I always wonder why it is when consumers complain about the price and performance of a product, that those that sell the product argue that the product is "good enough", when they don't use it themselves, especially. No one is complaining about the speed offered, they are complaining about the data caps that are lower than the current caps. That is more than a little insulting to people. People buy the high packages, not because they want to, but because they have to. If a kid needs to do homework, or even just spend time on the internet, in this day and age, what choice is there. Just because many are a captive audience with no choice, does not make it right to gouge customers. Those that know and understand the limits of satellite tech aren't expecting the high caps demanded, but with the years of massive hype this was given, there should have been an upgrade at least, not a downgrade, or such a HUGE increase in price to even stay at the now current level. The plans offered under the recovery act are more reasonable, at the prices listed. And yes Viasat has stated that they are going for the DSL market in fringe areas, offering a choice for those with slower speed, so yes, they -are- competing with DSL, they stated that in some of the press releases while it was being built/launched. Paying $60 per month with lease fee, it is quite possible for 1 person to be right up to the monthly limit, doing little more than looking at Ebay for an hour a day, on the current speed/base package. How reasonable is that?
A true upgrade would have been to give everyone 3 or 4 meg, much better than current, with the latency back to where it was in '06. Then something like 15 gigs on the BASE package, perfectly reasonable, and expected (at LEAST). That alone would have provided a much, much better browsing experience. Because again, the extra speed only really benefits large downloads or video, which can't be done without bleeding out of the wallet.
Go ahead, those that sell or service the equipment, continue to tell us consumers how wrong we are for complaining about what is being offered here, and demonstrate further the arrogant attitude that goes along with it. There used to be a saying that the customer was always right, guess that's not the case anymore. If you think these caps and prices are very reasonable yourselves, you live under their constraints and see how you like it. No one who has sold the service has responded to the fact that the service is no good if you don't have a high enough cap to utilize it.
Consumer reaction in the comments here, and many other places as well.
More Details On ViaSat's New 12 Mbps 'Exede' Service - 7.5, 15 and 25 GB Monthly Usage Caps | DSLReports.com, ISP Information
