# Time Warner Cable tries metering Internet use



## ricksterinps (Oct 11, 2007)

I just caught this through Yahoo AP news. Just thought I would pass it on. What is this going to do about Directv On Demand???

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080602/ap_on_hi_te/tec_time_warner_cable_internet_4

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By PETER SVENSSON, AP Technology Writer 13:45 PST

NEW YORK - You're used to paying extra if you use up your cell phone minutes, but will you be willing to pay extra if your home computer goes over its Internet allowance?

Time Warner Cable Inc. customers - and, later, others - may have to, if the company's test of metered Internet access is successful.

On Thursday, new Time Warner Cable Internet subscribers in Beaumont, Texas, will have monthly allowances for the amount of data they upload and download. Those who go over will be charged $1 per gigabyte, a Time Warner Cable executive told the Associated Press.

Metered billing is an attempt to deal fairly with Internet usage, which is very uneven among Time Warner Cable's subscribers, said Kevin Leddy, Time Warner Cable's executive vice president of advanced technology.

Just 5 percent of the company's subscribers take up half of the capacity on local cable lines, Leddy said. Other cable Internet service providers report a similar distribution.

"We think it's the fairest way to finance the needed investment in the infrastructure," Leddy said.

Metered usage is common overseas, and other U.S. cable providers are looking at ways to rein in heavy users. Most have download caps, but some keep the caps secret so as not to alarm the majority of users, who come nowhere close to the limits. Time Warner Cable appears to be the first major ISP to charge for going over the limit: Other companies warn, then suspend, those who go over.

Phone companies are less concerned about congestion and are unlikely to impose metered usage on DSL customers, because their networks are structured differently.

Time Warner Cable had said in January that it was planning to conduct the trial in Beaumont, but did not give any details. On Monday, Leddy said its tiers will range from $29.95 a month for relatively slow service at 768 kilobits per second and a 5-gigabyte monthly cap to $54.90 per month for fast downloads at 15 megabits per second and a 40-gigabyte cap. Those prices cover the Internet portion of subscription bundles that include video or phone services. Both downloads and uploads will count toward the monthly cap.

A possible stumbling block for Time Warner Cable is that customers have had little reason so far to pay attention to how much they download from the Internet, or know much traffic makes up a gigabyte. That uncertainty could scare off new subscribers.

Those who mainly do Web surfing or e-mail have little reason to pay attention to the traffic caps: a gigabyte is about 3,000 Web pages, or 15,000 e-mails without attachments. But those who download movies or TV shows will want to pay attention. A standard-definition movie can take up 1.5 gigabytes, and a high-definition movie can be 6 to 8 gigabytes.

Time Warner Cable subscribers will be able to check out their data consumption on a "gas gauge" on the company's Web page.

The company won't apply the gigabyte surcharges for the first two months. It has 90,000 customers in the trial area, but only new subscribers will be part of the trial.

Billing by the hour was common for dial-up service in the U.S. until AOL introduced an unlimited-usage plan in 1996. Flat-rate, unlimited-usage plans have been credited with encouraging consumer Internet use by making billing easy to understand.

"The metered Internet has been tried and tested and rejected by the consumers overwhelmingly since the days of AOL," information-technology consultant George Ou told the Federal Communications Commission at a hearing on ISP practices in April.

Metered billing could also put a crimp in the plans of services like Apple Inc.'s iTunes that use the Internet to deliver video. DVD-by-mail pioneer Netflix Inc. just launched a TV set-top box that receives an unlimited stream of Internet video for as little as $8.99 per month.

Comcast Corp., the country's largest cable company, has suggested that it may cap usage at 250 gigabytes per month. Bend Cable Communications in Bend, Ore., used to have multitier bandwidth allowances, like the ones Time Warner Cable will test, but it abandoned them in favor of an across-the-board 100-gigabyte cap. Bend charges $1.50 per extra gigabyte consumed in a month.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

ricksterinps said:


> I just caught this through Yahoo AP news. Just thought I would pass it on. What is this going to do about Directv On Demand???
> 
> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080602/ap_on_hi_te/tec_time_warner_cable_internet_4
> 
> ...


this thing pops up from time to time. just wait, it will probably go down in flames soon


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

If the cable companies infrastructure wasn't set up like an old fashioned "party line" they wouldn't be in this predicament. Their customers are being penalized for their lack of peak capacity.


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## DodgerKing (Apr 28, 2008)

I use TWC for my internet (Road Runner) and phone. If they tried this on my I would immediately switch to FiOS for my phone and internet.


