Man Pays Best Buy For Washer/Dryer, It Doesn't Appear, Takes Laundry To Store, Shames Store Into Delivering

Man Pays Best Buy For Washer/Dryer, It Doesn't Appear, Takes Laundry To Store, Shames Store Into Delivering: "

After Best Buy blew two delivery dates on the washer/dryer he paid $1,600 for at Best Buy on Black Friday to arrive, a man decided to take his dirty laundry to the store. He had unhooked his washer/dryer at home in anticipation of the new appliances and wanted to know which washer of theirs they wanted him to wash his clothes in while he waited for his. His buddies videotaped the adventure. This plan didn't go ever so hot with Best Buy management. Let's roll the clip:

The manager appears at about the 3:20 mark. She calls the cops, accuses them of being drunk, and kicks them out. She doesn't even seem to be interested in finding out why they're there. The man had paid $1600 for his washer/dryer and Best Buy was more concerned that he was bothering their associates by asking for them to fulfill their legal obligation to deliver the goods. They certainly had no problem, however, with advertising these washer and dryers for Black Friday, selling more of them then they had in stock, and promising a delivery date they couldn't live up to.

His video getting popular on Reddit seemed to help, though, as yesterday he uploaded this clip, of his new washer and dryer getting delivered, with free delivery:

'Best Buy really came through and made up on this one. I appreciate this customer support I received after a bit of turmoil,' he says.

So, in the end, maybe he was a bit of a dick, but it's what got the job done.

(Thanks to Josh!)

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Is the 'Bandwidth Hog' a Myth? [Net Neutrality]

Is the 'Bandwidth Hog' a Myth? [Net Neutrality]: "
Every ISP's discussions of pricing plans, net neutrality or piracy invoke the same faceless villains: the bandwidth hogs. Benoît Felten, analyst and blogger, has been working in telecom for over a decade, and he wants proof these monsters even exist.
With the debate on net neutrality in full swing in the US, we've been hearing about Bandwidth Hogs again. 'Bandwidth Hog' is a sound bite that conveys a strong emotion: you can virtually see the fat pig chomping on the bandwidth, pushing back all the other animals in the barnyard with his fat pig shoulders all the while scrutinizing with his shiny piggy eyes to see if the farmer isn't around...
The image is so powerful that everyone thinks they understand what the term means , no one questions if the analogy is correct. In discussing this issue, Herman and I realised we had serious doubts about the existence of that potentially mythical beast. In fact, we are not sure even the telcos know what a bandwidth hog is and does.
But it makes great headlines: 'Net Neutrality will force the telco's to give The Internet away to Bandwidth Hogs'. They claim that bandwidth hogs steal all the bandwidth and cause network congestion, and therefore their behaviour harms all the other regular and peaceful law-abiding users. And to add insult to injury they pay the same price as the others! No, policing and rationing must be applied by the benevolent telco to protect the innocent.
Unfortunately, to the best of our knowledge, the way that telcos identify the Bandwidth Hogs is not by monitoring if they cause unfair traffic congestion for other users. No, they just measure the total data downloaded per user, list the top 5% and call them hogs.
For those service providers with data caps, these are usually set around 50 Gbyte and go up to 150 Gbyte a month. This is therefore a good indication of the level of bandwidth at which you start being considered a 'hog'. But wait: 50 Gbyte a month is… 150 kbps average (0,15 Mbps), 150 Gbyte a month is 450 kbps on average. If you have a 10 Mbps link, that's only 1,5 % or 4,5 % of its maximum advertised speed!
And that would be 'hogging'?
The fact is that what most telcos call hogs are simply people who overall and on average download more than others. Blaming them for network congestion is actually an admission that telcos are uncomfortable with the 'all you can eat' broadband schemes that they themselves introduced on the market to get people to subscribe. In other words, the marketing push to get people to subscribe to broadband worked, but now the telcos see a missed opportunity at price discrimination...
As Herman explains in his post, TCP/IP is by definition an egalitarian protocol. Implemented well, it should result in an equal distribution of available bandwidth in the operator's network between end-users; so the concept of a bandwidth hog is by definition an impossibility. An end-user can download all his access line will sustain when the network is comparatively empty, but as soon as it fills up from other users' traffic, his own download (or upload) rate will diminish until it's no bigger than what anyone else gets.
Now I'm pretty sure that many telcos will disagree with our assessment of this. So here's a challenge for them: in the next few days, I will specify on this blog a standard dataset that would enable me to do an in-depth data analysis into network usage by individual users. Any telco willing to actually understand what's happening there and to answer the question on the existence of hogs once and for all can extract that data and send it over to me, I will analyse it for free, on my spare time. All I ask is that they let me publish the results of said research (even though their names need not be mentioned if they don't wish it to be). Of course, if I find myself to be wrong and if indeed I manage to identify users that systematically degrade the experience for other users, I will say so publicly. If, as I suspect, there are no such users, I will also say so publicly. The data will back either of these assertions.
Please email me if you're interested. And please publicise this offer if you're not in a position to extract such a dataset but are still interested in the answer. This is a much more important question than knowing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin!

