RE: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] anybody doing "tier buy through" withmediacom?

["Matthew Ross" <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

> > They could also charge $15 for premium cable and still make a
> > signifigant profit.
> 
> I severely doubt it...but my question now is:

When you actually see what the company has to pay, compared with the sum of what they charge their customers, it never makes sense. You don't need 300% profit to run a business. Wal-Mart has done well with only about 40% profit ratio.

> > When they were under the PSC's jurisdiction (as TCI which Mediacom
> > bought), their rates were a LOT less than they are now. They had a
> > contract with the city where they could be a legal 
> monopoly, so long as
> > they answered to the PSC. They have established themselves 
> so well that
> > nobody could really compete, and the contract has ended, so 
> they aren't
> > restricted by competition or government now.
> 
> That does not sound quite right.  The Act of 1996 that 
> re-de-regulated the
> cable industry drastically limited the kind of contracts that 
> cities could
> have with cable companies.  In Columbia, the ownership chain 
> was actually
> TCI -> ATT -> Mediacom, and where we missed our chance was in 
> okaying the
> last franchise transfer.  

ATT was the intermediate step, I had forgotten that, but still, the franchise keeps getting bought out, but the monopolistic abuse hasn't changed with the changing name.

> They could have (and SHOULD have) 
> put this out
> to bid again and specified they needed two providers.  That 
> might not have
> worked out (more than likely, it would have killed the ATT sale to
> Mediacom since we were the jewel of that deal), but it was a shot.

Don't Trinity and Fidelity provide cable up there? (Might be thinking the wrong part of the state)

> In San Diego, for a while the deal for non-premium channels was $2 per
> channel above basic, but we didn't get cable in those days since our
> reception was good enough for over the air.  (And that's one 
> reason why 
> they did have to offer the deal; reception was actually good 
> enough for 
> people in many places, so cable had to be value-added.)

That used to be the case here. I could get 6 (PBS), 8, 13 (CBS/KRCG), 17, and 25 (KNLJ/Larry Rice) with little or no static on a coathanger antenna. Now, with a fairly large antenna, I can get 13 usually, and an extremely fuzzy 8 and 25. I'm not sure what has happened since then, but I suspect it has to do with all the Cell towers in the area. Radio has also lost a lot of its quality.

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