AT&T's TV service beats Comcast in J.D. Power satisfaction study

AT&T's U-verse TV service ranked highest in customer satisfaction among residential television customers in all three regions where it was ranked, according to the J.D. Power and Associates 2008 Residential Television Service Provider Satisfaction Study.

It's the first year AT&T U-verse has been included in the survey. And it's the first time a telco provider and IPTV service have topped the annual survey.

You can read the full report here: J.D. Power and Associates 2008 Residential Television Service Satisfaction Study

In the South Region rankings (which includes Florida), AT&T U-verse ranked first, followed by Verizon FiOS, DIRECTV, DISH Network, Insight, Bright House, Cox, Cable One, Suddenlink, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Charter and Mediacom ranked last.

The study measured customer satisfaction with providers of home video services, such as Internet Protocol (IP) TV, cable and satellite TV. A total of 18,938 residential video customers in the U.S. participated in the study.

AT&T U-verse is only available in some parts of South Florida now. You can find out if it's available in your area at http://uverse.att.com.

Office Depot gives you gift cards for your old electronics

Have an old gadget just collecting dust? Too lazy to put it on eBay? Don't throw it in the trash. Get some money for it by sending it to Office Depot. In exchange you can get a gift card. But if it has no trade-in value, you can still send it to be recycled.

Office Depot will accept things like mp3 players, cameras, notebooks, desktops, smartphones, televisions and game systems.

The site said I could get $32 for my Sansa San-Disk mp3 player in good condition. Not too shabby... but of course that could go down if the person inspecting it doesn't find it to be worthy of $32. And the site said it would give me $22 for my Sega Genesis with all my games... no way would I give up Sonic for that price!

Go to officedepot.com/techtradein to see for yourself. Just remember to properly wipe out your data before shipping it off.

Comcast raises prices for DVR service

Some of you may have noticed a letter from Comcast in the mail saying that DVR service will change from $9.95 to $13.95, beginning August 30th.

A coworker of mine from Broward just got this letter. Comcast says the price adjustment is because of the added HD channels and other upgrades made to the South Florida area, like Channel 1 On Demand programming. As of May, Comcast's South Florida network added HD channels for Animal Planet, ABC Family, Discovery Channel, Disney Channel, Food Network, HGTV, History Channel, Science Channel, TBS, TLC and USA.

Taking a tour of the new AT&T Experience Store in Coral Gables

Today I got a tour of AT&T's first Experience Store in Florida, which showcases all of AT&T's wireless, broadband, video and land-line services under one roof.

The store encourages customer interactivity with multiple "information stations" with touch screens to help customers learn more about products and services.

Customers can use the stations to get suggestions on what service plan or phone is best after answering a few questions. Still other screens offer access to customer account and contract information.

The store at 215 Miracle Mile, which opened last week, is one of three bilingual AT&T Experience stores in the country. Signs are in English and Spanish, and 26 of the 29 store employees are bilingual.

The store is about 5,400 square feet in size -- larger than a typical wireless store -- and is designed with the AT&T blue globe logo in mind, which is reflected in the ceiling architecture and lighting.

AT&T spokeswoman Kelly Starling said it's part of the company's goal to move away from
wireless-focused stores and be a one-stop retail store for communications and entertainment services.

As part of the store's nearly paperless experience, two television monitors display the customer service queue so employees on the floor know who is next to be helped (on of the monitors is pictured here ... although there were no customers waiting to be helped when I arrived at 10 a.m.).

Customers can get demonstrations of the DISH Network service.  They store will provide details on AT&T U-verse TV once it becomes available in the area. They can also test home services like the Remote Monitor through an in-store camera.

Store manager Diane Marim said one in three customers that have walked in the store the past week said they were surprised that the store deals with all aspects of AT&T communication and entertainment services, not just wireless.

This is AT&T's 20th Experience Store. Another is scheduled to open in West Palm Beach in the fall, Starling said. AT&T has about 330 retail locations throughout South Florida.

Is American Idol to thank for the popularity of texting?

Think back to 2003. How much were you texting? Did you have a plan that included text messages, or were you paying per text since you rarely texted people?

In 2003, AT&T began its sponsorship with American Idol, and thus began encouraging viewers to text message their votes.

AT&T sent me some interesting stats. At the end of Season 2, AT&T wireless customers sent more than 7.5 million American Idol-related text messages (which includes polls, sweepstakes entries, trivia as well as votes).

