Lincoln Nebraska holds hearings over buggy Time Warner PVRs

I've spent a lot of time as a journalist covering City Council sessions in Philadelphia, but I've never sat in on a hearing quite as geeky as this. A Lincoln, Nebraska City Councilman will hold hearings in March on Time Warner's PVRs which as pretty much anyone in the country who uses them can tell you, kinda stink.

Councilman Jonathon Cook -- a Time Warner customer -- says subscribers "are not getting what they paid for," with Time Warner PVRs. Apparently the city's franchise agreement with the cable company allows City Council to hold such hearings. It's entirely clear what actions the city could take against Time Warner in response to the hearings, but if there's one thing I learned during my aforementioned years covering legislative sessions, it's that you don't need actual power to hold a public hearing, you just need the urge to grandstand on a topic.

Lincoln Time Warner customers have complained that a new program guide rolled out by the cable company is both ugly and buggy, and that the cable boxes are slow to react to button presses on a remote control, all of which sound par for the course for generic cable company PVRs.

The Lincoln Journal Star, which reports the story also has a page filled with customer complaints/suggestions for Time Warner.

[via digg]