bitbol

Charter has initiated a dirty little tactic of redirecting all bad requests to their own error that is riddled with adverts. It has the typical domain parking site which consists of irrelevant links to "vacations" and so forth (click image for larger screenshot). Based on this and other factors, I can tell that this is surely done for profit, not because it is "handy." Plus, there is no way to get rid of it because turning it off only sets a cookie (which doesn't last long) and then redirects to Microsoft Live Search, where they likely also get money in return. This is also something that EarthLink previously did, and was highly criticized for.

I preferred my original setup, which would simply give the error page produced by FireFox. Like one of the comments from the slashdot article, I would promptly cancel my service with them and find another way to access the internet, but I cannot do that because my parents would die if they lost cable TV (which is bundled). If anything goes wrong with my internet connection, I think I will call them and give them hell about this, but until then, it often does not effect me often enough.

Previously: Charter hate Google Maps

Labels: Internet, Rants