Dish Talk @ my Job

[pez2002]

so these last few weeks people have benn bad mouthing the Dish here are some of the things people have said



Digital cable is better then the Dish it sucks The picture goes out when it Rains :lol:

Dont get the dish it stinks


You have to pay extra for your local channels


So i told them i had directv they all just laughed @ me And told me to get Cable Becuease the Picture was better :nono:


When will people Learn :eek2:


So have any of your co-workers Bad mouthed the Dish

[Cyclone]

They usually don't know that much about DBS, so they are eagar to hear about it from someone who has it.

[marko]

I know a dude at work that hates Time Warner Cable. He has been waiting years for dsl to be run to where he is at, which will probably never happen (even though he is close). I always tell him to go with Road Runner for high speed access(which is pretty good around where I am), but he will just swear by how much he hates time warner cable.

But of course, what tv service does he have, TWC. I keep telling him if he hates them so much, he should switch to dish network (or directv), but he never will. Not really sure why.

Another guy at work actually seemed like he might make the switch, but I think he was wired for too many tv's in his house to make it practical with his current wiring situation.

[TNGTony]

Well...considering I work for a community TV station that relies on cable subscribers for its existance....I don't bring it up much. :)

See ya
Tony

[Wayne]

My problem is getting people to understand how a DVR works. Most people tell me that they don't watch TV very much and don't need it. I can't seem to convince them that DVR allows you to view your favorite shows when you want to and by skipping the commercials you can save time by viewing an hour drama in 45 minutes or less.

I point out the fact you can pause a program when the TV rings or you can go back and review the weather forcast you just missed while you were folding the laundry.

I'm sure when DVRs become more popular that many people will wonder why they took so long to get one.

[Jacob S]

Satellite is something different and would be new to some people so that would bring about interest in itself. People like to have something different every once in a while. Its like getting a new car even if you have a real nice one already.

[Mike Richardson]

Tell him to get Earthlink Cable internet. It's a little cheaper than Roadrunner in most markets, and in most markets it's a little faster. In some markets, the price is the same, and the speed is the same, but in ALL markets, Earthlink is $3 to $10 cheaper than RoadRunner for people who don't have Cable TV.

[pjmrt]

Cable has come a long way in to retaking ground gained by Dish and DirectTV. Unfortunately, they just "don't get it" any better than Dish. I had time warner + roadrunner - great picture quality, no DVR (although they just rolled out DVR capability for $6/mo), and NO RAIN FADE. They lost me as a customer to Dish when they raised their rates by ~15%. Duh.... with the price increase, they were more expensive than Dish - not a lot mind you, but I was PO'd about the sudden increase. Since I switched, you should see how many TW calls I've gotten with "special" deals to get me back. If they hadn't tried to stick it to us existing customers, I'd probably still be a cable subscriber. The sad thing is Dish seems to be trying to stick it to their existing customers w/ the PVR fee, ... etc (see the Dish discussion). So no one seems to learn from history.

[catman]

I have DSL . Mine is with SBC . Cable does not have as good as softwhare what you will find with DSL . IF , you have cable you don't have as good firewall protection . This means , you are more , apt . to receive a virus .

[Robert F. O'Connor]

catman, I'm sorry, but that is about as uninformed an opinion as I've heard. The software you can run has nothing to do with your internet connection. If you are talking about a firewall built into your DSL router, then great, but I haven't heard of ISPs giving away that kind of hardware. If you are talking about the Yahoo software they try to convince you that you must run to use their DSL service (wrong!) and that has a firewall built in, well good for you, but there are equal or probably better free software options available for firewalls and lots of cheap hardware options.

On top of that, it is much more important to keep your virus software and OS patches up-to-date as well as practicing "safe" computing: e.g., don't open e-mail attachments unless you know exactly what they are and why they were sent to you, don't run software you download from newsgroups (Usenet), etc. Given the speed that SoBig.f spread these warnings apparently bear repeating. Firewalls are secondary protection that are mostly useful when you've already unknowingly infected yourself with a trojan horse or are behind on your OS patches. If you are relying solely on a firewall to keep you free from viruses, you are making a big mistake.

To get back on topic, my sole coworker (my business partner) has satellite too, so, no, no DBS bashing where I work.