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## Motley (Sep 23, 2004)

DodgerKing said:


> I use TWC for my internet (Road Runner) and phone. If they tried this on my I would immediately switch to FiOS for my phone and internet.


Yep same here. But DSL in my case.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

Motley said:


> Yep same here. But DSL in my case.


Hmm

Road Runner, your customers are after you..
Road Runner, if you meter them, you're through.


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## RAD (Aug 5, 2002)

I use Earthlink as my ISP, which uses TWC for the actual transport. I hope Earthlink isn't forced (or decided to do this to enhance their revenue on their own) to go to usage based pricing. 

If they do they should provide access to at least 6 months of activity history so you can see what you have been using to allow you to make intelligent decisions on what you need to do.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

Will be interesting to see how this affects users that use DirecTV on Demand, especially those that are DL'ing HD movies. Now along with the cost of the DoD movie, you'd be paying for the download as well.

- Merg


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

This is just another way to increase rates while being able to say that they didn't raise rates and engage in anticompetitive behavior.

There is no bandwidth crunch on the backbone connections with the cable company. There is plenty of capacity there and very easy to turn up more if needed. Where there is a capacity crunch is the local neighborhood node. At this choke point, everything is just data. TV. VOD, internet access, telephone. Its all just data.

If this was really about fairness, the usage caps would also apply to TV, VOD and telephone because its all just data. It obviously is not, because there isn't money to be made in charging twice for your own service, but there is money to be made in charging for someone else's service. This is just a way to discourage use of competing services (internet video, VoIP) though deceptive slight of hand.

But...but...those competing services are using the cable companies networks, right???? No, they're using the internet connection that the customer paid for. The cable companies aren't giving away internet connectivity for free. But now they've come up with a way to charge more for it and con some folks into thinking that they're being fair in doing so.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

trekologer said:


> This is just another way to increase rates while being able to say that they didn't raise rates and engage in anticompetitive behavior.
> 
> There is no bandwidth crunch on the backbone connections with the cable company. There is plenty of capacity there and very easy to turn up more if needed. Where there is a capacity crunch is the local neighborhood node. At this choke point, everything is just data. TV. VOD, internet access, telephone. Its all just data.
> 
> ...


I hear Squeeling (Does not refer to any poster, but years ago cable raised their rates, and Dish responded with an ad campaign called who let the pigs out)


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## JDubbs413 (Sep 4, 2007)

I pay a flat rate now and don't really download that much I could actually save money if they did it right.


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## RAD (Aug 5, 2002)

JDubbs413 said:


> I pay a flat rate now and don't really download that much I could actually save money if they did it right.


IIRC they said they would count up and download, so with a Slingbox that could eat up their quota fairly quickly.


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

DodgerKing said:


> I use TWC for my internet (Road Runner) and phone. If they tried this on my I would immediately switch to FiOS for my phone and internet.


Gotta say, DK, if I were in your position and had the option of FIOS (God, how I wish), I would have dumped Road Runner immediately after the FIOS became available.


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## Grydlok (Mar 31, 2007)

The best way to stop competion is to discourage your subscribers. Jabcast will be soon to follow.
Apple, Microsoft, Netflix, Sony, and others better start their lobbying now!.


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## DodgerKing (Apr 28, 2008)

bidger said:


> Gotta say, DK, if I were in your position and had the option of FIOS (God, how I wish), I would have dumped Road Runner immediately after the FIOS became available.


The comparable FiOS phone internet bundle is about $10 more per month. It is not worth the extra $10 for the slightly better upload and download, especially when most of the slow downs I encounter are the servers at the other end (the servers from the sites I am accessing).


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## saleen351 (Mar 28, 2006)

I agree with what the cable companies are complaining about, the torrents are sucking up all the bandwidth and if they increased capacity the torrents would just eat that up as well... Either cap it or throttle the torrents, there is no other solution, as long as torrents are around, they will suck every ounce of bandwidth..

So for those who say it's their substructure, you are wrong, FIOS will face the same issues.


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

saleen351 said:


> I agree with what the cable companies are complaining about, the torrents are sucking up all the bandwidth and if they increased capacity the torrents would just eat that up as well... Either cap it or throttle the torrents, there is no other solution, as long as torrents are around, they will suck every ounce of bandwidth..
> 
> So for those who say it's their substructure, you are wrong, FIOS will face the same issues.


Haha, sure, blame the people who torrent. There's much more to it than that. I like the way davring says it... Its not the customers fault that the cable company needs to renovate.



davring said:


> If the cable companies infrastructure wasn't set up like an old fashioned "party line" they wouldn't be in this predicament. Their customers are being penalized for their lack of peak capacity.


