[somewhat off-topic] Comcast and Verizon

[dsr-mzpnVDyJpH4k7aNtvndDlA at public.gmane.org (Dan Ritter)]

On Mon, Oct 26, 2009 at 02:59:56PM -0400, Mark J. Dulcey wrote:
> Ward Vandewege wrote:
> > On Mon, Oct 26, 2009 at 12:43:55PM -0400, Mark J. Dulcey wrote:
> >> I do know that Comcast has a connection validation step that requires 
> >> you to download a validation app (Windows and Mac only) and run it; 
> >> until you do that you can only connect to Comcast's servers. 
> > 
> > In fact, this is not true. Their docs make you believe that, but the way
> > around this is to call Comcast customer service and ask them to activate your
> > modem. Takes 5 minutes. Basically all they do is associate the mac address of
> > the modem to your account, and allow that modem on the network. 
> > 
> > I did this for my parents in law (they run Ubuntu) when they moved into a
> > house that had never had cable installed. I did it while the installer was
> > still there, which allowed me to verify that everything worked before he
> > left.
> 
> That might be true. However, I consider carrying along an old Windows 
> laptop to be a lesser evil than having to talk to a human being employed 
> by Comcast :) (No, I don't do business with them personally, but I have 
> had occasion to deal with them on behalf of people I help with their 
> computers.)

Note that the actual installers, though taking money from
Comcast, are independent contractors. Many of them are decent
people. When I show them a working MythTV or Asterisk setup,
they usually ooh-and-ah the way you would expect real people to
do.

-dsr-

Don't crack jokes about the difficulty of getting Myth or
Asterisk up, please.



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