said by funchords :

Except on Comcast, where it does -- albeit it never leaves Comcast's network but where it does ride on Comcast's network, that network is part of the Internet.

said by karlmarx :

Look at the cell phone this way. I used to pay sprint 59.99 for a 1500 minute plan. BUT, add in the taxes and fees, and the real price was about $82.00 a month. I dumped that when I left, and when I came back I bought a t-mobile prepaid. 10 cents a minute. I am using about 300 minutes a month, and I pay, bingo. $30.00. Period. No taxes, no fees, no early termination fees. The way I see it, if you're not a heavy phone users (i.e. less than 20 minutes a day), then prepay is definitely the way to go. Charge up $100.00, and get a free $50.00 upgrade.

said by Matt :

Comcast controls the QoS on "their" network. Who cares if their network is attached to the internet or not, it never leaves their backbone so no, it never traverses the internet.

said by ftth_freak :

Obviously you are technically lacking in VoIP knowledge. Cable Co's like Comcast, Time Warner, Charter, Cox and others use an entirely separate CMTS and separate return and forward signal than their cable modem system. This insures the QoS for the cable co's VoIP/phone service. For all of you P2P defenders, this mean when you are sucking up all of the upload and downoad capacity in your neighborhood with your cable modem, the VoIP/phone CMTS will not be affected. When using a third party VoIP like Vonage, Vonage piggy backs off of the same bandwidth as your cable modem and thus will be affected by the users bandwidth habits.

For instance, a user who pays for the lowest level of modem speed and uses Vonage will hear a degraded quality of voice and could also experiance dropped call if the down/up load a large file at the same time.

FYI...all things are not created equal in reality...only in your mind.

said by ftth_freak :

Cable Co's like Comcast, Time Warner, Charter, Cox and others use an entirely separate CMTS and separate return and forward signal than their cable modem system. This insures the QoS for the cable co's VoIP/phone service. For all of you P2P defenders, this mean when you are sucking up all of the upload and downoad capacity in your neighborhood with your cable modem, the VoIP/phone CMTS will not be affected.

said by Anonymous :

Cable co in my area charges $29.99/mo if you bundle all three services so it's worth $5 extra just to have these benefits.

said by Anonymous :

I've had it for almost 3 years now. Also this is regular pricing.

said by DonLibes :

Please identify the cable company to which you are referring, preferably with a website that posts the rates so we can all see them.