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## admiral39 (Nov 7, 2006)

CJTE said:


> Haha, sure, blame the people who torrent. There's much more to it than that. I like the way davring says it... Its not the customers fault that the cable company needs to renovate.


Exactly. It speaks to how the infrastructure was set up in the first place. If you weren't sharing bandwidth with your "Torrent-ial" neighbors then what they download and how much would be a non-issue. Technologies such as Fios and Dsl don't have that issue given that the nodes are not shared.

The only crunch you would see would be if the servers at the head end of your ISP were tapped out (not likely) or if you were trying to access the same site as others who were downloading gigs worth of data. Face it. There is no excuse for cable to be set up the way they are and now they're trying to weasel their way out of bad planning.


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## David MacLeod (Jan 29, 2008)

not sure why this is surprising to people, its not new. many of us in rural areas have had to deal with it for years. in my example I have only 1 choice for broadband, TDS DSL, and we have an 80 gb per month cap. anything extra gets charged, I don't remember the rate though. lot of companies in this state use 40-50 as the limit, so I guess thats one good thing about TDS.
luckily I've never had an issue, so far whenever I came close it rolled to next month just in time.


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## ansky (Oct 11, 2005)

It would be nice if they had some type of tier pricing set up where you are charged based on usage rather than a flat monthly fee. 99% of my internet usage is just casual browsing on sites like this. I rarely download music or video files so I would guess the amount of MB I use per month is very low. This type of pricing structure would be more fair as the people who download most would pay the most.

0-100MB - $19.99
101 - 500MB - $29.99
501 - 1GB - $39.99
1GB+ - $49.99

I don't know if those numbers make sense, but you get the idea.


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## HIPAR (May 15, 2005)

ansky said:


> ...
> 
> 0-100MB - $19.99
> 101 - 500MB - $29.99
> ...


I think you would be surprised how quickly you can use up the 100 megabytes. I just patched my OS X computer and there were several hundred megabytes downloaded in less than an hour.

But, I have no problems with the billing concept.

If you all want to do whatever you want on the internet, somehow you will need to become your own ISP.

--- CHAS


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## dodge boy (Mar 31, 2006)

I sure hope AT&T doesn't get this idea....


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## Chris Blount (Jun 22, 2001)

CJTE said:


> Haha, sure, blame the people who torrent. There's much more to it than that. I like the way davring says it... Its not the customers fault that the cable company needs to renovate.


Exactly. We pay these companies to keep up with demand. I don't use torrents but I use Apple TV and VOD. If Time Warner starts this crap in our area, I will disconnect them in a heartbeat.


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

trekologer said:


> This is just another way to increase rates while being able to say that they didn't raise rates and engage in anticompetitive behavior.
> 
> There is no bandwidth crunch on the backbone connections with the cable company. There is plenty of capacity there and very easy to turn up more if needed. Where there is a capacity crunch is the local neighborhood node. At this choke point, everything is just data. TV. VOD, internet access, telephone. Its all just data.
> 
> ...


Trek --

Good points. This is certainly an attempt to limit competing services. I'm not sure if VoIP is affected, since telephone doesn't seem to use a lot of bandwidth. But it certainly would impact video downloads, which directly compete with the cable company's television and VOD services.

But there does need to be some sort of throttle on individual usage. In my neighborhood, cable internet speeds slow to a crawl in the evening when the local node can't handle the demand. I don't know if the constraint comes from people downloading video, internet gaming, cable VOD, or what. But the local node cannot handle the volume. If the slowdown is caused by just one or two people, it is not fair that everybody else in the neighborhood don't get what they pay for because a few people are "stealing" bandwidth.

But as a consumer, I would have a real problem with the system TWC proposes. I wouldn't like blindly visiting websites not knowing how much data will be downloaded and what it will cost me. I would be especially annoyed at streaming ads that waste bandwidth.


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

Upstream said:


> In my neighborhood, cable internet speeds slow to a crawl in the evening when the local node can't handle the demand. I don't know if the constraint comes from people downloading video, internet gaming, cable VOD, or what. But the local node cannot handle the volume. If the slowdown is caused by just one or two people, it is not fair that everybody else in the neighborhood don't get what they pay for because a few people are "stealing" bandwidth.
> 
> But as a consumer, I would have a real problem with the system TWC proposes. I wouldn't like blindly visiting websites not knowing how much data will be downloaded and what it will cost me. I would be especially annoyed at streaming ads that waste bandwidth.


