Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
roze318
Enthusiast - Level 3

Letter I sent...

(And if you moderators want to delete "duplicate" posts, please delete the previous one I used as a reply!!!)

Dear President Dennis Bone:


I have been a FIOS customer for almost two years now and a Verizon customer (and all the iterations before it became Verizon) for over 3 decades, but not for much longer.


I simply cannot stand the new Channel Guide (guide). I can't read the new guide. It's awful. No contrast and I've got tons of black horizontal lines across the entire screen if any text lives there, even outside the guide. Inside the guide, I'm either reading blurry white on gray or light black on light gray! All that gray and light bluish gray...did someone just get hired away from Microsoft (er...MS from the 90s)?


Descriptions, aka the smaller type, are very blurry. Even my TV picture has been affected!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm sure it's due to even more changes made in order to accommodate 3D.

I've tried a bunch of settings to get my sharper picture back but since I have another TV that I can use, annnnd since I may just cancel the TV service if something isn't done, well, I figure I can address that later, if at all.


The guide is also stupid now. It used to be smart. Why when I use the BACK to PREVIOUS channel, I have to suffer with the guide coming up telling me what's there? I know what's there...that's why I'm returning to that channel. ##@!$##@  And in SD, that description not only takes up half the screen, but it sits there for way too long, especially since I ALREADY KNOW WHAT'S THERE.


Why did you change how reminders are set? If I find a program in the FUTURE and click on it, I move to that channel. Why? If I clicked on the current program, that would make sense. NOT A FUTURE PROGRAM. I'm not stupid...I would not click on a program in the future to watch it now. Clearly I'm clicking on it to set as a reminder or to get info. Long story short, I can't simply set a REMINDER like before. You've added clicks to the process of setting reminders (which used to be flawless and fast).


Oh, and the reminder indicators....Hmmmm, could you make them blend into the program name any more? Let's see, maybe make them even grayer?!!


Also, what happened to the program-in-session indicator? Now it appears that EVERY PROGRAM is beginning anew. Before this ridiculous revision, if a program had begun in a previous timeframe, the title would reflect that.


And why do I need to see the description of shows that I don't care about while viewing the full screen guide? That's a terrible waste of real estate. Browsing the guide now takes TWICE the TIME as I wade through each of the descriptions (partial descriptions, no less, which are useless). Give me SINGLE lines in the Guide...if I'm interested I'll open for more info.

Speaking of info, where are all the actor names under Full Info? Now I just see a few of them and then I see dots indicating there are more. I know you are provided this information. WHY DON'T YOU GIVE IT TO YOUR VIEWERS?!???!!!


The logos also waste space. Almost 25% of the horizontal space is used for the channel logo column. That's just silly and unnecessary.


Lastly, what is the Classic View? It's just more salt in the wound, yes? It's a tease, isn't it? Why can't the Classic View be used to return me to the previous, nothing-is-wrong-with-it-or-at-least-nothing-warranting-these-huge-stupid-changes version of the guide. Please let us go back to the previous version...You can monitor everything we do in FiOS, so just let customers return to the old guide and you'll see how many folks decide to stay there.


Worst of all...Where was the warning?
You have that capability as well! Stop sending me messages about your overpriced movies. Instead, solicit my feedback about stupid changes that someone who apparently doesn't use the guide has decided to make. That way I might have an opportunity to provide feedback...or at least time to find a new provider.

I guess you ignored the sage advice...If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Bottom line, if you don't let me return to a better or the previous Channel Guide, which I rely on heavily, then I'm going to return to cable TV or maybe even try Dish Network. I hear they offer customers the option to customize their channel guide skins or at least the color schemes. And that makes sense since (A) there are vision-impaired, color-blind, elderly, and other diverse customer sets in your community and (B) it is the TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY!!!!!!


If this action is any reflection as to how you view your customers, especially considering all that is going on with the US economy, then Verizon's disregard for its customers appears epic.

Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
Malcolm_Stanley
Contributor - Level 3

We are listening here and elsewhere to what customers are saying about the new guide. While a lot of the feedback is good, not all of it is, and that is why we have forums like this: so you can be certain your opinions are heard. Thank you for your honest feedback. We appreciate it greatly, and will use it to continue to make the FiOS TV product even better. 

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
jeffcoll
Enthusiast - Level 1

I agree with the original poster, the new guide is awful!

If the changes were for the "techies", HD or 3D users, then give it to them and let us average users have the simple, fast, easy to read guide back.

We have always praised Verizon's guide as the bar to which other providers should be measured. Not any more!

Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
questioning_old
Contributor - Level 2

Actually I find that if I hit the "guide" button a couple of times, it will bring me to a list of upcoming programs with black print which is easier to read.  The synopsis on the bottom of the screen is still readable and so is the list of upcoming shows on the "info" screen.  It's just the standard TV guide list of the programs on all the stations that is hard on my eyes. 