Reprinted with permission from Fiberevolution; written in collaboration with Dadamotive. Megahog source image from the AP via TheAge

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Senator Introduces Bill to Smack Down Early Termination Fees [Politics]

Senator Introduces Bill to Smack Down Early Termination Fees [Politics]: "
Amy Klobuchar, True America Hero and Senator of Minnesota, introduced a bill in Congress today in response to Verizon's doubled early termination fees, aiming to limit them.
Verizon's response:

A broad array of Americans who might not otherwise be able to afford broadband connections to the Internet with a home PC, or by paying full price for a smartphone, have an affordable way of participating in the online world when they choose a subsidized option.

Also noted is the fact that smartphones are available at full, unsubsidized price, although it's not mentioned that the monthly fee doesn't change with an unsubsidized phone and that said unsubsidized phones are incredibly expensive. Hey Verizon, haven't you heard that this is a recession? Have some consideration. [The Hill]

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Why A Comcast/NBC Merger Is Bad News

Why A Comcast/NBC Merger Is Bad News: "
As the Comcast/NBC mergepocalypse draws near, we wanted to remind readers of the ways that this is going to harm consumers (beyond the obvious things like 30 Rock being promised to come on between 6 and 10 pm and actually airing at 11:30). Join us for a sad look into the future.


Let's Just Look At What Comcast/NBC Would Own

TV Stations: NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, Chiller, CNBC World, mun2, Oxygen, Sleuth, Syfy, Universal HD, USA Network, The Weather Channel, E! Entertainment Channel, G4, Golf Channel, PBS Kids Sprout, Style, TV one, Versus, CN8, Exercise TV, FEARnet, AZN Television, a portion of MLB Network,


NBC owned and operated stations in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Bay Area, Dallas/Fort Worth, Washington, Miami, San Diego, Connecticut.


Telemundo owned and operated stations in Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Houston, Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, San Antonio, Las Vegas, San Francisco/San Jose, Phoenix, Fresno, Denver, Boston, Tucson, Puerto Rico.


Film: Universal Pictures, Focus Pictures, Universal Studios Home Entertainment

Internet: Hulu (more on that below), iVillage, NBC.com, CNBC.com, Weather.com


That's a lot of channels, and they're ones that Comcast/NBC will be able to use as bargaining chips against other cable and internet providers who want to carry them. Comcast/NBC will have the incentive and means to discriminate against other channels that compete with NBC content, in favor of the NBC alternative.


For example, a recent story about the merger suggests that Comcast/NBC would challenge ESPN for sports content. Comcast's own sports channel, Versus, would benefit from NBC's pool of talent and production resources, but Comcast/NBC could prop Versus up in more ways. The most obvious thing Comcast could do to hurt ESPN, though unlikely, is refuse to carry the channel, thus depriving ESPN of all of Comcast's cable subscribers. Another scenario is that whatever sports content that Comcast/NBC acquired and offered, like the Olympics, could be entirely exclusive to Comcast/NBC. That is, ESPN wouldn't be able to run footage from Comcast/NBC events on SportsCenter. As a content and service provider, Comcast/NBC could even firewall its content, allowing only Comcast cable subscribers to see certain games or events. If Comcast/NBC decides not to block content entirely, they can still ransom it to other cable providers, charging higher prices for NBC content than NBC currently does. These expenses would of course be passed onto the subscribers.


More Mergers Will Happen, and Cable Rates Will Rise

If the Comcast/NBC merger goes through, it will lead to more media consolidation. Other service and content providers will merge in order to keep pace with Comcast/NBC, further limiting competition and increasing the possibility of collusion and price fixing, including rate increases. This was repeatedly seen in the late 1990s: after media ownership rules were relaxed, companies scrambled to buy up as many stations as they could to remain in equilibrium with each other (as a refresher, here's a sickening breakdown of who owns what).


Say Goodbye to Free Streaming Video

Although Hulu has already announced that it will begin charging for content, Comcast's acquisition of NBC, which, along with ABC and Fox, owns a substantial share of Hulu, would further harm the developing streaming video market. A merged Comcast/NBC would control both content—NBC programming—and distribution, and would have strong incentive to move its content behind its own pay wall. One hypothetical scenario would see Comcast/NBC pulling NBC content from Hulu, and making streaming NBC content available only to cable subscribers. Even worse, Comcast/NBC could further restrict streaming content to customers who subscribe to cable and internet, forcing customers who enjoy watching streamed content to sign up for unnecessary bundles. And by withholding content from any other streaming video service, whether free or subscription based, Comcast/NBC would harm their chances at viability.


Blocked content, rising rates, forced bundling, and more. Despite claims from NBC and Comcast that this merger would be 'pro consumer,' the end result will be more restrictions on what content consumers can access and how they can view it. And it will inevitably be more expensive. Consumer and media rights groups are urging the FCC and/or Department of Justice to either block the merger outright or impose very strict conditions to prevent the problems listed above. To read more about the proposed rules, visit FreePress's release on the merger.
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AMC Theater Chain Bans All Outside Snacks

AMC Theater Chain Bans All Outside Snacks: "

After reporting a loss in the 2nd quarter of this year, AMC is doing what it can to increase revenue. Since the business model of movie theaters is to give all the ticket sales to the studios and scrape out a living on concessions, that means forcing more patrons to buy snacks--so it's officially banning any outside food and drink.

Aside from the most common reason for bringing in food, which is that movie concessions are too expensive, there's also the problem of limited and unhealthy options. To address this, AMC told SmartSpending that "it’s going to offer greater variety. Some of its theaters have French toast and Thai coconut chicken tenders on the menu."

'AMC theaters ban outside snacks' [SmartSpending] (Thanks to HogwartsAlum!)

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