Comcast is, by most accounts, a middling broadband provider and a poor corporate citizen (see linkfest below). It also looks like they use their power to censor critical speech.

Last month, a YouTube user posted this video of a Comcast tech sleeping on the job. In titling over the video, the user also “thanks” the company for “two broken routers, four hour appointment blocks, weeklong internet outages, long hold times, high prices, three missed appointments, promising to call back and then not calling.” It’s hilarious.

Now, it appears that Comcast has tried to keep people from seeing it. As Herold Feld explains on his blog:

Last Friday night, ABC’s “Nightline” aired a segment on consumers using the internet to strike back at companies. This segment ended by running the now famous Comcast sleeping repairman video.

But that’s not how it ended on Comcast’s [Video on Demand] system, apparently. The “Comcastic” version dropped the part critical of Comcast.

Comcast replied through a spokesperson that the problem was on the ABC side.

The Consumerist apparently broke the story, begged for reader help in getting a good video capture, and then posted a link to this video capture. Here’s Feld’s reaction to the official explanation:

Still, am I the only one who notices this apparent never ending stream of corporate oopsies. Not just from Comcast mind. The times myspace drops the Savetheinternet and anti-Ted Stevens blogs, the time Cox blocks Craigslist, the time AOL blocked the “Dear AOL” campaign emails critical of its “Certified mail” program?

How many “oopsies” before I get off the paranoid speculation list?

Harold, you’re not just being paranoid. Comcast also yanked a regular AFL-CIO town hall meeting after one meeting featured the testimony of Comcast workers about hostile working conditions. They have a track record of censorship, so “oops” just doesn’t cut it.

It’s not like Comcast is the only broadband provider with terrible customer service, either. In two separate blog posts (one, two), I could only partially recount my experience with Verizon DSL: 3 weeks of down time, 5 missed service appointments, 20+ hours on hold. It was only resolved after I worked through the PA Public Utilities Commission. I’m still a Verizon customer, too. Where else will I go? Comcast? Dialup? Starbucks?

Which brings me back to net neutrality: How in the world are we supposed to trust these companies with the direction of the internet when they can’t even competently administer the end nodes? How can we trust them not to degrade unfavorable traffic if they already blatantly censor content?

We can’t, and that’s not just paranoia.

P.S. If you don’t know about Comcast’s awful corporate citizenship, here’s a link fest. They bust unions in flagrant violation of the National Labor Relations Act (even suing the city of Oakland over a pro-union ordinance), they demand tax breaks from the city of Philadelphia under threats to leave town, and (with a big assist from Philly’s City Council) they have failed to provide Philadelphia with a community access TV station.