The following year, there were 13.5 million Idol-related text messages. In 2005 there were 41.5 million Idol-related texts, which was the first season after the AT&T Wireless and Cingular merger.

In 2006, that number jumped to 64.5 million.

AT&T also shared these points from 2003 customer data:

• More than one-third of all voting participants had never sent a text message as an AT&T customer before American Idol
• The number of text votes received increased by nearly 5,000 percent from the first voting episode to the last voting episodes
• Approximately 70 percent of text voters voted more than once

AT&T said they were not able to disclose the 2007 numbers, and they won't know this season's text stats until the show ends.

But have reality voting shows helped Americans embrace texting? Obviously American Idol is not the only show you can text your vote. I remember Verizon sponsored the texting in the CBS show Rock Star. And now every reality show has some texting element. Heck, even Bravo's reality shows like Top Chef have instant texting polls that serve no point other than to entertain. But there's no question - people are texting more now than ever before. I don't think Ryan Seacrest deserves all the thanks -- it probably also has to do with the increase of cheaper data plans from wireless providers.

But what about you? Did a television show motivate you to start texting? Or were you texting long before Kelly Clarkson hit the stage?

Comcast improves Video on Demand, ups Internet speed for Business Class

Comcast has made improvements to it's Channel 1 Video On Demand for South Florida, adding more content for customers to choose from.

Comcast spokesman Spero Canton said customers could notice more local and high-definition On Demand choices on the menu in the coming days. The upgrade to Comcast's equipment was designed to have expanded capacity for additions in the future. Currently, Comcast offers more than 4,000 hours of separate Channel 1 On demand programming for anyone who has signed up for digital cable.

Also, Comcast announced Wednesday that it is increasing the basic and advanced Internet speeds for its Comcast Business Class customers. The basic package was increased from 4Mbps downstream to 6Mbps downstream. The enhanced package doubled it's downstream speed from 8Mbps to 16Mbps, and upstream went from 1Mbps to 2Mbps.

The higher speeds will automatically be added for existing customers. To activate the new speed tiers, customers need to power off their modem for a minute, then power it back on.

AT&T offers Dish Network service, adds cell site to Pembroke Pines

This week, AT&T Wireless activated a new cell site in southwestern Pembroke Pines on Pembroke Road, which is "an area in great need of the expanded coverage," spokeswoman Kelly Starling said via e-mail. The site is part of a $220 million investment in AT&T's Florida wireless network this year.

The new site provides added coverage to southwestern Pembroke Pines and northwestern Miramar, from S.W. 172nd Ave. to S.W. 196th Ave and from Pines Boulevard south to Miramar Parkway.

The company reports they plan to activate another new cell site on N.W. 184th Ave. later this year.

In addition, AT&T is allowing customers in the Southeastern states to order the DISH Network service, which offers more than 250 channels.  Go here to read the press release from AT&T. For more information on prices and bundles, visit www.att.com/dish.

Where no home theater has gone before

OK so technically it's not where "no" home theater has gone before, since there are several people in this solar system with seriously devoted sci-fi themed rooms, but I thought I'd share this little gem I heard about from Into Tomorrow.

Electronic House writes about a local Trekkie with style: A resident from Palm Beach County has turned their home theater into a starship bridge from Star Trek. He also built a bar and ready room area. This is one truly glorious piece of nerdness. Click here to see the room.

SanDisk device puts downloaded shows on the TV

SanDisk is making a USB drive that lets you view the shows you download off the Internet on a television. I think it's great that there are devices like this coming out that connect the Internet and television experience. I remember visiting a Radio Shack about a year ago looking for a cable to connect my laptop to my television so I could watch what I downloaded, and they didn't have anything that could do that. (Ugh.) But glad to see that a big name like SanDisk is getting in the PC-meets-TV game.

By MAY WONG
AP Technology Writer

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- (AP) -- Flash memory maker SanDisk Corp. on Monday will debut an online video service and a USB flash drive that can carry television programs and videos from a computer for playback on TVs.

The Sansa TakeTV video player -- an ensemble of an oversized USB drive, remote control and a small dock that connects to a TV -- and its accompanying video service, Fanfare, marks the latest attempt by a company looking to bridge content between the PC and the television.

