Competitive arguments aside for a moment - here in rural Minnesota, it would be near impossible for Frontier Communications to provide shittier, less competitive service options than virtually any other provider on the planet.

Verizon fixed 4G/5G service is an order of magnitude (or in my specific case, two or more orders of magnitude) faster than the *best* Frontier has to offer - at 30% lower cost.

Here at least, Frontier's idea of "innovation" is being forced (by the PUC) to install fiber-fed remote DSLAM's connected back to an exchange that's in turn connected to the rest of the world solely by copper. Yeah, you read that right. There is less than 40Mbps (far less, actually - was around 12Mbps Internet bandwidth last I knew, 8x T1) of Internet bandwidth *total* shared among all of the customers in the exchange (of around 150 voice and data customers at it's peak, both in town and rural).

Granted, they have almost no customers left now that another independent company has overbuilt a good portion of that exchange footprint with fiber. But, they've lost so much business (and subsidy) in that area that I find it hard to believe they even have enough gross revenue from that exchange to pay the electric bill and property tax for the CO building and property itself. There is, and will remain *zero* incentive to invest a single penny in that exchange unless it's purely a government handout.

This particular exchange is admittedly an outlier in that it's not connected by fiber to Frontier's network, but other similarly rural exchanges that *are* directly on their fiber network have similar problems - an aged (to ancient) purely copper outside plant, equally aged broadband technologies in use (ADSL2+ at best), poor line conditions with similarly poor throughput (our ADSL2+ loop was ~500 feet, and never saw line rates over 2Mbps downstream, friends in other nearby exchanges had very similar experiences), and simple network congestion at every turn.

Don't get me wrong - the folks working in the field for Frontier (what few are left around here) are really good people. They catch the brunt of the complaints unjustly, but are powerless to do much about it. They don't write the checks needed to even start resolving the issues - if management actually listened to them, and paid any attention at all to anything the people actually doing the work had to say, they wouldn't be in nearly the bad way that they are now.

The reality is that they've mismanaged their capital, customer and subsidy revenue so badly over the last 20 years that they really don't deserve the business or loyalty they do still get.

I get it's not everywhere, but here in Minnesota (and other nearby, predominantly rural states), it certainly is.

So, even if Verizon were to gobble them up - good riddance.

I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

To call Frontier Communications a "leading U.S. communications provider" in 2024 (or for that matter, anytime in the last two decades really) is akin to proclaiming that an abacus is a "leading computational device".

... the universal "personal area network" that still encounters crippling stability or interoperability issues for even some of the most basic use cases, despite more than 30 years of development.

Yes, that company.

Remember kids - a universal anything fits nothing.

It was additionally reported that nearly half of the customers in their fiber footprint have already signed up for service. Frontier says that they should have all 14 customers connected by the end of this year.

"Frontier is best known for its rural DSL internet service..." That sounds suspiciously like it was meant to be a compliment there, bud.

What Frontier is known for here in southern Minnesota is notoriously shitty service all around.

Entire rural CO's and many RT's are still connected to the rest of the world by copper and a small number of T1's. Their DSL service "up to 6Mpbs" service is a complete farce when there often isn't even that much bandwidth available to the entire exchange or remote terminal worth of customers. Welcome to "up to 0.6Mbps" - on a *good* day, and if you're less than a thousand feet from the DSLAM, and your cable pair is actually dry...

They are slowly being eaten alive by their competition, thankfully. But the level of mismanagement, miscalculation, and horrible service has been nothing short of astonishing.

Fraudtier - the exact opposite of stable, or competent for that matter. They are so terrible that they truly have *earned* the "corporate death penalty" fate that awaits them eventually.

I think you should be heeding some of your own advice there, buddy. Normally, I don't feed trolls, but I'm feeling particularly ornery today, so here goes...

So you're now quoting the very same layman's definition of a "ballast" from Wikipedia I referenced in our previous discussion here to belittle someone else for not being "educated"? This, coming from the same troll who was unable/unwilling to comprehend the fact that an offline LED power supply (whether a simple, linear deign, or a more complicated SMPS type) was analogous to a gas discharge lamp ballast... That's rich.

LED's require their junction current to be limited, period. However, when the power source cannot be configured to supply "constant current", and is a "constant voltage" type, a series resistor is inserted in circuit, with it's value selected based on desired junction current, source voltage, and junction voltage. That series resistance (whether supplied from winding resistance, external resistor, or a combination of both) is known as... ballast resistance.

Rather than continuing to cultivate your own astonishing ignorance on subject matters you obviously know less than nothing about, I'd suggest you search that empty head of yours and try to locate two brain cells to rub together, educate yourself before you speak/type, and try to form a coherent thought. I know that may be a stretch for you, but give it a try - you'd be a better person for it.

And, if you aren't willing to actually try, then shut your trap.

--Brad

In the future, I suggest you do a little research of your own before you accuse others being "ignorant". Unfortunately, I fear that bit of advice is nothing more than wasted words on a blunt object such as yourself. But, I welcome you to prove my fears unfounded.

Moving on, let's consult Wikipedia for a reasonable common-man's look at the disputed subject matter... From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrical_ballast we have:

"An electrical ballast is a device intended to limit the amount of current in an electric circuit." Seems pretty straightforward.

Applying that to LED lighting, LED's must have their junction current limited. Ideally, for a constant brightness and reasonable life expectation, it should be fairly tightly regulated regulated - usually by a circuit most often referred to as a switch mode power supply, operating in a "current regulation" mode.

Therefore, as I said in my reply, it's proper to refer to it as a "power supply". However, in terms of a "ballast" used in gas discharge lamps, it's performing the same function.

