Sidecut Reports

There’s no official company link between the two ideas, but it’s hard to miss the obvious “customer retention plan” Comcast is crafting with its experiments in WiMax wireless services and its TV Everywhere content-on-the-Internet test. By allowing paying customers to view cable content anywhere on the web — and by giving them a low-cost, fast and mobile way to do so — Comcast is building the blocks of an entertainment-option package that will be tough to beat.

At the very least, Comcast should be able to keep a big part of its existing customer base happy simply by helping them view the content they already pay for in more places at more times. And if those customers decide sticking with Comcast for mobile broadband is better than spending more dough on an AT&T 3G card, that’s another feather in the competitive cap.

I’d be willing to wager a pint that most people who remain cable customers do so because they are generally happy (or simply resigned) to paying a certain amount each month for a wide assortment of couch-potato entertainment that’s easy to find. They may be aware of new technology and Internet TV, but when push comes to shove they just pay the cable bill, kick back and grab the clicker.

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In news announcements today cable giant Comcast announced that it would start reselling Clearwire’s WiMax services, a business move they promised earlier this year.

From the press release, the main pricing plan for the service (which they are calling Comcast High-Speed 2go™) is a combo of wired cable broadband and local Clearwire WiMax for $49.99, or cable plus a hybrid 3G/4G card for $69.99:

The $49.99 Fast Pack Metro service includes Comcast’s 12 Mbps home Internet service, a free WiFi router for mobility and extended coverage in the home, and 4G service that will provide up to 4 Mbps download speed when customers are on the go. For an additional $20 per month, consumers can upgrade to the Fast Pack Nationwide service that includes the same services plus nationwide 3G mobile network access.

Though we haven’t yet heard the full details from Comcast it appears the cable company will be offering its customers a version of the Sprint 3G/4G hybrid card that allows for access to both Clearwire-hosted WiMax services where they are available and Sprint’s 3G cellular network where they’re not. Like Sprint’s reselling plan Comcast will make these services available in markets where Clearwire launches, which include Chicago, Philadelphia and Dallas/Fort Worth this year among others.

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I really like the thinking behind the big 3G network test compiled by our old pal Mark Sullivan over at PC World, but I just wish Mark and the team had gone further and asked more questions about how robust the big providers’ 3G networks really are.

The big question that goes unanswered by this and other tests is asking how well these networks are built to handle increasing numbers of users. Will network crunches like the now-famous SXSW debacle become more commonplace as more users turn on their iPhones? Unfortunately, the PC World review seems a little too cautious and perhaps advertiser-sensitive, leaving a feeling of incompleteness after wading through all six pages and the assorted charts.

You can see some nibbling at the edges — in good objective journalistic fashion Sullivan shows that having a lot of bars on your phone means pretty much nothing when it comes to determining actual potential service speed. Though Sullivan and his team found that all the providers pretty much hit their advertised promises of speeds and reliability, he also notes that the terms of service are worded so loosely that the bar isn’t set too high:

Do wireless providers deliver the connection speeds they promise for their 3G networks? In our tests, on average, they did. However, the services promise speeds within a wide range–if they provide a low end to the range at all–due to the wide variability of network performance from day to day and from neighborhood to neighborhood. So in practical terms, these ranges don’t represent much of a commitment to consumers.

On the minus side, it doesn’t appear that Sullivan and his team were able to get any real input from the providers — there is a huge self-serving quote from an AT&T rep that essentially tries to argue that AT&T tests its network itself and everything is just fine, thanks for asking. (And you wonder why the tech press doesn’t trust Ma Bell!) What we would like to see, of course, is more thorough questioning, along the lines of whether or not AT&T and Verizon actually have adequate spectrum to really launch the so-called 4G services they are planning. Maybe in the next study!

The master of mobile disaster speaks, and we listen: Wondering what to call the new class of cool portable routers that provide mobile Wi-Fi hotspots … in your pocket? Andy Abramson, who probably already owns all types manufactured so far (except the WiMax-powered Clear Spot) has dubbed them…
POCKETSPOTS.

Expect a Kleiner Perkins PocketSpot fund to arrive shortly.

It’s no secret that service providers of all stripes are lining up to grab their share of the government stimulus funding pie directed at broadband deployment. Our friends at DigitalBridge Communications got some prime-time buzz the other night, when CBS Evening News stopped by for a video look:

Watch CBS Videos Online

The money quote from Kelley Dunne, CEO of DigitalBridge, whose new ambitious plans are part of the rural broadband rollout: He says the company has about 150 applications out there, seeking $40 to $50 million in funding. Good news for the WiMax industry if the applications go through, adding more to the pig-pile of government funding for WiMax rollouts.