Similar to using a USB drive to store and move data files, users of TakeTV can drag-and-drop video files stored on their computer -- Fanfare downloads, home videos or other unrestricted video content from the Web -- onto the device. Users can then plug it into the cradle connected to a TV. A simple menu appears on the TV to scroll through the files for playback.

The TakeTV player is $99.99 for a 4 gigabyte model and $149.99 for an 8 GB one that can hold up to 10 hours of video. Fanfare, in a test stage, offers premium TV shows for $1.99 per download -- roughly the same price as rival services, but SanDisk says it hopes to ultimately provide a broad mixture of free and ad-supported content as well as pay-per-download videos.

Fanfare's catalog at launch is small, with about 85 titles. It features TV shows from CBS, including "CSI'' and "Survivor," Showtime, TV Guide, and Smithsonian Networks. Dozens of titles are being added each week, SanDisk said.

The online video service is a new venture for Milpitas-based SanDisk, which is the leading maker of flash memory cards and holds a distant but steady second-place position behind Apple Inc. in the portable media player market with a 10 percent share in the U.S., according to market researcher IDC.

SanDisk saw an opportunity in the fledgling market it didn't want to pass up, said Kate Purmal, senior vice president and general manager of SanDisk's digital content unit.

The distribution of videos, movies and television shows over the Internet is expected to grow as companies ranging from Apple and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to the TV networks themselves compete for the audience. The various methods of getting the video from over the Internet onto the TV, however, has yet to become easy or cheap enough for the mainstream market.

CBS Corp., one of SanDisk's first major partners, found in its consumer research of the TakeTV product that people liked its simplicity, compact size, and price, said David Poltrack, president of CBS Vision.

SanDisk will need to build a larger video catalog to succeed, said Danielle Levitas, analyst at IDC.

Dunder Mifflin Infinity

If you watched The Office last night, you saw the commercial for the new Dunder Mifflin website where you can apply to be a part of the Dunder Mifflin family at www.dundermifflininfinity.com.

As Office fans know, the fictional paper company is a disaster. But ironically the site -- which was an online game to run your own branch -- crashed last night. Or at least that is what seems to have happened, as it was full of error message gobbily gook. It's seems to be working now, but some forums are reporting bugs with the game.

Fans are able to become their own branch managers for several virtual branches and recruit employees, and branches compete against each other. One fan is so dedicated to winning, he made up his own recruitment video for Elizabeth, N.J.

As a fan I hope the site won't go haywire again. I want to go on all day long. (That's what she said.)

AT&T not saying where in Florida new television services will launch

Well, the big news of the day is that AT&T is preparing to be a competitor to Comcast by offering broadband and digital television to Florida, as you may have read in my previous post. But as an update to that, I spoke with AT&T spokesman Don Sadler and "for competitive reasons," he said AT&T is not saying exactly where they will launch the new services or how long it will be until we know more. "In the future" is the only time frame they've given us reporters, so until there is another announcement (could be tomorrow, could be 10 years from now) we'll know more.

But of course it won't be in 10 years from now. Judging from news in other areas, the company is working fast to implement these new services. AT&T says it is expecting to deploy it's U-verse service (the Internet protocol-based television) to 18 million households by the end of 2008. As of Sept. 5, there were 100,000 U-verse TV and Internet customers in the country. You can check out other news releases of where AT&T has launched U-verse here.

*whew* NBC shows available on Amazon

Dear fellow fans of Heroes and The Office: If you panicked last week when iTunes dropped NBC shows, you can relax now. Amazon's Unbox digital download service will be carrying NBC's shows. How much will they be sold for? Well, as of now the old episodes are still $1.99, but it's not clear how those prices will change. Here is an excerpt of the story running on the wires:

NBC IN DEAL WITH AMAZON TO SELL SHOWS ON THE WEB

By BROOKS BARNES

c.2007 New York Times News Service

   NBC Universal significantly deepened its relationship with Amazon's digital video download service after a dispute with Apple over the pricing of television shows on iTunes.

   The media conglomerate, part of General Electric, said Tuesday that Amazon had agreed to give it something that Apple would not: greater flexibility in the pricing and packaging of video downloads. As a result, NBC Universal said it had agreed to sell a wide variety of television programming on Amazon's fledgling Unbox download service, including the drama "Heroes'' and the comedies "The Office'' and "30 Rock." Episodes will be available on Unbox the day after they are shown.

