comcast

The total number of paid TV subscribers was up last year, but cable companies weren't so lucky.

According to In-Stat, the total number of paid TV subscribers around the world was up over 6 percent compared with 2009. The research firm said that gains in subscribers were seen in "nearly every region" around the globe. However, when it came to cable television subscriptions, only Western Europe saw a jump compared with 2009.

Elsewhere around the world, cable customers were migrating to satellite or IPTV, the research firm said.

Growth in the paid TV business in 2010 has … Read more

Amazon scored tops in customer service out of 143 different companies, according to the Temkin Group.

Based on a survey of 6,000 different consumers in January, the 2011 Temkin Experience Ratings rated companies across a variety of industries based on recent dealings with customers. The survey looked at interactions online, in person, and over the phone, and asked consumers how their needs were met, how easy it was to do what they needed to do, and how they felt about the overall experience.

Retail chains did well in the survey, with Amazon followed by Costco, Lowe's, and Sam'… Read more

Sometimes, late at night, those who run companies lie awake, slapping their foreheads.

"Why did we do that?" they mutter, as they dribble. "Why?"

I wonder whether those who run Comcast might be wondering the same after asking staff to vote in the "Worst Company in America" competition run by the Consumerist.

It seems that someone at Comcast wasn't happy that last year the company won (or lost) the Consumerist's competition. So this year, discovering that the Consumerist's readers had nominated it again, they sent a memo out to staff, asking … Read more

Comcast is ushering in the launch of a 24-hour 3D channel by enlisting the help of Kings of Leon and the National Hockey League.

The cable provider said yesterday that starting at 3 p.m. PT on Sunday, its new Xfinity 3D channel will begin broadcasting. The channel will start with an airing of the 2011 Tim Hortons NHL Heritage Classic, pitting the Montreal Canadiens against the Calgary Flames outdoors at McMahon Stadium in Calgary. After the game is over, Comcast plans to broadcast a Kings of Leon concert from Hamburg, Germany.

From there, the channel will broadcast 3D programming … Read more

With its acquisition of NBC Universal finally done, Comcast today reported a boost in both sales and earnings for its fourth quarter.

For the quarter ended December 31, the cable carrier earned $1.02 billion, a gain of 6.6 percent from the $955 million earned in the prior year's quarter. Sales grew by 7.2 percent to reach $9.72 billion compared with $9.07 billion a year ago. Both results managed to beat the expectations of analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, according to Reuters, and prompted the company to lift its annual dividend by 19 percent.

With … Read more

Comcast and Time Warner Cable, two major Internet service providers, will participate in the World IPv6 Day testing June 8 to help test readiness for the next-generation Internet Protocol.

Because the two companies are crucial gateways to the Internet for millions of people, their test will be an important--both for trying their own technology and for supplying some IPv6 users who can help other's setup. The companies announced the test today.

Internet Protocol version 6 supplies a vastly larger address space for attaching computers to the Internet than IPv4, which was established with a paltry 4.3 billion addresses … Read more

WASHINGTON--A federal appellate court ruled yesterday against Verizon in its first-out-of-the-gate lawsuit challenging the Federal Communications Commission's Open Internet Order--the so-called Net neutrality rules.

But the decision turned on a minor procedural issue and gives no indication of how the court will ultimately decide. The ruling was only one sentence.

"Request for Comcast panel of judges denied," the court said.

After filing its appeal on January 20, Verizon asked that its case be heard by the same panel of three judges that decided against the FCC in an April 2010 case involving Comcast's alleged throttling of BitTorrent traffic. … Read more

It's official. Comcast has completed its acquisition of NBC Universal.

On Saturday, the cable giant announced that the transaction is complete. Comcast now owns 51 percent of NBC Universal. General Electric still owns 49 percent of the media conglomerate. The new company, which will be called NBC Universal, is valued at $37 billion.

The deal was originally announced in December 2009. The Federal Communications Commission and U.S. Department of Justice gave the final blessings for the deal earlier this month. Regulators imposed several conditions on the deal to ensure that Comcast would not stifle competition, especially when it … Read more

As promised, Netflix released a report today on the company's tech blog about which Internet service providers are best at distributing the company's streaming video to customers' homes. According to Netflix's data, the nation's largest cable operators are tops in delivering the company's content.

Netflix, the high-flying video rental service, said cable operator Charter Communications was the best-performing Internet service provider, with Cox Communications, Comcast, Cablevision, and Time Warner Cable all outperforming phone companies AT&T and Verizon Communications, as well as wireless broadband provider Clearwire.

Ken Florance, Netflix's director of content delivery, … Read more