Comcast with a surprise price increase?

Surprise, surprise. Comcast is changing the terms again on their already outrageously expensive internet offering. For about the same price (even with the bad exchange rate) as Comcast internet alone, customers in France can have fiber optic 100MB internet, phone calls around the world at no additional cost and a bunch of TV channels. The same combination in the US will be considerably more expensive and probably slower than the French offering.

Instead of offering more for US customers or a faster product, Comcast is going against online trends and changing prices to punish users who use services such as Hulu or other streaming video. It's almost as though Comcast is admitting that they're lazy and haven't properly invested in modern technology for their customers. Why else would they create a new price list to punish customers who are using these services?

Just as the US needs serious competition for mobile phones, the US needs real competition for internet offerings. What's out there today is expensive and backwards and not in line with what American consumers deserve. If US internet providers can't match or beat what's offered in France, they need to clean house and start over.

CNNMoney:

Though Comcast, the country's largest broadband provider, said it hasn't reached a decision on how it will implement the tiers, it will be pilot-testing two possible solutions in yet-to-be-determined markets.

The first program will set different allotments for different tiers of service, starting at 300 GB per month, and charge customers for additional blocks of usage when they go over. The example the company gave was $10 more for 50 GB of additional data.

The second approach would give everyone 300 GB per month, and then charge for additional usage in blocks.

And for the Comcast workers who often jump into comments about how great the company is and how much they donate to Democratic candidates, please focus on when Comcast is going to start being competitive with First World countries. Comcast's prices are horrendous and the company would collapse if they had real competition.