Our point though is that its not the responsibility of the down-loaders. T.W.C. needs to renovate their system to handle this task. The whole "party line" infrastructure *SUCKS*


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## F1 Fan (Aug 28, 2007)

Wow Data Usage caps is just so 90's


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

But the party-line infrastructure is the nature of cable internet. TWC can't do anything about it without technological changes to their system.

The advantage of cable technology over DSL is that you have greater bandwidth. At 3:00 am, my neighbor's cable modem is much faster than my DSL.

The disadvantage of cable technology over DSL is that the pipes are shared. At 8:00 pm, my DSL is much faster than my neighbor's cable modem.

I don't know if there is anything TWC can do about that.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

CJTE said:


> Our point though is that its not the responsibility of the down-loaders. T.W.C. needs to renovate their system to handle this task. The whole "party line" infrastructure *SUCKS*


Who do you think is going to pay for that renovation? Should it be a flat price increase for everyone or should the people that use more pay more?


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

Ken S said:


> Who do you think is going to pay for that renovation? Should it be a flat price increase for everyone or should the people that use more pay more?


Competition from DSL, FIOS and possibly cell phone like technology will force them to upgrade to stay competitive. People with the option to switch will do so.


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

Ken S said:


> Who do you think is going to pay for that renovation? Should it be a flat price increase for everyone or should the people that use more pay more?


Maybe TWC should pay for it as an investment out of their profits. They entered the internet and VoIP service markets with minimal capital investment, because they just reused their existing television service infrastructure. The television infrastructure was already capitalized through the television service. The addition of internet and VoIP service was just a cash generator.

So maybe it is time for TWC to reinvest in internet service. Just like Verizon is doing in rolling out FIOS.

With a different technology, TWC can charge different rates for different bandwidth, without capping or surcharging data usage.


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## Rakul (Sep 3, 2007)

David MacLeod said:


> not sure why this is surprising to people, its not new. many of us in rural areas have had to deal with it for years. in my example I have only 1 choice for broadband, TDS DSL, and we have an 80 gb per month cap. anything extra gets charged, I don't remember the rate though. lot of companies in this state use 40-50 as the limit, so I guess thats one good thing about TDS.
> luckily I've never had an issue, so far whenever I came close it rolled to next month just in time.


Wow I would kill for an 80gb monthly cap  Verizon Wireless sets a soft cap at 5gb per month for their EVDO cards, nothing happens if you exceed it once or twice, but make it a habit and they will disconnect your account all together. Unfortunately in rural Virginia no one wants to invest in broadband so it's Sat based or cell based if you don't want dial up....


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

That's not going to happen just as DirecTV is going to continue to raise their fees to support new satellites, programming, etc. So...we can be pretty sure the cost is going to be passed on. How should that cost be apportioned? Equally to everyone or by usage?



Upstream said:


> Maybe TWC should pay for it as an investment out of their profits. They entered the internet and VoIP service markets with minimal capital investment, because they just reused their existing television service infrastructure. The television infrastructure was already capitalized through the television service. The addition of internet and VoIP service was just a cash generator.
> 
> So maybe it is time for TWC to reinvest in internet service. Just like Verizon is doing in rolling out FIOS.
> 
> With a different technology, TWC can charge different rates for different bandwidth, without capping or surcharging data usage.


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

Ken S said:


> That's not going to happen just as DirecTV is going to continue to raise their fees to support new satellites, programming, etc. So...we can be pretty sure the cost is going to be passed on. How should that cost be apportioned? Equally to everyone or by usage?


DirecTV does not have a satellite launch fee on your bill, and does not charge you extra for watching more TV. They invest in the satellites out of their profits, and charge their customers the market price for the services they receive. But they also have price tiers based on the channels you get (but not based on how many hours you watch), so the customer can keep reasonable control on their costs.

Likewise, TWC should invest the money to modify their technology. Then they can offer different bandwidth options at different price points, and manage capacity by bandwidth.

Then customers can reasonable control their costs and get what they pay for. But with TWC's plan, customers will never know what they are paying, since they cannot control how much data is flowing back and forth on websites they don't control. With TWC's plan, consumers with options will flee to competitors like DSL or fiber, where they don't have to worry about whether there is streaming video when they go to www.espn.com, or if www.dbstalk.com has a popup ad, or if the kids have exceeded the data limit researching a homework assignment.


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## Hansen (Jan 1, 2006)

This seems destined to fail by virtue of how negatively people react to it. 

From my perspective, I have TWC Road Runner for internet and pay a pretty good monthly bill for it (about $55 per month). While the download (10 + mb) and upload (1+ mb) speeds are pretty good, I'd dump them in heartbeat if they start to charge me for overage. Absolutely ridiculous. It's not about how to even out usuage "fairly"....it's about how can TWC squeeze more money from it's consumers.


