On Sun, 24 Jul 2011 07:48:06 -0400, "Ed Pawlowski" wrote:


wrote
I've never used them, but know people who have. They'll constantly
find ways to get more money out of you, have lousy repair service, and
good luck trying to get a real person, particularly one who lives in
the US. And if you want to cancel their services, good luck getting
out of thir contract, they will continue to take money out of your
credit card even after you tell them to cancel..... and the list goes
on. Not only that, but they are intentionally killing all the smaller
local companies.


At one time you were probably right, but they have changed. I've been with
DirecTV for a year now. The few times I've called, I was surprised at how
fast I got a real person, in the US, on the phone. They spoke English and
wee very helpful.

I've got Dish and it's pretty much the same. Service is not the reason I
don't like Dish.

I did need service once. They had someone out next day. They had a bad
component from a supplier and quickly replaced it. Both the original
installer and the service tech were courteous.

We just had a remote control die. They shipped a replacement out to use
next-day.

As for buying local, how many sat TV providers do you have in your town? Or
cable TV providers? They tend to be large companies that have franchises
for a town pr part of the state and no real choice. That is changing with
U-Verse and FIOS though. but they are huge non-local companies also.

The only alternative here is Charter Cable (just ran the wires past our house
in the last month or two). The people I know who have them are extremely
unhappy with the service so we're not likely to change.

There are few choices if you want to watch History, Science Channel, Travel
Channel, etc. They are not available OTA and can be a PITA with Hulu and
other web based sources. Meantime, I lay out a few bucks and have a DVR so
I can skip commercials, it records my favorite shows for me and I watch at a
time I choose. While I can always say no, I prefer to say yes and watch my
choices in TV when I want to watch them.

Yup.

Shop locally, and support
locally....

While I agree most of the time, I bought a new Weber Summit grill (S-470 if
you want to do your own comparison) a couple of weeks ago. The price
locally was $500 more than what I paid from an internet supplier. I
probably would have paid $50 more, but $500 is just too much to support Mr.
Local.

Mr. Local is all but nonexistent here. Mr. Internet gets most of the
non-essential business.