No no no no: Comcast to buy Time Warner Cable

Jarrod

Jarrod

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Sep 11, 2013
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/12/c
Comcast is set to buy Time Warner Cable in an all-stock deal, reports CNBC's David Faber.

Faber reported the news on Twitter, announcing that the deal would be made on Thursday morning. The reported share price will be about $159.

Citing sources, Faber disclosed more details of the coming deal.

Bloomberg News corroborated the report, noting that the deal would combine the largest two U.S. cable companies.

According to Bloomberg, Charter Communications and Comcast have been approaching a deal to sell Time Warner Cable assets to Comcast if Charter's shareholders approved.

CNN'S Brian Stelter noted on Twitter that "For Comcast, the crown jewel of [Time Warner Cable] is the New York City market. Soon [Comcast] will have its 30 Rock studios AND the cable pipes beneath."
 
No way the DOJ allows this to go through. AT&T tried the same deal with T-mobile and that got killed quickly.
 
wshowers said:
No way the DOJ allows this to go through. AT&T tried the same deal with T-mobile and that got killed quickly.
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It looks like if anyone steps in to stop it that it'll have to be the FCC and not the DOJ, it's a different type of situation than the AT&T/T-mobile deal.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57618829-93/comcast-said-to-be-buying-time-warner-cable-for-$44.2b/

While the Justice Department is usually responsible for antitrust reviews of large corporate mergers, this deal is likely to come under the scrutiny of the Federal Communications Commission, according to equities analyst Paul Gallant of Guggenheim Securities.
In a research note to investors last November, Gallant reasoned that since Comcast and Time Warner don't compete with one another directly in any single market, an antitrust argument to block the merger is less likely. However, Comcast is already the largest cable operator in the US, and its acquisition of the second-largest cable operator could affect the public interest and as such be something that would attract the interest of the FCC.

"Over the past 20 years, Republican and Democratic DOJs have basically stopped challenging vertical mergers because courts were increasingly unwilling to accept government claims that they violated the antitrust laws," Gallant wrote. "So the FCC will be even more central in a possible Comcast-TWC deal because its 'public interest' review is broader than pure antitrust analysis."
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Looks like service is about to get a lot worse for former Time Warner people. What is this, some deal to counter Google that is on the doorstep with it's teeth out?
 
Freezasaurus said:
Aren't they both horrible services, though?
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TWC internet is fantastic for me. It is smooth and stable. Their TV service is pretty bad, but most cable is.

I hear nothing but horror stories about Comcast.

This is really awful for TWC customers.
 
Well hopefully it doesn't effect service too much. Otherwise will have to find something else.
 
Kerosene31 said:
TWC internet is fantastic for me. It is smooth and stable. Their TV service is pretty bad, but most cable is.

I hear nothing but horror stories about Comcast.

This is really awful for TWC customers.
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It's the same story for me with Comcast. Their Internet is really good, their TV really sucky :(
 
Kerosene31 said:
TWC internet is fantastic for me. It is smooth and stable. Their TV service is pretty bad, but most cable is.

I hear nothing but horror stories about Comcast.

This is really awful for TWC customers.
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Their internet is dogs*** here, always spotty . as for cable wouldn't know, i haven't had it in more than 6 years.

The biggest problem i have had with TW is their stupid rules
$5 a month to use the wifi feature on their router
you can only use a set of approved routers
if you want to use wifi on a router off of their approved list $5!
on your internet isn't getting the speed we promised, let us charge you $10 more a month to get it there.

Bring on comcast, it cant get much worse.
 
morfeeis said:
Their internet is dogs*** here, always spotty . as for cable wouldn't know, i haven't had it in more than 6 years.

The biggest problem i have had with TW is their stupid rules
$5 a month to use the wifi feature on their router
you can only use a set of approved routers
if you want to use wifi on a router off of their approved list $5!
on your internet isn't getting the speed we promised, let us charge you $10 more a month to get it there.

Bring on comcast, it cant get much worse.
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Buy your own cable modem and router? They started to charge me $6/month to lease their cable modem. I just went to Amazon and bought the exact same one I had for $70. Just get your own router too.

I hear the "all-in-one" solutions are always terrible. Spend money and get a quality router (I have an Asus that cost $130 but it was worth every penny). You're connection should be a ton better.

If you need support, just unplug the router and wire directly into the modem. They don't even need to know you have a router (because step 1 in TWC phone support is to blame your router).

Hazard71 said:
I have never been capped on TW internet service. If Comcast has caps then I hope this crap isn't the truth.:(
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Same here. They've never capped that I know of (not that I'd ever hit a really high cap).

TWC isn't perfect, but they seem way better than Comcast.
 
O yeah i forgot about the charge you for a modem crap. I only have 10 months left in this home so i'll wait and see what options i have in my new area.
 
I think "service" wise all cable is "your mileage may vary." Depends on the wiring in your neighborhood really.

Comcast has no caps (at least for most people, apparently they still "test" them in small markets) and I've never really heard of people having bad internet experiences with them.

I've been on Comcast for a decade or so, at 5-6 different locations, and never had a major issue with my internet service other than a brief incompatibility with my cable modem (which was quickly upgraded, was partly my fault, I'd ignored phone calls.)

On Demand/Other actual "cable" stuff? Pretty much everyone I know has the same problems.. channels don't work sometimes, On Demand stuff free or PPV fails to work, or has horrible video distortion or skipping.. Comcast is quick to offer refunds or "free months" but I wish they'd just get their s*** in order.

Now if you have a REAL problem with your service?

Worst customer service on the planet. They'll lie to you to get you off the phone.. put you on hold and then hang up on you, etc.

But when things go smooth, I imagine Comcast isn't any better or worse than average.
 
My heart'll be full of joy the day I hear the news that Disney is buying DC. :eek:
 
BunzHoles said:
I think "service" wise all cable is "your mileage may vary." Depends on the wiring in your neighborhood really.
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Definitely. When TWC first took over from our local provider, it was a nightmare. I couldn't even play multiplayer games because the connection would cut out completely for a few moments all the time. No big deal if you're just surfing the web, but of course that usually means you get booted out of a game.

The only thing you can do is keep calling and keep complaining. It took me forever to get them out, but eventually one day magically everything started working.
 
Kerosene31 said:
Definitely. When TWC first took over from our local provider, it was a nightmare. I couldn't even play multiplayer games because the connection would cut out completely for a few moments all the time. No big deal if you're just surfing the web, but of course that usually means you get booted out of a game.

The only thing you can do is keep calling and keep complaining. It took me forever to get them out, but eventually one day magically everything started working.
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Good ole Adelphia.
 
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The first couple years I lived in Vegas (03-05) Cox had the WORST internet service. It was down no less than once a week, sometimes more than that. A friend had such a horrible time playing WOW (constant disconnects) that he had to b!tch at them for a month before they finally agreed to come out and replace all his cable. Turns out because of the hot ass sun and the fact that the cable leading to his home was nearly a decade old it ALL had to be replaced on the entire street.

I moved back to Michigan in July, since then I've had one short outage (last night in fact) that lasted about 20 minutes. Other than that my internet has been flawless. The TV is another story. It's not so much the service as that's been solid, but it's the boxes Comcast uses. The UI is less than intuitive and if you have HD service you get three listings for each channel. One for SD, one for HD and a second one for HD. It makes things rather confusing to say the least. On top of that both boxes in my home like to forget my series recordings for my DVR, they seem to do this when shows go on a break for 2-3 weeks.

My brother hates Comcast as well and from what I've experienced so far I don't understand why he hates them so much as my service has been pretty good.
 
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