AT&T? You feel the need to give people a little paper keychain that flaunts the fact that they supported the troops with, let’s face it, a pretty insignificant amount of money (for most people in there buying a cell phone) in order to entice them into doing good deeds?

I’m not sure which is more depressing: that AT&T felt they had to do that to get people to contribute, or that some people probably countributed just so they could immediately hook the flimsy little card on their keychain and show it with pride.

First iTunes Genius Attempt

I seeded with “Horsehead” by the Black Crowes. I’d say, overall, Genius did very well. It pulled some very complementary songs, such as “The Wanton Song” by Led Zeppelin, “Grind” by Alice in Chains, “Burden in my Hand” by Soundgarden, “Nobody” by Robert Randolph, and “Mr. High & Mighty” by Gov’t Mule.

Unfortunately, there were some complete oddball selections, such as “Head Like a Hole” by Nine Inch Nails, “Take a Look Around” by Limp Bizkit, and, my personal favorite, “I’m Not Crying” by Flight of the Conchords. (Yes, I’m admitting to having a song by Limp Bizkit in my iTunes library.) Besides that, there were another 3 Black Crowes selections, one from the same disc. Led Zeppeling had 3 total selections, as well. While this may not be a complete violation of the purpose of Genius (to create a cohesive, coherent playlist from a seed song), I’d prefer to disallow it from selecting more than one song from the same artist.

The New Laptop Report

To mark the two-month anniversary of the day I took delivery of my new Dell XPS M1330, I offer my observations—my “review,” if you will—after a nice break-in period.

The short answer: I love it! The form factor is everything I hoped it would be, it feels zippy, handles Aero with aplomb, and the LED-backlit screen is incredible.

The size of the M1330 is perfect for my current lifestyle. It’s very lightweight, yet sturdy (picking it up by a corner instills no fear whatsoever), and it fits much more comfortably on my bedside table and on my over-the-sink shelf, where it keeps me entertained while I wash dishes. As I mentioned, I don’t need a lot of resolution for heavy-duty designing, anymore, so the 13.3” screen doesn’t bother me a bit.

It came with virtually no crapware, though I had to exorcise the Dell Support Center software less than a week after I received it. This was due to a nasty bug rather than it being entirely worthless software, though.

My biggest complaint thus far is that I can’t adjust the brightness with one hand, due to the placement of the adjustment keys extremely far from the Function key. Even my ape-like hands cannot reach.

But other than that, I’m very happy with it. Dell may have a new convert in me.

Picture Conan O'Brien delivering this:

Ted Stevens’s future cellmate is looking forward to exploring Ted’s Series of Tubes. No, he’s not looking forward to discussing Ted’s idea of how the Internet works, he wants to explore Ted’s tubes.

[Optional tag during laughter/applause:] Anal tube… oral tube… nose tube… whatever.

There are New York State custom plates for Acupuncturists and Hypnotherapists. What, nothing for Astrologists?

A Laptop Limerick

My laptop is not acting well
So I decided to purchase a Dell
I know that I’ve said
I’d never get in that bed
Must be having a blizzard in hell

Alright, so a lot of you know that in the past I’ve sworn that I would never buy a Dell, believing them to be overpriced, poorly-engineered hunks of junk. Well, I’m reversing course on that opinion.

I believe that Dell has turned a corner and is on the road to being a respectable and maybe even well-liked technology company. The first evidence I saw of that was the launch of IdeaStorm, a site at which users submit ideas to Dell and vote on ideas they like the best. A site like this is only as successful as the ideas the company decides to implement, and Dell has done an outstanding hop of this. Some ideas that Dell has accepted and implemented include environmental initiatives (carbon offsets), allowing users to opt out of almost all preinstalled software, offering more systems with Linux installed as the primary operating system, producing a Tablet PC, and improving the aesthetics of their products, just to name a few. This really impressed upon me the value of listening to your customers and taking care of their needs and desires.

Aside from mere good intentions—and we know the place to which those pave the road—I began to see Dell products gain more and more traction in the tech community. The XPS M1330 laptop, first released in mid-2007, has been extremely well-received, and it’s probably not a stretch to call it the most popular laptop Dell has ever released among the tech community.

I previously believed that any laptop screen under 15” was not worth my time. After schlepping my current laptop around for 3 years and 9 months, I decided that I would like something a bit more agile, and I began considering exactly why I was so insistent on having a screen that size. I realized that a lot of it came from wanting to have enough resolution to have an adequate work area for my design work. This is still a concern, but not nearly as much as it was when I was still in school and carting my laptop to class, or when I was using my laptop for work last year. So I came to the decision that a 13.3” screen would serve me adequately, while allowing for the overall size and weight of the laptop to be dramatically reduced.

The M1330 is just 1.33” at its thickest point (no comments from the Airhead gallery, please; there is pleasantly thin and then there is obsession) and weighs in right at 4 lbs. This will make it much more pleasant to carry around the house and yard and to take with me on the road. Dell also does not make some of the major feature sacrifices that some other subnotebook (ultramobile? thin-and-light? I can’t remember the preferred nomenclature) manufacturers must make. The M1330 includes a slot-loading optical drive, 2 USB ports, 1 firewire port, ethernet, VGA and HDMI outputs, an ExpressCard slot, and an 8-in-1 card reader.

I also configured my M1330 with an LED-backlit screen, the Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 processor (2.4GHz, 800MHz FSB, 3MB L2 cache), 802.11n Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth. Getting the LED-backlit screen was very important for me, as its increased brightness will reproduce colors more faithfully, and its energy efficiency will increase battery life.

Additionally, I went with the (PRODUCT) RED model of this laptop. Fifty dollars of my purchase will go directly to the global fund to fight AIDS in Africa, and no, the $50 was not added to the price of the laptop. Beside the fact that it’s just a good thing to do, the special model features a stunning red lid.

The last, very important reason for choosing Dell was that all of this was available at a very attractive price point. Dell has come a long way from their past egregious pricing models.

So there you have it. I never thought the day would come, but now I anxiously await the arrival of a shiny new Dell!

I anticipate a lot of people wanting to comment on this post. Regrettably, Tumblr doesn’t allow comments. Feel free to get in contact with me any way you know how. I might post a follow-up with some of the feedback I receive.