Ahhaha, you said:
<People are so desperate for BB that they are willing to go it alone and Cablevision is not controlling this wild scramble. I had that attitude. That means that Cablevision will be incurring tremendous latent cost in the form of support truck rolls. You roll now or you roll later, but you will be rolling. >
The fact remains that those subs are now Cablevision's. It may cost more money to maintain some of those connections (but it will also cost no money for some), but in the end those subs are (1) most likely not going to leave the OptimumTV's cable BB experience, for DSL or otherwise, (2) going to be paying $40 per month while things are sorted out, (3) going to be surfing OptimumTV's sites, generating revs, and (4) will be counted as a BB sub for OptimumTV as it recruits content providers and advertisers.
I wouldn't worry too much about brand name. Do you really think that anyone will wait for an extended period of time for @Home to become available if DSL (or other BB) becomes available in their area? Even if the answer is yes, do you that the same customer would have waited for "any" cable BB (i.e., would the customer have waited for @Home but not OptimumTV based on their respective reputations)?
AOL doesn't have a great reputation, but people (generally) don't leave AOL because (1) they don't want to change their e-mail address and (2) they love instant messaging. Once people get hooked on BB, they learn to "deal" with any temporary downsides such as getting a truck roll to fix a self install. Lord knows that AOL's members have learned to deal with the most basic of problems: slow and unreliable connections.
Bottom line: get self-installs asap and deal with the problems of having too many subs or subs that need maintenance later. In the meantime, they'll be paying @Home monthly fees and also @Home will be able to recruit content providers and advertisers. |
