FiOS Con Dios But Not in Seattle

"there's a cable guy outside my window," courtesy of Seattlest Flickr Pool member Walsh

If you really care about superfast internet or high definition TV service, don’t bother reading the rest of this post. It’ll only piss you off.

In September 2008, Verizon unleashed its new FiOS internet and TV service in Western Washington. Problem is, they can’t offer this service within Seattle city limits. Owing to antiquated cable franchise rules in the Emerald City, the FiOS service, at this point infinitely superior on the TV front to Comcast and on the internet front to Qwest, can only be accessed to parts of North King County and Snohomish County.

That’s right, they can get better speeds and service in Bothell, but not Ballard. They’re wired better in Lynnwood than Fremont. They have a better picture in unincorporated Snohomish County that we’ve got on Capitol Hill.

Just to pour salt in our wounds, Eric Rabe, Senior VP of Media Relations from Verizon, flew out from New Jersey to sit down with Seattlest and show us what we’ve been missing. The FiOS cable television service, which starts at $47.00 a month, is a long-awaited fulfillment of the promise of cable TV to cross over and carry internet content. The service has more than 250 HD channels.

The picture, displayed on a Panasonic plasma HDTV for our demonstration, is amazing with a quick refresh, no blur (even for sports). The HD controls for the box are intuitive and easy to use. One vital feature is better search through the online guide. You can search by title, actor, genre, and programs in HD only.

According to Rabe, the high capacity is due to Verizon’s all-fiber optic network: "A lot of people claim they are all fiber optic, but right now we are the only ones who bring fiber right from our servers to your wall," he said. "Having that full fiber network means we grab the signal from the content creators and give it straight to our customers without filters or compression."

The best feature on the FiOS system is the "widget"; button on the HD controls. With one click, you can bring up an information bar across the top of the screen. Currently, you can access local weather, news headlines, and sports scores. Coming soon, Rabe promises the ability to bring up your Facebook page and Twitter accounts, either your own, or ongoing Tweets on a specific show. This interactivity is the wave of the future and something we’ve been waiting for but didn’t have until now.

The FiOS DVR system allows one DVR box to record content off of up to seven other TVs in one house. The DVR can be set online remotely, even on mobile devices.

The FiOS service can be bundled with internet and phone service. $99.99 a month will get you all three with 10/2 Mbps. If you want superfast 20/5 Mbps, with additional HD channels on the TV side, the cost is $109.99 a month. If you want an outrageously fast 50 Mbps, give Verizon a call. "We don’t have a lot of individuals who want or need that kind of speed, it’s mostly businesses," said Rabe. "But we have some extreme gamers who have picked it up."

Verizon currently has no plans to offer the service in Seattle. They are prevented by existing cable franchise authority contracts to Comcast and Qwest. Those ancient, legacy restrictions go back to the early days of cable when cities gave cable companies local monopolies because they didn’t want competitive companies digging up the streets.

Verizon says they could bring this service in without disrupting traffic. Maybe it’s time to bring competition back as a vehicle to drive lower prices and innovations.

Consider contacting the city about cable service. But only if you're really into better HD and Internet service. If you're not, by all means carry on.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@seattlest.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By RvO in Miscellaneous on May 7, 2009 2:00 PM

Comments [rss]

plasmatron

Well, here's why Verizon hasn't been interested in advancing into Seattle: Verizon just sold all of its wired operations (landline/internet/TV) in 14 states (including all of Washington and Oregon) to a small east coast company called Frontier, which deals mainly with rural communications.

Verizon reportedly did this so it can focus on FiOS in other states.

So, anyone who already has FiOS in the Seattle area will be at the mercy of Frontier as soon as the deal is approved (in 9 to 12 months).

Various stories online report that Frontier has no experience with fiber optic delivery systems, nor with delivering television signals. Frontier is undecided on what type of service current FiOS customers in their newly acquired 14 states will continue to receive after the deal is approved. But it's unlikely Frontier will get into the fiber market, nor television delivery. The bulk of what Frontier purchased was copper lines.

