| mrstickball said: You forget why American internet is slower. Hint: it may have something to do with the physical size of the country, and the cost of adding lines to increase capacity. FYI, I am getting 20 megs/sec where I live for $45. I can't complain. I was getting 1.5mbps for $30. |
Well looks like you are getting a lot better deal now. When I called to cancel my AT&T ISP service they offered their 12 mbps for the same price but I was like that is still 8 mbps slower than what Time Warner is offering for the same price (plus I was getting pissed cause my speedtest was showing up as 3.5 mbps lately instead of the 5-6 I usually got, so basically I was paying for a service that they were only half providing). Usually, calling companies to cancel they will offer you better deals but they still aren't the best. I remember when I was first trying to get service through AT&T and since I was only getting DSL and nothing else they were going to charge me $150 for someone to come out here and hook up the modem. I called back later and said cancel that connect order I'll just go to Time Warner because I refuse to pay $150 dollars for something I can do myself. They then waived the fee and somehow waived the $50 modem fee also. Thus competition is key. For a consumer to be able to pick from a bunch of providers and then threaten to leave their business allows consumers to get better deals (or what they should be getting in the first place). I understand that these companies need to make money but some of these prices are outrageous compared to what other countries offer. Yes, I know USA is big and to run lines out to small towns / suburbs is expensive yet I live in a pretty major city (Austin, TX). I suppose you are going to say they charge everyone more because they want offer service to a city with a population of 20,000 along with a city with 500,000 .
