I try to keep it clean here at my little experiment on the web, otherwise this title would have been, “F**k you, Time Warner!”
I quit cable. For good. Or at least as long as I can stand to be without it, which might only be until LOST comes back on next year.
Why?
I’m moving to a new apartment and stopped by the local office to get my service transferred. I paid my bill (thinking it really isn’t worth it) and asked for my service to be moved. But while I paid my bill a line of four people formed behind me, and the clerk got frustrated and said she didn’t have time, it was only her in the office. She wrote down a number and told me to call it, and shooed me out the door.
And then I began thinking. Now, admittedly part of my frustration might have been having to drive way out of my way because a main bridge in town is closed, but that’s beside the point.
I just paid over a hundred dollars, was treated rudely, and didn’t get what I want. And for what? Since the LOST season 4 finale, I have watched maybe an hour of TV in the last six months. One hour. Really all I use is internet. Hundred bucks a month for internet? Meh. I spend too much time online anyway. And have gotten nothing but poor customer service on the phone with them and then wasn’t treated well today. (To be fair, I’ve had nothing but excellent customer service at that office in the past. Today was not the normal and I could see the clerk had a lot to do. But that doesn’t make it OK to not satisfy a customer. They should have adequate staff to handle the traffic.)
And, sure I could call to transfer my service, but right now I can’t make calls from my phone. My phone is broken and I can make and answer calls, and speak, but I can’t hear the person on the other end. I don’t get audio.
I gathered my cable modem and DVR and returned to the office. I set the equipment on the counter and the clerk asked, “Moving?” I replied, “No, I quit.” She asked, “Why?” I replied, “I’m sick of it.” She said, “Me too.” I replied a snide, “I can tell.” She tossed my stuff onto a pile, handed me a receipt, and I walked away from Time-Warner, possibly for good.
It feels somewhat liberating. That’s a bill I’ve hated paying for years. Telecom companies are just so horrible to deal with.
So, I’m going to go offline for a while and use public wi-fi (as I am right now), friends’ connections, et cetera when i want to go online. For at least a month. Flush some bits from my system and do analog things for a while.
