Cable company logic: "Our predatory anti-consumer practices are really pro-consumer"

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• Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

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  • isthingoneventhis@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Seeing this episode when it came out vs in 2023 really hit different. It never dawned on me how finely honed their comedy was that season.

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    • freebee@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Which episode is that?

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• gregorum@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I’d like to think that this is also massive gambit by the FCC to get all these assholes on record so they can build some massive Rico case to take them all down.

  But I am high right now.

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  • Apeman42@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

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• underwire212@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Believe it or not, the same study actually said giving me a million dollars is also a good thing

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  • NotMelon@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I accidentally send you 2 million could you please send back 1 million

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    • wabafee@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      How many gift cards is that?

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• afunkysongaday@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  “See when I slap you in the face that’s actually a really nice thing of me to do. Because if I don’t slap you in the face I’d kick you in the groin really hard instead. Do you want to get kicked in the groin? No? That’s what I thought.”

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• rxmc@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Cable companies say they’ll will raise the price without early termination fees? Oh please. They’ll do that whether there’s early termination fees or not. They’re just threatening to bump it up on the schedule.

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• RegalPotoo@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  “we’ll have to raise prices if early termination fees are banned” has a real “look how you made me hurt you” abuser vibe.

  I’m imagining the logic is something like “predatory fees generate $xx million in revenue a year, so if we lose that revenue source we will have to put our other fees up to compensate, because as a multi-billion dollar company our shareholders will get all butthurt if our profit drops by a fraction of a percentage point next year”

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• Kolanaki@yiffit.net ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  “Early termination fees are good because without them, we will just do something worse.”

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  • wewbull@feddit.uk ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Which is better because then they are being upfront about the charges, and more people can tell them to fuck off.

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  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Something better, as the price would be overt and transparent rather than arbitrary and hidden.

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• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Me, the cable company: “If you don’t let us charge people an assortment of fines and fees after they’ve signed up for service, then we’ll increase our base rate before they sign up.”

  Consumers, looking at the high price of cable: “Fuck, I can’t afford this. Guess I won’t sign up.”

  Me, the cable company: “Regulations are destroying my business!!!”

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  • Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Right? Gosh forbid we stop them from tricking people into spending money they don’t have. That would be un-American.

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• Trashcan@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Early termination fees are not that horrible. They can give you a monthly cost where some of the costs for installing it might be distributed over they contact period. Fine and ok

  But i should still be able to cancel my contract without jumping through 11 loops and queues.

  If you sign up for a given contract, that’s what you have agreed upon. It sucks if you only have one option and they can set a ridiculous price. So if you want to regulate pricing, that’s a different matter. Cancelling is something else altogether.

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  • SupraMario@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    What costs to install equipment? Most homes are already wired for their services. The lines they roll out to new users are usually subsidized by taxes and running coax into a house is not that expensive.

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    • Riven@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Doesn’t stop them from charging.

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  • webghost0101@sopuli.xyz ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You mean the installation which was provided for free as a “limited special offer” for new members but is actually already accounted for in the price?

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  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    If you sign up for a given contract

    Listen, it says clear as day, that I get a pound of flesh closest to your heart. I don’t see what you’re complaining about, a contract is a contract.

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  • Maggoty@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    “installing”

    You mean when they send someone out to flip the switch and then come look at the TV screen to make sure the switch worked? You know my ISP doesn’t even send someone out anymore. They just do it remotely with me on the phone.

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• smegger@aussie.zone ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Only if they buy the argument that it’s too difficult to explain what the hidden charges are for so they shouldn’t have to.

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• apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Yes, Republicans.

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• cm0002@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  What are these Cable TV companies smoking? I want some!

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  • theodewere@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    high grade monopoly is a tough high to kick

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• Maggoty@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Oh look. The “We’ll hurt people a different way if you stop us from hurting them this way!” argument.

  I wonder who else has made that argument? Oh yeah the Mafia and Cartels.

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• r00ty@kbin.life ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Cable companies "We'll raise monthly prices if you ban termination fees"

  Lol, they're going to raise them anyway!

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  • bruhduh@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    CEO’s always think in quarters, they said “we’ll raise monthly prices if you ban termination fees (this quarter)”

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• _number8_@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  early termination fees for anything are complete made up bullshit

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• Alph4d0g@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Article link arstechnica.com/…/cable-tv-companies-tell-fcc-ear…

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  • Humanius@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You could add the link to the post description
    Currently it’s showing up at the bottom of the thread for me

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    • Alph4d0g@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Fair! I intended to have it in the original post but it didn’t take. Likely my error.

