Time Warner was going to leave me without internet service from yesterday (Thursday) until next Monday until I said by then I could have service from a competitor in place. Then the guy on the phone with me rattled the cages of enough supervisors that they're going to try to fix it today.
The takeaway lesson is that we need vigorous competition among internet service providers. If an area has just one provider, they should be held to the same standards as other utilities, like the electric company, the water supply, and the telephone company.
What's below the orange "Fleur-de-Kos" is an example of how long an intermittent problem can go unacknowledged and misdiagnosed.
Anyone who can come up with better technology to diagnose intermittent electronic problems deserves to get rich, and maybe a Nobel Prize.