   While Amazon is still working to determine pricing, Unbox typically charges more for newer releases than for older ones. Unbox also gives consumers more options, including whether to rent a movie for $3.99 or buy a download for $14.99. Amazon agreed to offer promotions, including a 30 percent discount when buying full seasons of television shows.

Plasma Prevails

The other day I got the chance to talk television with William Schindler, Panasonic's vice president for electrical engineering at the Panasonic Plasma Display Laboratory of America. (I'm surprised all that fit on a business card.) William and others from Panasonic demonstrated some of their newest plasma TVs in the the Ester Williams Suite of the Raleigh Hotel in Miami Beach.

With the curtains closed and lights dimmed, he played demonstrations on a plasma set next to an LCD set. It was clear to see that the image on a plasma was far better, and for several reasons. But those differences are not something that can be easily seen in a florescent retail showroom.

Try this test the next time you are gawking at the televisions at a big box retailer: The LCD screens are back lit, so if you tap the screen you can see the light. If you are looking at an LCD head-on, then it's very hard to tell the difference between LCD and plasma. But if you view it from an angle, the colors begin to fade.

That doesn't happen when you look at a plasma from an angle, because each pixel is its own source of light. Having each pixel emit it's own light also made it superior in contrast. With LCD being back lit, the black wasn't as true of a black as the plasma when looking at the sets side-by-side. Same with the colors.

Another interesting test was when he compared viewing fast motion simultaneously with a plasma and LCD side-by-side. As scenery began to zoom by, you could still make out a good portion of the detailed lines. But LCD couldn't keep up with speed as well as the plasma, and the scenes would blur more than they would in the plasma. For this reason, plasma is clearly superior for gaming.

Going to a briefing like this, it's clear that they wanted me to fall in love with plasma. But to give them credit, the presentation was not completely one sided. Panasonic does make LCD televisions -- just not as many -- so the meeting didn't become a complete LCD bashing session. LCD is a fine technology for a brightly lit room, and chances are you won't notice the differences unless you had both a plasma and LCD side-by-side.

So if plasma is so great and cheaper than LCD, why is Panasonic going to great lengths to prove to me that plasma is better than LCD? They tell me the general public thinks plasma is dangerous and are hesitant to buy it. The idea in many consumer's minds is that it can blow up since the light is from phosphors and gas mixtures, and that the image can easily burn on the screen.

William tells me the gas is "totally inflammable" and there are only a couple thimbles full of gas in each set. And as for images burning on the screen, he tells me the stories began when plasmas first came out and large companies would use them to display messages in lobbies -- like at an airport. But when that screen wouldn't change and would stay on 24/7, over time the image eventually burned. The same thing happened on other basic televisions, but those were cheaper to replace so companies didn't complain as much.

Panasonic is not getting returns for burning, he said, and that today's sets have improved technology to help that problem. In Panasonic press-release tech speak: "Newer Plasma designs radically minimize the likelihood of permanent images retention through improved xenon and neon mixtures and a more efficient cell design that allows for more light with less degradation in the phosphors. The less aging a phosphor exhibits, the less likely it is for permanent image retention to occur."

Panasonic is putting lots of resources into pushing plasma. They expect the demand for plasma TVs to top 25 million units in 2010, and have a new plasma panel factory -- the fourth -- at Amagasaki, Japan. The new facility, the company said, will increase Panasonic's production capability by 170,000 panels a month, bringing the company to making the equivalent of 592,000 42-inch panels a month.

Does Lemon need a lesson in tech etiquette?

If you caught video of the Dolphins mini-camp, you may have noticed quarterback Cleo Lemon had a Bluetooth stuck in his ear during a media interview.

It seemed rude to some people that he didn't take the phone off, and Cam Cameron brought it up in a press conference that he didn't understand why Lemon had the phone in his ear.

I didn't think having a Bluetooth resting on your ear was something worth bringing up in a press conference. I was with my family when the news came on, and it was clear that my parents found it disrespectful and were shocked that someone would dare have a phone in their ear, whereas I just thought it was pretty lazy on his part. But if I was interviewing him, I don't think I would feel offended.

Perhaps with new technology comes the need to learn new etiquette. Our parents taught us table manners, so the next generation needs to teach their children things like cell phone and texting manners. An Associated Press story featured in today's Business Monday about E-mail etiquette seemed like common sense to me, but then again many people I know could use a few lessons in tech etiquette -- especially in a culture that is expected to be in touch 24/7.