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• Got_Bent@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Getting yourself involved with a cable company is worse than borrowing money from your local waste management representative. Easy to get in, impossible to get out.

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• Zellith@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Yar har, fiddle de dee!

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• Paragone@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  those who are lobbied will buy whatever argument they are paid to buy.

  _ /\ _

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• uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  You know what’s also nice? Bribes to the regulating officials. Junkets. Free samples. Fancy dinners. Golf games. Promises of no-show jobs if their political career tanks.

  Some doctors gladly overprescribe opioids (or bad SSRIs like Seroquel) for a few free lunches from a pharma spokesperson hottie.

  People with political power are cheap.

  It’s why the rest of us have that lean and hungry look.

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  • nonfuinoncuro@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You know, I’ve never understood that conspiracy theory about doctors getting money from Big Pharma. I by no means endorse Skrelli bros but I’ve been a doctor for a decade and while I do take advantage of free lunches whenever I can get them, I just prescribe what I want to and I don’t get any money whenever I do so. Most of the time I just heckle the company throughout the lunch and don’t use their product. Seroquel helps a lot of people and while I don’t prescribe it, it’s basically the Kleenex or Scotch tape of antidepressants and nobody gets any special kick backs when they write it, they know their patients are just getting it from India over the internet anyway or CVS/DR/Walgreens/Rite Aid just swaps it for the generic anyway. inb4 studies showing slight biases towards companies you got a free pen from, I still don’t get any kickbacks. No matter what I do the fake blonde with fake nails and lashes shows up faithfully to get my office staff Panera or Chick-fil-A. It’s pennies to them and I usually skip cause I’m trying to avoid carbs.

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    • Maggoty@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I would hope someone with your education would understand the difference between data and an anecdote. For the record we aren’t even mad at most doctors. We’re mad at the Pharma industry for introducing such corruption to our medical system.

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    • uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      You’re not most doctors. Your a doctor. Also bribes and propaganda can affect you whether consciously or not. My own doctor of twenty years (now retired) only took pharma submissions through regular channels.

      Seroquel came to mind because I personally witnessed someone who suffered from dystonia as a side effect of Seroquel, months before the class action that the side effect was understated (or misrepresented) when it was being tested for FDA approval.

      That said, the lunches-for-overprescription pattern was discovered and highlighted during investigations into the opioid epidemic in the United States, in which, yes, a lot of lunches were bought by Purdue pharmacy representatives, and yes, a lot of correlating doctors over-presribed OxyContin, and whether or not it’s a matter of neglect, laziness or willful malice to exploit the inflated medical market and poor Americans, the opioid crisis continues to this day, with 109,600 Americans dying from opioid overdoses in 2023.

      I can cite plenty of other industries in which good press is bought and regulatory departments are captured with bribes, in pay or in kind. I’m personally familiar with the game industry and photography industry. But I can’t help but be bitter about the medical industry, having seen the effects of bad medicine on friends and family, when not experiencing it personally.

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• BudgieMania@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  a threat that doesn't pass even the slightest sniff test, any significant raise in prices would leave them open for a competitor to undercut them.

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  • Im_old@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    For what I understand, a lot of places in US have only a single provider available, so no competition. And when towns try to run their own broadband infrastructure they get sued by Internet companies.

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    • BudgieMania@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      broadband? Isn't this specifically about cable TV, not Internet communication?

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    • Num10ck@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      luckily theres also 5G wireless home internet and starlink, usually also telecom land options as well.

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  • afunkysongaday@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Yet another problem the free market will surely solve aaaaany minute now.

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  • BrianTheeBiscuiteer@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You mean the one other provider in the area? They raised prices too because it’s be easier to pump existing customers for more than entice people to switch.

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• kromem@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Not like there’s a parallel market in cell phone contracts before and after T-Mobile’s branding as an ‘uncarrier’ to showcase that this is complete bullshit or anything…

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• Twentytwodividedby7@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Yes, eliminating a revenue source in one area means they will just price for it elsewhere.

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• Katana314@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Whoops. There’s a problem with the title. I fixed it.

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