Since I moved out to LA, I’ve joined up with Time Warner as both an internet and cable provider. I’ve never really been happy with any of my service providers (phone, cable, Internet), but Time Warner seemed like the lesser evil of the ones I’m eligible for, and they haven’t been too bad — they’ve had fairly solid prices and the service hasn’t been terrible. Sure, there are dropouts, but I don’t expect any service to be up 100% of the time — if they were really bad, I’d switch.

And then, the other day, I got this email from them.

Basically, they’re saying that they face increasing contract prices when it comes time to renewing their content deals, and they’re telling me, their customer, that they may have to raise prices on my service if I want to keep getting the same programming that I’ve gotten before. In essence, they’re trying to say that it’s not their fault that prices will be going up — it’s those evil content providers who are fleecing the innocent Time Warner. And if they do raise prices, it’ll be my fault as a customer — I should have supported them when I wanted them to get tough.

What a complete crock.

Of course, I hit roll over. I’m Time Warner’s customer — I chose them, not the other way around. If they’re going to raise prices, I’m going to hold them accountable, not some network trying to break even on a show I like. There’s already way too much crappy TV on, if you ask me, from those nonsensical reality shows to pointless “news” programming twenty-four hours a day. If prices are going up, it’s not my fault — I pay my bills on time every month. If Time Warner is finding they’re paying too much for network content, then it’s time to stop buying network content.

Hitting “roll over” sends you to a page that basically says “sorry — the right answer was ‘get tough.’” Time Warner wants to show you that they’re the little guy. Of course, they’re not actually producing any of the content I like, or put on my DVR, or watch weekly — they’re just buying it in contracts. And the prices on those contracts are going up not just because quality content is more expensive than ever, or just because networks are fighting for advertisers in an increasingly competitive environment, though I’m sure both of those things is probably true. But let’s be honest, it’s because “going up” is what prices do. Just ask my landlord. If they’d sent an ad that said that, I wouldn’t have minded at all.

Time Warner is apparently going big with this campaign as well — it’s not just in my email, I saw it show up on TV, and I’d bet I’ll get it in snail mail soon. Whoever dreamed this up is an insidious genius (“Waitaminute, guys — what if we tried to convince the public that we were a scared little kitten, faultless for raising prices and making more money?”), and whoever believes that Time Warner isn’t at fault for raising prices on their customers, no matter what costs they have to deal with, is a moron.

That said, I am still a customer — sending out stupid emails isn’t enough to get me to drop your service. But raising prices while blaming customers is. If I get another email in a few months from them that says, “We told you we didn’t want to do it, but we have to raise prices because you didn’t tell us to get tough enough,” I’ll be looking for a new service provider. And if the time comes that the price of all the shows I watch in iTunes is lower than my monthly cable bill, I’ll be rolling on over there. That tough enough, Time Warner?