-Robert

[Phil T]

Tony, I was in your neck of the woods for the last two weeks. (long story) and watched some of the Time Warner Digital Cable.

Things I noticed:

Rain fade and signal outages during storms and at other times on both national and local nets. (WCVN Covington was out quite a bit).

No program guide information for 2 days until the Pioneer box rebooted itself. (Reminded me of my Dishplayer)

Dish AT-150 seems like a much better value because the Time Warner Digital did not include any of the Encore Theme channels. The few additional channels hey had (Trio, Oxygen, etc) didn't do much for me.

The VOD channels looked like a waste, probably because I am used to PVR's.

I did like some of the local ballgames and council meetings on Waycross.

[TNGTony]

Hi Phil!

You could have caught me on TV a week ago Tuesday. I was forced to do a "stand-up" (introduction) before a concert at the Greenhills commons at 6pm. Live TV and I'm supposed to be teching, rolling tape and be on-camera talent at the same time. YIKES! After that I think everyone realized why my chosen profession is BEHIND the cameras! :)

I'm with you on the TWC package. Overall Dish is still a better value. And their Pioneer boxes make the Dishplayer look like the cream of the crop!

The only thing that cable can offer over satellite is true local TV. Council meetings, community concerts, high school games, concerts and events and "real" public access to the airwaves. It's amazing how few people take advantage of this. But we do have reasonable viewership. Especially for our midnight tape delayed football "game of the week" on Friday midnight/saturday morning.

It's too bad that most access facilities aren't "active" in producing programs. Most are passive waiting for people to bring shows to them.

Thanks for the compliment.

See ya
Tony

[waydwolf]

so these last few weeks people have benn bad mouthing the Dish here are some of the things people have said

Digital cable is better then the Dish it sucks The picture goes out when it RainsIt does quite often. I've transitioned more than one person I originally installed on DTV back to digital cable after some bad summer storms interrupted their DTV too much for them to stand. They didn't want to hear the cost of a larger dish.

Dont get the dish it stinks


You have to pay extra for your local channels

True. Local channels are part of every basic cable package which is the start of all higher packages. AND you will certainly NEVER see HD locals on DBS the way you will see them on every system within the next couple years.
So i told them i had directv they all just laughed @ me And told me to get Cable Becuease the Picture was better :nono:
Dish Network fuzziness from overcompression bites without a question compared to my digital cable from Cox.

Regarding rate increase, when a child running a lemonade stand has their cost from their suppliers go up, the pass it on in the form of a price increase going to fifty cents from twenty-five cents for a cup. Basic business. Cable does it and survives.

Now then, do you all really think DTV and E* are getting some sort of sweetheart deals from HBO, ESPN, Food Network, etc. that allows them to keep a price so low? No, of course they aren't. Put another way, do you really think GM would have kicked Hughes to Murdoch if they saw it as a tremendous profit center? No, they wouldn't, and they did because it wasn't.

DBS is no panacea and digital cable is retaking DBS customer share at a rate that should make those with the ability to see beyond venal hate of their cable company sh*t bricks if they've banked on DBS. Look! LEO DBS and MVDDS are on the horizon! I hear the other shoe getting ready to drop on DTV and E*. I won't miss them the way I don't miss IBM's OS/2 development team and the people who used to make buggy whips.

[TNGTony]

Waywolf... last I checked the DBS market share was still growing as oposed to cable and with lower churn. If anything Digital cable is catching up to the competition, but nothing more. The numbers don't seem to indicate anything about DBS losing market share back to cable unless I'm reading the wrong trade papers in my office.

See ya
Tony

[dlsnyder]

Here where I work I know of six others besides myself who have satellite. Out of the seven of us only two are with Dish. Of the five with D* at least two of them know what an unlooper is used for. :eek2:

[FTA Michael]

The only thing that cable can offer over satellite is true local TV. Council meetings, community concerts, high school games, concerts and events and "real" public access to the airwaves.I agree 100%, but on the other hand, DBS offers a different set of non-profit programming. I'll never get my local city council meeting with Dish, but I'd never get to watch university programming or Colours on my local cable.

The real solution is to use "lifeline" cable with DBS, since even the lowest level of cable throws in all those community channels.

[mattb]

Cant forget the Good Samaritan Network, gotta love the P.I. Channels avil on the bird, makes the shopping channels jealous :-D