Hence referring to is as an "analogue". Perhaps you need to look that up? Here, I'll help you with that - https://www.google.com/search?q=analogue+definition

Are there any other multi-syllable, "big" words you're having trouble comprehending in either of my replies? I can try to help you with those too if you'd like...

--Brad

Well, if you consider a "ballast" as a sort of "power supply", then, yes, there most certainly are "ballasts" in many LED lamps.

LED traffic lights usually have several long-ish strings of LED's (each with a voltage drop of ~2V) wired together so that the drop resistor does not need to dissipate much heat under normal operation - identical in concept to a string of common LED Christmas lights. In the case where there are these long series connected LED strings, it's true that there's no "ballast" per-se.

But, in the case of replacement LED bulbs (40W, 60W, 80W "equivalent" bulbs commonly available now), there is indeed a power supply circuit inside each bulb that regulates the LED current, and some (many, now) provide for phase controlled dimmability too.

LED "flood lights", which would include street lamps, also have a fairly sophisticated power supply in them, particularly important where the power to the lamp housing can be less than ideal, and subjected to large voltage spikes/transients - which can be downright deadly to the light emitting diode junctions in the LED (amongst other things). To get the long lifespan, the power supply circuitry needs to be well designed, built with high quality components, and the LED's themselves need proper thermal management. Not impossible, but not cheap either.

So, in the case of "cheap" LED lights, there isn't necessarily a "ballast". Anything more efficient or higher luminosity than that, there is a "power supply" which would the be LED analogue to a "ballast".

--Brad

Ironically, a cogent argument seems to be the antithesis of your rebuttal(s).

In an attempt to coax you into offering up a meaningful, cogent counter-argument of your own, I would ask you one simple question:

Why did Apple offer up a $22.99 "refund" to all Breaking Bad Season 5 HD "Season Pass" customers when you, in your own incredibly educated opinion, loudly proclaim to have had absolutely no reason to do so?

Normally, I'd be glad to debate your chemical-free toilet paper example with you. But, I'm afraid I currently have no faith that you're capable of discussing it intelligently, and your counter would reek more than your example product once used.

When you finish high school and are hopefully able to use several multi-syllable words together to form a coherent counter argument, please reply. Until then, please go back to Facebook and playing Candy Crush Saga on your Android phone.

This may be asking for too much, but I'll try to use smaller words here so that you might actually be able to comprehend the issue at hand.

It matters not what the price is, or what the product is called. The issue is with false/misleading representation of what the offered product consisted of.

Apple iTunes initially offered for sale a "Season Pass" of Breaking Bad Season 5. No disclaimer was made within the iTunes Store at the time of purchase stating that it included only episodes 1 through 8, or that it was a "half season", or that the other half of the season was going to be offered up separately as "Season 6" or "The Final Season". Further, no indication of that information was present on the receipt from iTunes.

So it comes down to being a false/misleading advertising through the manipulation of terms - specifically the term "season".

From laws-dot-com, we have "Advertising law also recognizes the manipulation of standards as a deception under consumer law. This means that a company will begin to change something, such as a unit of measurement, to mean something different from how it is normally understood. This will allow companies to charge more for their services, but is a violation of rights according to consumer law." In this specific case, the "unit of measurement" being manipulated is the length of a TV season.

Based on both of those commonly held interpretations, the issue is with what exactly comprises a television "season". And, fortunately that much is an immutable fact - by AMC's own publicized information, Breaking Bad Season 5 consists of 16 episodes.

As to who's responsible for resolving the debacle, that too is clear. The customer purchases the content from Apple iTunes, not from AMC or Sony Entertainment. The money goes to Apple first, who takes their cut and then disburses the remainder. There is no legal recourse or remedy to be had from any other party than Apple here, contrary to what all of the fanboi shills want to proclaim at the top of their lungs.

iTunes is Apple's content "walled garden", so by design they accept responsibility for the good and the bad that comes of it. If AMC/Sony chose or directed iTunes to represent the first eight episodes as "season 5", and the last eight episodes as something else - that's Apple's problem to resolve with both the content provider, and their customers. How Apple resolves it with AMC/Sony is a separate matter completely.

This was a case of false/deceptive advertising, plain and simple. And, that is also exactly why Apple did what it did.

Fanboi? Unclear. Obtuse? Apparently.

I have this belief that if I buy something I can do what the hell I want with it.

Which is indeed the case.

You can do whatever you want with it. That includes figuring out how to install Linux on it.

Microsoft has no obligation to assist or otherwise support you in that effort.

End of discussion.

It did fail on "political" reasons, mainly referring to corporate politics, you could boil that down to "pricing" if you wish.

It was priced at better than *4* times as much as *2* POTS lines in my area, delivering the same number of voice channels, and using at most the same amount of switch backplane capacity (two DS0's). And the Telco's got the advantage of having the A/D conversions done at the customer premise (giving cleaner analog performance), and using half the copper pairs of two POTS lines (once the integrated NT interface became the defacto standard). Benefits on two fronts that should have ultimately made providing the service *cheaper*, but it didn't.

And, on the technical aspect, it too failed. Not because the technology didn't work, but because of the limited reach it had. "Back then", even in metropolitan areas 12-18kft of cable was fairly easy to exceed if you were in the wrong place in town. Forget rural, it was often well over length by the time you reached the first home/business/farm out of town.

Overall, it failed. Miserably. ISDN PRI survives and thrives to this day, but is really only seen used in high density voice-grade situations such as ISP dialup or business applications with PBX'es and a need for 6+ voice lines, DID, inbound and outbound CID, and all the other amenities you can get with it.

Brad