I have another thought I wanted to put out there.  I have read in a few posts that some people are considering cancelling their Verizon Fios service and switching to another provider and a consumer always has right to do that but realistically, it's not as simple as switching banks.  It was an all day project just to set up the service here in my apartment and to have it removed would take just as long with the co-axial cables feeding through the cross base under the floor and the boxes that were installed in the kitchen and in the bedroom closet.  And then it would be another all day project to have a new service installed which may not be much better and which, I hate to say, would probably have its own set of problems.  At least for me, the time and expense involved in switching providers would outweight any real benefit if it's just about the TV Guide listing.  The service would have to be not working at all or working poorly for me to consider switching. 

If customers could switch that easily and a lot of people were able to do that, that would certainly send a clear message but if you ask me, I'm sure a lot of other people besides myself don't really have the time to do all of that.  My Internet service is top notch, my TV picture quality is clear, and my phone service is realiable.  I just feel like these corporate giants have got us no matter what.  I never thought I would see the day when we have to pay just to get decent TV reception and I knew even when I started the Fios service that there would be issues coming up along the way.

So given all of this, I hope Verizon is seriously considering our feedback and suggestions to improve the service. 

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
SageMedia
Enthusiast - Level 1

The Channel Guide is just incredibly poorly designed. It's really hard to believe that a team of "experts" came up with this.  First, there is a terrible waste of screen space that coud be better apportioned to more detailed information - the whole Guide is framed by empty or unproductive space leaving precious little for what we really want.  Could it really be true that the provider of information about movies - I'm assuming it's TV Guide - does not provide any cast details that could be shown without having to drill down into the info section - newspapers do better than this.  And, the color design?  You can't be serious...just awful!

Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
tns
Master - Level 2

Some of your arguments may be correct.

But the "wasted space" is actually trying to fix a often complained about problem of the old guide being outside the "safe" margins and therrfore hidden on many TV's.

TV Guide doesn't supply the guide info.  The TV guide logo is a requirement because all these Guide on all these providers infringe on patent held by TV Guide's parent Company.  Verizon has said they are trying to improve this info but using multiple sources in addition to the company they have been using.  Don't know how well that will work

The drill down on the guide is annoying but not really a change in 1.9.  It was also like this in 1.8.  They have been talking about improving the cast info for awhile, but its not directly related to the new or old guide.  Sometimes some of the main cast members shows without drilling down and sometimes it doesn't

Apparently the colors bother a lot of people although it looks okay to others.  Suggest you look for and vote on one of the suggestions that suggest that users have a choice of color and fonts in a future release.  http://forums.verizon.com/t5/Share-Your-Ideas-with-Verizon/idb-p/ideas .

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
questioning_old
Contributor - Level 2

Wow...it's really *that* bad?  I know it's not great and I'm not thrilled with it either but I've just never heard of people taking the whole thing *that* seriously.  Life has its share of unfairness and a little inconvenience at times but we have to move on. 

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
SageMedia
Enthusiast - Level 1

Clearly I must have something set wrong as my guide comes up as 4x3 and not 16x9. Of course, as such it does display the full raster and the wasted space is still just that as there is no cutoff.  And, the fact that we've had to "drill down" in past versions of the guide simply shows the inability to provide a slightly more in-depth level of information over several efforts.  If the providers of this information cannot include something as simple and defining as key cast members, perhaps they are not the right vendors for this service.  Certainly, color is personal, but yikes this is awful...and, I was told by a Verizon tech that they were working on a way to personalized this choice - perhaps that was inaccurate.

And, no this is not the most important thing in the world, but the level of design and function represented by this guide is certainly lacking. 

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
questioning_old
Contributor - Level 2

We have made our opinions and suggestions known about this and if a lot of us are not going to switch providers for practical reasons, then we're just going to have to deal with it.  I think that customer service really has taken a back seat with a lot of these corporate giants.  It's all about the money and a lot of them really don't care. 

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Re: Channel Guide is Simply AWFUL
Ron_in_New_City

I agree with all the complaints about the guide's color scheme, contrast, unnecessary summaries when trying to page through quickly, etc.

But one of the most peculiar things with the new guide is that if I'm watching channel 10, and press the guide button, the selected channel and summary is for channel 8.  So if I keep hitting "guide", then "OK", I keep jumping down 2 channels at a time.   And if I'm on a low or high channel, the guide stops and won't roll back (so you can't go from channel 2 to 430, but instead have to go back up through all the channels.  Alternatively, you have to leave the guide, change channels from 2 to 430, and then go back to the guide, which starts now at the high end, and only lets you move down.   This is dumb - but the 2 channel "offset" between what you're watching and what is centered on the guide is even dumber.

It may seem like whining to some of you - but living with this guide day-to-day has become very VERY annoying - what was wrong with the old guide?  Can we opt for the guide we prefer?.

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