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## dyker (Feb 27, 2008)

seems retarded that a company that offers to "double your downloading capability from 5mb to 10mb" for only $5 would be considering a cap. Yeah, I know I'm talking about charter.com here (my ISP) and hoping they don't impose a cap.


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## dbmaven (May 29, 2004)

dyker said:


> seems retarded that a company that offers to "double your downloading capability from 5mb to 10mb" for only $5 would be considering a cap. Yeah, I know I'm talking about charter.com here (my ISP) and hoping they don't impose a cap.


:nono2: :nono2: 
It's not a cap.

"Caps" were hard limits that were imposed by many cable ISPs when the bandwidth reached a certain "magic" number - and it was typically imposed based on upstream consumption. At that point, they would download a new configuration file to the modem which changed the upstream rate (how fast it would go) - and since TCP/IP "acks" need upstream bandwidth, it had the side-effect of crippling downloads as well. This was usually done without the knowledge, consent, or even notification to the subscriber.

This is metered usage. Not unlike leasing a car, when you pay $XXX per month and get 2000 miles per month "free". Go over that, and you pay a penalty per extra mile.
The bandwidth/speeds do not change - you get charged for the overage.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

Upstream said:


> DirecTV does not have a satellite launch fee on your bill, and does not charge you extra for watching more TV. They invest in the satellites out of their profits, and charge their customers the market price for the services they receive. But they also have price tiers based on the channels you get (but not based on how many hours you watch), so the customer can keep reasonable control on their costs.
> 
> Likewise, TWC should invest the money to modify their technology. Then they can offer different bandwidth options at different price points, and manage capacity by bandwidth.
> 
> Then customers can reasonable control their costs and get what they pay for. But with TWC's plan, customers will never know what they are paying, since they cannot control how much data is flowing back and forth on websites they don't control. With TWC's plan, consumers with options will flee to competitors like DSL or fiber, where they don't have to worry about whether there is streaming video when they go to www.espn.com, or if www.dbstalk.com has a popup ad, or if the kids have exceeded the data limit researching a homework assignment.


Your comparison to TV use to broadband use is ridiculous. One is a limited resource (broadband) the other is a broadcast where there is no effect on supply whether one person or ten million are watching. But, should you want to watch that show in another room...you pay additional fees for receivers. ISPs generally don't charge you more to share your connection throughout a home with routers, switches, and wireless access points. That's not what this discussion is about though.

You can complain all you want, but reality is if they build-out their network to support greater use by users they're going to charge more to cover the cost of that build-out. So, once again...knowing they will do that should it just be across the board increases or based on usage rates. I'd prefer rates based on usage.

As for competition...there isn't a whole lot. Many markets have two players providing broadband at most...DSL from the local telco and Cable. It's also become clear that FIOS and UVerse haven't had a huge effect on prices in the markets where they are available (other than limited time offers).


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

The Merg said:


> Will be interesting to see how this affects users that use DirecTV on Demand, especially those that are DL'ing HD movies. Now along with the cost of the DoD movie, you'd be paying for the download as well.
> 
> - Merg


For once, someone else has Direct TV by the %@))&. They have been manhandiling their customers for years, now someone even bigger is calling the shots. DTV on Demand is dead if they push this.

What happens when Comcast (and other cable companies) let you download their cable content for free (via bundled packages) but charge for excessive downloads from other providers (Direct TV, Slingbox)?

Big advantage for bundled service providers - which Direct TV will never be again.

Vonage piggybacked on High Speed internet and cable companies answered with packaged telco. Cable internet is not about to let Direct TV piggyback on cable's bandwidth and make their dime at cable's expense.

Same thing is happening with Sprint mobile broadband. Sprint is booting high end broadband users to use bandwidth for Sprint TV and reel in millions of teenie users.

The days of using someone else's bandwidth for your unrestricted use are over ... and that includes Direct TV. Video on Demand by Direct TV. Party over before it gets started.


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## Dave (Jan 29, 2003)

Mods,

Does this need to be moved to the Computer forums??


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## dhines (Aug 16, 2006)

if it is only targeting the 5% that they are siting at the problem. meaning, if the cap is only going to impact the 5% that is using 50% of the bandwith, how is that bad?

that being said, i would also expect that time warner would allow users to check their useage to see where they stand. honestly, i am tired of having the internet hogs pay the same rate as i do.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

Dave said:


> Mods,
> 
> Does this need to be moved to the Computer forums??


