re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBI sort of cringed when I read the news, anticipating the inevitable complaining and whining from the Net Neutrality crowd. "Free Internet is my birthright!" seems to be their belief. But the network operators' efforts to control traffic and the use of its systems (important disctinction - IT BELONGS TO THEM, NOT YOU, JOE PUBLIC), doesn't seem evil or insidious to me. No one complains about the power company or water company metering usage and charging for the amount used. No one complains that a 50 lb. package costs more to ship than a 1 lb. package. Why then do people complain about internet access? I find it interesting that the division between the pros and cons falls along political party lines - those who want something for free, and those who don't mind paying for what they use. I'll let the readers figure out who each side represents.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBThat's 2 terabits 250GB x 8bits/byte = 2 Terabits. Averaged 30x24x7x60x60 that comes out to about 771604.9382716049382716049382716 bps or 750kbps 24x7. When the average 24x7 consumption is floating at less than 100kbps, that is well outside the median and appears to be somewhere in the range of a couple to a few standard deviations off of standard distribution of usage.
In short that's equivalent to a professor letting you get a passing grade when you have a grade in the lowest 3% of the class. Another way of saying this is that approximatley 98% to 99.something percent of subscribers in a typical residential network would not be affected by this.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBHi vrparente, I agree with the sentiment, but I'd say it's even more extreme than you describe. Not sure what the statistical term for this is, but imagine the standard distribution curve being squashed inwards a bit.
Based on figures I've seen in the UK I'm guessing far less than 1% of our broadband population would find themselves being throttled with this size of cap. The size of caps here are one to two orders of magnitude smaller right now.
What has happened is that the "average" Internet user (ie. a person who does not download copyright-infringing material) now has a way to breach these smaller caps because of TV on demand services being offered by the BBC and our independent TV companies (ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5).
So if I were to describe a distribution curve for the UK I'd see a broader population pulling down more stuff (and doing so legally). And a very narrow peak of a small fraction of users who are probably downloading large amounts of material in order to create counterfeit movie DVDs and games. There's a popular outlet for these materials in what we call here "car boot sales", not to mention Internet auction sites.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBOne poster argued that one should pay for what one uses, arguing that one does not mind having his water metered. This is true, but there is something different about the Internet. In many cases, you cannot control the volume. Should Internet users send bills to Amazon for sending unwanted advertising to their computers that ultimately puts them over a bandwidth cap?
250GB might be a reasonable figure. But, what is the point? After all, they said this only applies to 1% of its users. So are they really saving anything? Or, is this just their way of kicking dirt on the FCC for its decision over P2P? Again, they said it only affects about 1% of the customer base!
Back to the water example... there are plenty of places that have "all you can eat" buffets. But, they do not charge one person differently than the next. The cost of service is spread across all customers.
And, these same companies are talking about delivering IPTV service? Would that not consume considerably more bandwidth?
While my own usage is far below the cap that will be imposed, I would be rather annoyed if I were a customer and would seek an alternative provider. Perhaps it is because I (like most of you) work in the tech field and see that the Internet has far more potential than it does. Frankly, I don't think there is enough deployed bandwidth and providers ought to continue to work to increase access and core network speeds. There are many services that simply are not possible today with limited bandwidth.
Putting the cap in place seems to suggest Comcast is happy to do nothing to improve service in terms of bandwidth. Have they decided they have enough deployed infrastructure for the next 100 years?
I would hope not. We need continued growth, more services, and ... I certainly do not mind subsidizing the 1% that use a lot of bandwidth.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBI think an important thing to point out here is that Comcast has historically placed a cap on what they deem excessive use. The big difference now is that consumers now know what that cap is...though the operator isn't providing a gauge or some way for customers to know how far below the ceiling they are or if they are approaching it. Although the cap has no direct relation to the P2P proceeding at the FCC, I think this cap disclosure was done in part to give more transparency to what Comcast's Internet service policies are. Jeffb
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBre: "One poster argued that one should pay for what one uses, arguing that one does not mind having his water metered. This is true, but there is something different about the Internet. In many cases, you cannot control the volume. Should Internet users send bills to Amazon for sending unwanted advertising to their computers that ultimately puts them over a bandwidth cap?"