This is disturbing. As an extremely satisfied FiOS TV and internet customer in Woodinville, I can attest to the ultra clear, uncompressed video signal. It's vastly superior to anything else on the market (with the exception of regular over the air signals, which also are uncompressed). And the 20/5 internet is astounding, allowing me to stream Netflix at HD quality. FiOS TV/internet is light years ahead of anything else.

I know it's just business, but it feels like a bait and switch for me. Verizon convinced me to dump DirecTv and Earthlink (a costly switch due to incompatible equipment and contract cancellation fees), and then, a couple months later, after binding me to a 2-year contract, sells me to Frontier, a company that excels at delivering slow speed internet to farms. Wow. Thanks, Verizon. I wish there were a penalty clause affecting your performance over that 2-year contract, rather than just binding me to you.

As a customer, I can only reward or punish by opening or closing my wallet. As soon as my incredible TV and internet experience is taken away from me by Frontier, I will be ending my family's wireless BlackBerry plan with Verizon and moving elsewhere. If I'm not a valuable TV/internet/landline customer, then I won't be their wireless customer either. I encourage other Washington/Oregon FiOS customers to do the same.

Troy Morris

So it seems that Verizon is just chicken. Well then, keep your ads outta my face, you big chicken!

RvO

Thanks to everyone that's chimed in. And especially those that have contacted the city. Verizon's response from Eric Rabe to these questions was this:

“Verizon’s pleased to have such ardent FiOS fans in the Seattle area. Obviously, we’d love for everyone to be able to experience FiOS’ superior Internet and TV service. For competitive business reasons, we don’t disclose specific plans for where and when we’ll be expanding FiOS. But we have said that we are focusing our efforts to build the FiOS service on areas where we already serve customers in the metropolitan area, and, unfortunately, we don’t serve Seattle itself. As we introduce FiOS into new communities, we’ll be sure to let you know.”

For the City's part, I had a very good conversation with Jill Novak, Strategic Advisor

Office of Cable Communications. She agrees that the city's current incumbent providers are not providing the kind of bandwidth that Seattle needs. But she says Seattle is not standing in the way of Verizon coming to town. Far from it. Novak says the city is very interested in bringing in competition to drive down prices and drive up speeds, speeds she says this city needs to remain competitive.

Verizon would have to apply for a franchise, but Novak feels they would be approved. Comcast and Qwest might have something to say about that, but the city would land on the side of competition.

Novak also said that the city is looking at options to build out a fiber network if Federal stimulus money comes in as expected.

It appears that help may be on the way for those of us slugging it out at 1.5 mbps. Let's hope it comes soon.

Stuart Maxwell

I forwarded a link to this post to the City of Seattle's Office of Cable Communications; here's their response:

"Our franchise rules have absolutely zero to do with having Verizon serve us. We would love to have them in Seattle,and, in fact, we have asked them repeatedly over the past few years to serve us. The issue is that they are not our incumbent phone company and hence do not have any plant within Seattle. They are serving those areas where they already have infrastructure first because 1) they don't have the financial outlay of starting from scratch; and 2) politically, they have to serve their existing cities. The decision not to serve Seattle comes wholly from Verizon."

Eptin

Au Contraire, my friend.

Here in Bothell, we tried getting FiOS to replace our 786kbps Verizon DSL (same speed we've had since 2001). Verizon told us that Fiber Optics is not offered here, and the only way we could get speeds above 786kbps is to convert to a business account, which "may or may not work".

Helllo, Comcast Triple Play!

Troy Morris

bmessina, that makes sense. Verizon HATES making money.

bmessina

The city responded to my email. Basically, they claim to have made overtures to Verizon regarding have FIOS in the city, but that it is Verizon that declined.

tdogg241

Just sent off an e-mail. I always wondered why I couldn't sign up for FiOS. From what I could tell, the franchise agreement with Comcast (read: government-endorsed monopoly) is in effect until 2016, so it looks like we'll probably miss out on FiOS. Hopefully by the time the next new technology rolls around, the city will have come to its senses.

misstake

FiOS internet is pretty freaking awesome. I live in Redmond and have had it for months-- the same price as Comcast, but at least three times as fast.

Definitely contact the city about getting them into Seattle.

jdavin

Yeah, this is really lame. I called Verizon to see if I could get FiOS internet a few months ago and was told it's not available in Seattle. They didn't say why though; interesting to hear the story.