No ... the original poster asked for comments on how it would affect Direct TVs Video on Demand ... seems exactly relevant


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## David MacLeod (Jan 29, 2008)

shudder... Direcway and that darn FAP limit..



dbmaven said:


> :nono2: :nono2:
> It's not a cap.
> 
> "Caps" were hard limits that were imposed by many cable ISPs when the bandwidth reached a certain "magic" number - and it was typically imposed based on upstream consumption. At that point, they would download a new configuration file to the modem which changed the upstream rate (how fast it would go) - and since TCP/IP "acks" need upstream bandwidth, it had the side-effect of crippling downloads as well. This was usually done without the knowledge, consent, or even notification to the subscriber.
> ...


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

Ken S said:


> Your comparison to TV use to broadband use is ridiculous. One is a limited resource (broadband) the other is a broadcast where there is no effect on supply whether one person or ten million are watching. But, should you want to watch that show in another room...you pay additional fees for receivers. ISPs generally don't charge you more to share your connection throughout a home with routers, switches, and wireless access points. That's not what this discussion is about though.
> 
> You can complain all you want, but reality is if they build-out their network to support greater use by users they're going to charge more to cover the cost of that build-out. So, once again...knowing they will do that should it just be across the board increases or based on usage rates. I'd prefer rates based on usage.
> 
> As for competition...there isn't a whole lot. Many markets have two players providing broadband at most...DSL from the local telco and Cable. It's also become clear that FIOS and UVerse haven't had a huge effect on prices in the markets where they are available (other than limited time offers).


Ken -- I agree the television analogy is weak. But I only used it because it built on your example.

And I agree that it is fair for a company to charge more to customers who use more of the company's resources. But in the case of TWC, the resource is bandwidth, not data.

The average consumer has only limited control (and only limited knowledge) of how much data he/she transmits over the internet. Some websites are data-heavy and some are data-light. The average consumer has no way of knowing whether they use a lot or little data.

Consumers have built home networks and business have built consumer-oriented websites with the expectation that consumers will keep their computers connected and upload and download at will. Fifteen years ago, the model was different, when most consumers had dial-up, and ISP's charged by the hour of connect time. Ironically, it was Time-Warner's AOL division which pioneered unlimited internet access for a flat fee, changing the model and paving the way for dramatic changes in consumer internet use.

If TWC goes to a data-metering fee structure, it becomes a burden on the average consumer (unless the the fees don't kick in until data usage so incredibly high that 90 percent of consumers could never encounter the fees). And it generates an economic incentive for consumers to switch to DSL, which also provides an incentive for more companies to enter the local DSL market.

And it isn't any more equitable. The guy downloading bit-torrents at 3 am is not causing the resource constraints on the cable system; why should he pay more. It is all the people sharing bandwidth at 8 pm which is the problem.

By regulating bandwidth, not data usage, TWC can build out their network to the amount of bandwidth they sell (just like DSL and fiber networks do). The customer pays for a certain amount of bandwidth, and then they can upload and download as much data as the bandwidth can support. If they need more bandwidth, they can buy that instead.

If TWC is going to invest in upgrading their data networks, they should do it so they build in the technology to allocate bandwidth, rather than the neighborhood free-for-all which currently exists.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

highheater said:


> The days of using someone else's bandwidth for your unrestricted use are over ... and that includes Direct TV. Video on Demand by Direct TV. Party over before it gets started.


But no one is using someone else's bandwidth unrestricted. The customer paid for it.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

Upstream said:


> Ken -- I agree the television analogy is weak. But I only used it because it built on your example.


The television example is actually a good one. The major cable companies are trying to move to switched digital video (SDV). SDV is basically video on demand for normal TV. SDV/VOD and even normal video is just bits of data to the node. The cable companies either need to suck it up and upgrade their networks for support the usage that their customers demand or fold.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

trekologer said:


> But no one is using someone else's bandwidth unrestricted. The customer paid for it.


some companies have a guaranteed bandwidth for each customer. if for some reason they are unable to deliver the bandwidth they should be fined,

this policy should go hand in hand with the metering


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## GregLee (Dec 28, 2005)

Upstream said:


> Maybe TWC should pay for it as an investment out of their profits.


I have a better idea. TWC should announce metered rates, frightening the heavy users to switch to DSL or FIOS or whatever. Just let those guys be a burden on TWC's competitors, since they cost more than they pay. Then, if all goes well, TWC won't need to renovate their plant. The extra income they get from metering charges will be piddling. That's not the point, which is to defer the costs of upgrading to handle more bandwidth.


