You hate your cable company, right? Seems like everyone does. Cable television routinely scores lower in customer satisfaction than just about anything else—including congress. So why don’t you just switch providers? Oh yeah, you can’t. You’re so screwed! More »
Well, that was anticlimactic. Viacom quickly sued Cablevision after the Optimum for iPad (now on iPhone and iPod Touch) app launched and allowed cable customers to stream the entire channel lineup on their tablets, but now they’ve resolved that and “an unrelated business matter”. Viacom’s case against Time Warner’s similar offering is on hold while they also try to work out a deal, but Cablevision’s stance from the start is that its approach fell within the existing agreements and they appear to have gotten their way. Just like most other channel carriage disputes, it was likely a deal on the supposedly unrelated issue that got things moving, but as long as we can keep watching Teen Mom in the kitchen, bathroom or out on the patio it doesn’t really matter. Check the official statement from both companies after the break.
Continue reading Cablevision and Viacom settle lawsuit over live TV on iPad
Cablevision and Viacom settle lawsuit over live TV on iPad originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Ever wonder if the speeds your ISP advertises are actually what you’re getting while reloading Engadget all day? The FCC did, and decided to team up with 13 major broadband providers in the US to test how they performed from February to June of this year. Notably, during peak hours the average continuous download speeds of fiber connections were 14 percent faster than advertised, while cable and DSL were slower than claimed by 8 and 18 percent, respectively. Upload speeds also varied, with DSL again dipping the lowest at 95-percent of what’s advertised — might be time to ask your phone-based ISP for a partial refund, no? In addition to sustained speeds, the FCC analyzed consumer connections’ latency and the effect of ISP speed boost tech on activities like VoIP, gaming, and video streaming.
In concluding its research, the Commission noted that it should be easy to get tools in users’ hands for keeping better tabs on ISP-provided services, without needing to contact customer frustrations relations. The study is chock full of even more graphs and stats, which you’ll find by hitting that source link below. Now, if only we could get those speeds on par with our friends across the Atlantic.
Continue reading FCC measures US wireline advertised broadband speeds, fiber dominates cable and DSL
FCC measures US wireline advertised broadband speeds, fiber dominates cable and DSL originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Aug 2011 07:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Starting this fall, for the first eight days after they air, watching Fox TV shows online will require a subscription to Hulu Plus or a participating cable or satellite company. So far Dish Network is the first and only provider to sign up its customers for access to the new walled garden on Fox’s site but others looking to fill out their TV Everywhere lineups probably won’t be far behind. While pay-TV networks like ESPN with ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app and EPIX have already gone the “authentication” route, Fox is the first of the broadcast networks to do so. The new rules go into effect August 15th, then we’ll find out if Fox is driving cable cutters towards paying for TV, piracy, or just ignoring the latest episode of Glee altogether.
Continue reading Fox restricts online streams of new TV shows to ‘authenticated’ pay TV subscribers
Fox restricts online streams of new TV shows to ‘authenticated’ pay TV subscribers originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jul 2011 19:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Jealous of Comcast customers with their 105Mbps cable hook ups or those lucky residents of the Kansas cities relishing in Google’s 1Gbps service? Well add Londonites to the list of people that drive you to indulging in one of the seven deadly sins. Virgin Media has finally started testing its DOCSIS2-powered 1.5Gbps network in the heart of merry ol’ England. Right now it’s being enjoyed by a group of test sites around Old Street that also get a 150Mbps upload connection. Virgin claims it’s the fastest broadband in the world, which may be true if you’re not counting lab experiments. The really good news is that it’s based on the same tech already delivering 100Mbps to residents across the country so, if the trial goes well, it should be trivial to deliver these mind numbing speeds to the rest of its customers. PR after the break.
