Bailing On Broadband?

from the how-big-of-an-issue-is-it dept

We've been having all these stories about whether or not broadband connections would help the tech sector (or will the tech sector drive broadband connections) and what people want to do with broadband. However, now it's becoming clear that the industry's worst fears may be coming true. Current customers may be bailing on broadband. There's no hard evidence - the article is just made up of some anecdotal evidence from a few people who have bailed. However, there are a few interesting reasons for people bailing. The bad economy and lost jobs mean that people are looking for ways to cut back on expenses. At the same time, bad service and broadband companies shutting down hurts the perception of the offering. Add to that the fact that many people are happy to just use broadband at the office, and there really hasn't been a "killer app" that requires broadband at home - and apparently some people are ditching it. I imagine, like the guy from Earthlink says, though, most people would "rather sell their grandmothers" then go back to dialup, but obviously it could present a problem. For the record, my grandmother (who reads Techdirt) is pretty cool, so I wouldn't sell her, but it would take an awful lot to convince me to willingly give up my current broadband connection (though, each company that provides it to me has done their best to force me to by going out of business). A couple of weeks ago I spoke to someone who is in the position to know, and he said that 26% of broadband users say they want to switch or get rid of their service - which is a very costly proposition for the companies who provide the service (since they usually put out a huge expense upfront, and hope to make it back with a long term customer). It appears the broadband revolution is becoming more difficult each day.