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## dbmaven (May 29, 2004)

curt8403 said:


> some companies have a guaranteed bandwidth for each customer. if for some reason they are unable to deliver the bandwidth they should be fined,
> 
> this policy should go hand in hand with the metering


The only "guaranteed" bandwidth services are typically relegated to "business" class service - one of the reasons they cost significantly more. I know of no "residential" ISP that guarantees anything about bandwidth. The TOS typically read "UP TO" so many KBPS - and even if you're getting 30% of that, they've met the TOS on their side.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

Upstream,

Yes, but data is what causes bandwidth constraints...so it's a chicken/egg kind of thing. Someone surfing the web, reading email, playing online games, chatting, etc could be at 100mbps and wouldn't be really constraining anyone else's uses....while a person at 50mbps who is completely saturating the connection by downloading large files would.

In reality the ISPs are probably right...at this time there are probably just a few people that are causing the problems...probably under 5%, but that's going to change as higher bandwidth applications become more prevalent. We all remember when we measured the size of our HDs in single and double digit megabytes and now 1TB is becoming the standard.

It wouldn't be hard for ISP to create a meter that customers could watch to see how much they were using...even realtime. They'd quickly learn what sites were eating into their allotment and be able to make decisions based on that information.

The problem would be for the companies that have based their business model on people having unlimited bandwidth...especially the video services and to some extent the online game companies when they distribute the game itself and patches that run hundreds of megabytes all of which must be downloaded by a huge audience at essentially the same time (the actual playing of the games themselves use almost nothing).

This is where the whole net neutrality issue comes into play. Should DirecTV be able to pay a fee to the major ISPs to guarantee that its data doesn't count against someone's allotment? Should they be able to guarantee packet priority to make their service offering better?

Finally, the DSL and fiber folks do not guarantee bandwidth for good reason...they have far less total bandwidth to the backbone than they sell. The sharing just comes further down the line than it does with cable. They're all overselling their actual connection...it's just more noticeable with cable if you live near some data hogs. Of course, the DSL and Fiber folks can also acquire and provide greater bandwidth when/if they deem in necessary much faster (in many cases) than Cable...but you know that because that's what started this whole issue 



Upstream said:


> Ken -- I agree the television analogy is weak. But I only used it because it built on your example.
> 
> And I agree that it is fair for a company to charge more to customers who use more of the company's resources. But in the case of TWC, the resource is bandwidth, not data.
> 
> ...


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## VaJim (Jul 27, 2006)

RAD said:


> IIRC they said they would count up and download, so with a Slingbox that could eat up their quota fairly quickly.


Are we talking Internet as in www.....or watching TV as In Directv or others??

Aside from any 'demand' thingy....


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

Ken S said:


> Upstream,
> 
> Yes, but data is what causes bandwidth constraints...so it's a chicken/egg kind of thing. Someone surfing the web, reading email, playing online games, chatting, etc could be at 100mbps and wouldn't be really constraining anyone else's uses....while a person at 50mbps who is completely saturating the connection by downloading large files would.
> 
> ...


The ISPs should buy a program like GetRight and give it to their customers to allow them to shift their downloads for a time late at night


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## Drewg5 (Dec 15, 2006)

GregLee said:


> I have a better idea. TWC should announce metered rates, frightening the heavy users to switch to DSL or FIOS or whatever. Just let those guys be a burden on TWC's competitors, since they cost more than they pay. Then, if all goes well, TWC won't need to renovate their plant. The extra income they get from metering charges will be piddling. That's not the point, which is to defer the costs of upgrading to handle more bandwidth.


You may have something here.. Quick math tells me that with 6Mbps connection on a avarage 30 day month I can use 15552000Mb or 1898.4375 gigabytes of data for $35 a month, using my telco's DSL. Using cable I would only get 40ish GB of data transfer.

In a normial month we use around 100GB of data from the internet. And with the Cable Co's offer here to even get servace close I need to spend 2x as much here.


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## PANCHITO (Apr 8, 2006)

Chris Blount said:


> Exactly. We pay these companies to keep up with demand. I don't use torrents but I use Apple TV and VOD. If Time Warner starts this crap in our area, I will disconnect them in a heartbeat.


You know what they say when a directv customer switch to cable or dish.

GOOD BYE.

just like directv is the leader in providing TV entertainment, cable is the leader in providing INTERNET service.


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## dbmaven (May 29, 2004)

curt8403 said:


> The ISPs should buy a program like GetRight and give it to their customers to allow them to shift their downloads for a time late at night


DirecTV ought to allow you to schedule DOD downloads to commence at a time of your own choosing. I (and others, I believe) brought this up when DOD was only available on CE releases - before it become a "public Beta". Residential ISP usage is low during the day (~ 9AM to 3PM), ramps up during the late afternoon into evening hours, and ramps down after 10 or 11 PM. By allowing HR2x users to start downloads at 10AM, or 4 AM, they'd be providing a significant enhancement to the service - and one which might well become necessary at some point in time...