Continue reading Virgin Media testing 1.5Gbps internet for lucky Londonites
Virgin Media testing 1.5Gbps internet for lucky Londonites originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 25 Jul 2011 18:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Rogers hasn’t exactly made a lot of fans with the rather draconian caps on its cable modem service. But the company wants you to know, it has heard your complaints and doesn’t want to cut you off from your precious, bandwidth-intensive Netflix streams. That’s why it’s raising the limits on its three top tier plans later this month. Extreme subscribers are getting a bump from 80GB to 100GB, Extreme Plus users from 125GB to 150GB, and Ultimate customers from 175GB to 250GB. The company is even boosting speeds, you know, to help you make more efficient use of that newly raised data ceiling — from 15Mbps to 24Mbps for the Extreme and 25Mbps to 32Mbps for Extreme Plus. It’s always nice to see a company listen to its customers, and come on, data caps aren’t all that bad.
Continue reading Rogers listens, bumps data caps, lets you stream a few extra Netflix movies a month
Rogers listens, bumps data caps, lets you stream a few extra Netflix movies a month originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Jul 2011 05:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Redpark’s iOS cable lets you interact with Arduino hardware through iPhones, iPods and iPads. Photo courtesy of Make
With the introduction of a new cable made for Apple’s iOS devices, hardware modders are no longer beholden to the Android platform alone to fulfill their hacking desires.
Electronics accessory builders Redpark introduced a serial cable on Monday, which lets you connect your iPod, iPad or iPhone devices to physical computing peripherals. After hooking your iOS device up to hardware like Arduino — one of the more popular open-source hardware platforms with the DIY community — you can download a software developer kit that allows you to control the unit using your iPhone like a remote control.
Over the past few years, open hardware computing platforms have grown in popularity. ARM Holdings’ mbed project gives non-programmer types the ability to program small computers known as microcontrollers, while encouraging integration with unconventional objects. In May, Android introduced its accessory developer kit (ADK) based on the Arduino hardware at its annual developer conference in San Francisco. Using the ADK and Arduino’s free software tools, those familiar with coding for Android can make programs that interact with other devices, from a simple LED to a remote-controlled robot.
While the iOS platform remains far from ‘open,’ Apple gave Redpark’s cable its official stamp of approval. That means unlike previously, you won’t have to jailbreak your iPhone to connect it to an Arduino unit.
The cable costs $60 from Redpark’s site, and works with devices running iOS version 4.3 and above.
Head on over to Make magazine for a great rundown of how to hook the cable up to your iOS device and get coding right away.
While US residents seethe over increases in Netflix’s pricing, our neighbors in Canada are upset by the competing Movie Club package Shaw Cable is offering. The $12 per month service offers unlimited access to “hundreds of the best Hollywood movies” and plans to have high definition feeds later this summer for an additional $5 (cable companies in the US have a similar scheme under the name Vutopia.) Causing the issue are promises that “the only limit is the number of hours in your day” unlike bandwidth capped streaming from unnamed services like Netflix. While Movie Club viewing over the internet on a PC, tablet or other device is capped just like any other service, access via the cable box is not metered. That distinction doesn’t sit well with subscribers and consumer groups arguing for net neutrality, particularly as the CRTC is in the midst of hearings over usage-based internet billing. While that case hasn’t been decided, our own ruling is already in and is firmly against Shaw, or anyone else, advertising based on advantages that exist only due to policies it created in the first place.
Continue reading Shaw Cable’s Netflix competitor bypasses bandwidth caps on its way to the TV
Shaw Cable’s Netflix competitor bypasses bandwidth caps on its way to the TV originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 16 Jul 2011 15:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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If you’ve been thinking about buying a one piece Mini DisplayPort-to-HDMI cable to bring vids from your Macbook to an HDTV, you may want to get it now. According to a report from TechRadar, the group behind HDMI has decided they don’t meet the requirements and cannot be tested or licensed for compatibility. Their sin? Not having a male HDMI plug on each end as required by the spec, which only allows for dongles featuring an all-female pairing of Mini DisplayPort and HDMI to get the job done. We’ve contacted the group to find out exactly what’s going on, but until we hear back it may be prudent to keep an eye on suddenly black-market cable pricing like gasoline before a big holiday.
HDMI group reportedly putting a stop to Mini DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapters originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 10 Jul 2011 13:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Apple Thunderbolt cable, Promise RAIDs now available to get your 10Gbps interconnect on originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 28 Jun 2011 18:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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