Comcast will charge Amazon for delivering the ads and won't account against the consumer for those bits. This allows them to keep there middleman position between consumer and content/application providers. Most of the COAX spectrum is used to deliver garbage and there are no caps on that. The media companies pay them to peddle the trash into our homes. That's their biz model. Don't like it then start digging.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBWhile Comcast is @ 250GB. Most of the others are @ 5-50GB. That effects a lot more average subscribers than 1%. Who is to say that Comcast will stick to 250GB.
I have supported tier pricing, but with some meter for subs to understand how much they are using. But this takes one back to the QoS/DPI argument for efficiency vs. blind control. But at least customers will know the real level of service they can expect to receive.
re: Comcast Draws the Line at 250GBComcast's policy displays obvious flaws in the so-called deregulated free market. A market would charge higher for congestion periods and not for using idle bandwidth. A functioning market would provide more capacity when supply was exceeded and not cut off demand by disconnecting their customers for a year.
Study the electric industry to see what should happen. There, the ones that prevailed drove peak and average demand to converge in order to maximize efficiency. They did this by catering to high demand users in a manner that shifted their demand to lower periods of utilization. They didn't cut off their customers service for a year as punishment.
If this policy doesn't scream conflicted interests of network provider being both a broadcaster and a unicast network owner, I don't know what does. And the FCC wants the phone companies to emulate the cable companies for the fantasy of facilities based competition?
In short that's equivalent to a professor letting you get a passing grade when you have a grade in the lowest 3% of the class. Another way of saying this is that approximatley 98% to 99.something percent of subscribers in a typical residential network would not be affected by this.
I agree with the sentiment, but I'd say it's even more extreme than you describe. Not sure what the statistical term for this is, but imagine the standard distribution curve being squashed inwards a bit.
Based on figures I've seen in the UK I'm guessing far less than 1% of our broadband population would find themselves being throttled with this size of cap. The size of caps here are one to two orders of magnitude smaller right now.
What has happened is that the "average" Internet user (ie. a person who does not download copyright-infringing material) now has a way to breach these smaller caps because of TV on demand services being offered by the BBC and our independent TV companies (ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5).
So if I were to describe a distribution curve for the UK I'd see a broader population pulling down more stuff (and doing so legally). And a very narrow peak of a small fraction of users who are probably downloading large amounts of material in order to create counterfeit movie DVDs and games. There's a popular outlet for these materials in what we call here "car boot sales", not to mention Internet auction sites.
Cheers,
Geoff
250GB might be a reasonable figure. But, what is the point? After all, they said this only applies to 1% of its users. So are they really saving anything? Or, is this just their way of kicking dirt on the FCC for its decision over P2P? Again, they said it only affects about 1% of the customer base!
Back to the water example... there are plenty of places that have "all you can eat" buffets. But, they do not charge one person differently than the next. The cost of service is spread across all customers.
And, these same companies are talking about delivering IPTV service? Would that not consume considerably more bandwidth?
While my own usage is far below the cap that will be imposed, I would be rather annoyed if I were a customer and would seek an alternative provider. Perhaps it is because I (like most of you) work in the tech field and see that the Internet has far more potential than it does. Frankly, I don't think there is enough deployed bandwidth and providers ought to continue to work to increase access and core network speeds. There are many services that simply are not possible today with limited bandwidth.
Putting the cap in place seems to suggest Comcast is happy to do nothing to improve service in terms of bandwidth. Have they decided they have enough deployed infrastructure for the next 100 years?
I would hope not. We need continued growth, more services, and ... I certainly do not mind subsidizing the 1% that use a lot of bandwidth.
Comcast will charge Amazon for delivering the ads and won't account against the consumer for those bits. This allows them to keep there middleman position between consumer and content/application providers. Most of the COAX spectrum is used to deliver garbage and there are no caps on that. The media companies pay them to peddle the trash into our homes. That's their biz model. Don't like it then start digging.
I have supported tier pricing, but with some meter for subs to understand how much they are using.
But this takes one back to the QoS/DPI argument for efficiency vs. blind control. But at least customers will know the real level of service they can expect to receive.
OP
You mean like say Cablevision rj?
seven
Study the electric industry to see what should happen. There, the ones that prevailed drove peak and average demand to converge in order to maximize efficiency. They did this by catering to high demand users in a manner that shifted their demand to lower periods of utilization. They didn't cut off their customers service for a year as punishment.
If this policy doesn't scream conflicted interests of network provider being both a broadcaster and a unicast network owner, I don't know what does. And the FCC wants the phone companies to emulate the cable companies for the fantasy of facilities based competition?
OP