OK, rumor has it that Comcast is in talks with T-Mobile USA parent company Deutsche Telekom to purchase the American wireless carrier. All I can say as a consumer is, PLEASE… NOOOO!
I’m an AT&T customer now, which was a switch required back in 2007 when the only carrier that offered the iPhone was AT&T. I loved T-Mobile and loathed AT&T (still do, but that’s a point for another column), but I really wanted the iPhone, so I switched. T-Mobile at the time was the only carrier that was great about letting experimenters like myself swap out SIMs with reckless abandon, try whatever phone we wanted, and they had a pretty decent network in my home town as well. I could switch to T-Mobile again… and I probably should… but I have concerns about their network in my city. I still have a very large amount of love for T-Mobile in my heart, because I find its CEO John Legere to be the Steve Jobs of the American mobile carrier scene, willing to speak plainly and publicly and do what’s best for the consumer.
Well, the Great Satan of Internet Service Providers and the antithesis of what you’d refer to as a “consumer-friendly” corporation is Comcast. Whether it’s the creeping price tag on your “triple play” — which in my case has gone from about $130 per month about five years ago to over $230 with no improvement in service — or their tactics at trying to retain customers who are cutting the cord, Comcast is (IMHO) a company I’d rather not be doing business with. Sadly, I’m forced to because they’re the only company offering the bandwidth I need.
So, it’s with a great deal of sadness that I’m reading the blurbs about Comcast wanting to purchase T-Mobile USA. Let’s hope that Comcast is unsuccessful and that T-Mo manages to be financially viable on its own. The peacock doesn’t need the magenta network, and it would be a great disservice to the customers of T-Mobile to accept any offer from Comcast.
This is my opinion, and I’m sure there are a legion of Wall Street tech analysts and telecom experts who would line up the reasons why this is a good idea. But for the common consumer, this would be a really bad deal.
