Is Philly Full Of Slowskys?

Woo-hoo! The Philadelphia Business Journal reports Comcast is doubling its internet speeds! Finally, the company’s Internet service will… oh.

Comcast is offering the higher speeds to customers in its Willow Grove, Lower Merion, Bucks and Chester counties and Cherry Hill, N.J., systems.

Thanks, guys. It’s not like your headquarters is here or anything.

(It’s not all bad news. Supposedly, we’ll have the faster speeds by the end of the year.)

Comcast increases Internet speeds [PBJ]

Comcast News Isn’t All Bad!

Okay, so our Comcast rates are going up and the company is laying off 300 people. (Nice timing, whoever managed to get that puff piece to run the same day as the layoffs.)

But let’s be clear: There is an upside. They’re rolling out faster Internet. And, oh my, am I salivating:

Comcast Corp. said Wednesday it will begin rolling out “wideband” Internet services, which will allow subscribers to download data at up to 50 megabits per second.

The Philadelphia-based cable TV, Internet, phone and media company expects the services will be available to nearly 10 million customers in 10 major markets in the next few months.

Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA,CMCSK) is introducing two new tiers of Internet service each for its business and residential customers. The fastest will have download/upload speeds of 50 mbps/10mbps; the other will have speeds of 22mbps/5mbps.

Hey, look, Verizon FiOS had a 50/5 connection in early 2007, although it did cost like a million billion dollars. Still, I guess I’ll take what I can get. Here’s to quicker browsing!

Also: How the hell does Comcast’s 250 gig bandwidth cap jive with speeds of 50/10? Hmm, the more I think about this, the worse it gets. I’ll just smile, nod and forget about it now, then.

Comcast increases Internet speed [Phila. Business Journal]

Comcast: More Expensive Than Ever

Another year, another chance to get closer to spending $200 for cable! Comcast is upping its prices early this year, raising them by 3.5 percent on November 1.

Comcast spokesman Jeff Alexander says the company faces higher costs in a challenging environment. Among those higher costs, he says, is programming, notably high-def:

“We’ve added about 15, 20 new channels for customers: CNN high definition, Disney Channel high-def, TLC HD, Animal Planet HD, the Big Ten Network, Fox Business, and others.”

Verizon Fios says it’s not raising its rates; of course, you can’t get that in the City of Philadelphia, so… You know, at this point I might as well just hand over my whole salary to ‘em. Because I have to watch me some Animal Planet HD. Oh, there’s this show with little baby wolves, and they howl, it is so cute.

Comcast would like it, I guess, if you did not pay attention to this article in yesterday’s Inquirer headlined, “Certain that Comcast will thrive despite turmoil.”

Comcast Hiking Prices By 3 1/2 Percent Next Month [KYW 1060]