Until recently, I believed that shares of Comcast Corp. (NASDAQ: CMCSA) had been unfairly punished by investors who were too skeptical about the company's prospects. Now, I am changing my tune because I have come to realize that the future of the company will be filled with endless pricing battles, which will force the Philadelphia-based cable giant to sacrifice the needs of shareholder to retain customers.

To be fair, Comcast reported a decent quarter Wednesday and was able to hold the line on capital expenditures. Net income was $632 million, or 21 cents a share, versus $588 million, or 19 cents, a year earlier. Sales jumped 11% to $8.55 billion. Results were short of the 23-cent forecast of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg but beat the $8.57 billion sales forecast.

Now, ordinarily missing the profit forecast would cause the shares to tank. Instead, they are trading up slightly because investors found much about the earnings report to like. For one thing, Comcast's free cash flow was $1.17 billion, more than triple from a year earlier. This beat the forecast of veteran cable industry watchers such as Craig Moffett of Sanford C. Bernstein. It also reaffirmed its earnings guidance for the year, countering worries that it would be hurt by cash-strapped customers falling behind in their bills.

Even so, Comcast has plenty of problems. Advertising sales fell 2% to $399 million amid softness in the economy. Average monthly revenue per customer fell in the phone and high-speed Internet businesses, though the overall rate rose slightly. The company also is embroiled in a dispute with the FCC over its policy of slowing some Internet traffic of people using BitTorrent and other file-sharing sites. It continues to bleed basic cable subscribers, losing 138,000 in the quarter. That rate has increased from 101,000 a year earlier.

Moreover, Comcast will continue to face tough sledding for years to come as customers – including me – will show the company little brand loyalty and base decisions on regarding telecom services on price alone. Verizon (NYSE: VZ) added 187,00 new FiOS Internet customers and 176,000 FiOS TV ones, while AT&T (NYSE: T) gained 170,000 clients for its U-Verse TV service. That's a recipe for great deals for Comcast consumers and lousy ones for shareholders.