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Upstream said:


> The advantage of cable technology over DSL is that you have greater bandwidth. At 3:00 am, my neighbor's cable modem is much faster than my DSL.
> 
> The disadvantage of cable technology over DSL is that the pipes are shared. At 8:00 pm, my DSL is much faster than my neighbor's cable modem.
> 
> I don't know if there is anything TWC can do about that.


Of course they can do something about it. I use a small regional provider (small in footprint, not in customers) and my speeds are constant throughout the day. Downloading from a capable server, I get 6.5mbps at 3am, 12pm, 8pm, you name it. But they take care of their network, and add bandwidth as necessary. Now, 6.5mbps may not be keeping up with the fastest cable providers, but at least I can rest assured that when they do raise the speeds, they will still be consistent.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

According to an article in today's Wall Street Journal Comcast will begin testing bandwidth limitations on heavy users. They have picked a couple of test markets where they will be constraining bandwidth on heavy users during busy times. This may be a problem for anyone trying to use DoD for HD content during prime time.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

PANCHITO said:


> You know what they say when a directv customer switch to cable or dish.
> 
> GOOD BYE.
> 
> just like directv is the leader in providing TV entertainment, cable is the leader in providing INTERNET service.


BINGO ... now Direct TV is the small player at the table ... and will be boo-hooing about fairness ... Direct TV manhandled its customers in setting up its business model ... now its Direct TV's turn to receive the same treatment from internet providers ... lesson ... BIG GUY wins ... LITTLE GUY loses ... except this time Direct TV is actually the LITTLE GUY.


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## JayB (Mar 19, 2007)

Seems to me that the simple solution here, as was suggested earlier, is to have a multi-tiered system. To me, this would be similar to what the cell phone companies do - I buy, say, 700 minutes a month and if I go over, I get charged a fee for each minute I use over. With this, I would buy 250gb/month and then get charged if I go over it.

However, if they're going to do that to me I want something in return and that something is guaranteed bandwidth. Right now, I pay $55 per month for "up to" 15mb/sec. That "up to" is very interesting because I've never - not at 12p.m., not at 3a.m. ever seen better than 12mb/sec and it's more like 8mb/sec most of the time. So, if you're going to make me promise to limit my bandwidth, I want all of it when I use it.

Seems fair to me.


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## Chris Blount (Jun 22, 2001)

PANCHITO said:


> You know what they say when a directv customer switch to cable or dish.
> 
> GOOD BYE.
> 
> just like directv is the leader in providing TV entertainment, cable is the leader in providing INTERNET service.


Well, true but it gives me a warm fuzzy knowing that I'm not giving them my money.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

JayB said:


> Seems to me that the simple solution here, as was suggested earlier, is to have a multi-tiered system. To me, this would be similar to what the cell phone companies do - I buy, say, 700 minutes a month and if I go over, I get charged a fee for each minute I use over. With this, I would buy 250gb/month and then get charged if I go over it.
> 
> However, if they're going to do that to me I want something in return and that something is guaranteed bandwidth. Right now, I pay $55 per month for "up to" 15mb/sec. That "up to" is very interesting because I've never - not at 12p.m., not at 3a.m. ever seen better than 12mb/sec and it's more like 8mb/sec most of the time. So, if you're going to make me promise to limit my bandwidth, I want all of it when I use it.
> 
> Seems fair to me.


Jay,

You can get that...they'll call it a guaranteed account or business account. It'll cost quite a bit more but just about every major ISP makes them available.


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## Thaedron (Jun 29, 2007)

My hope is that this remains a cable ISP phonomenon and that it is principally targeted at over-use of the shared bandwidth down to the home. If so there is really no reason why DSL providers would need to follow suit. (keeps fingers crossed that my DSL provider doesn't consider this to be a good idea). 

Of course there is always the "market will bear it" arguement...


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## JayB (Mar 19, 2007)

Ken S said:


> Jay,
> 
> You can get that...they'll call it a guaranteed account or business account. It'll cost quite a bit more but just about every major ISP makes them available.


Yup, a friend of mind got his company to pay for that for awhile - got him upgraded tech support (4 hour on-site for outside cable problems and such was sweet), guaranteed bandwidth, and a static IP. I'm just saying that if they want to get me to accept a ceiling, they have to provide service that makes that ceiling acceptable. Or, I suppose, they could cut the price by 50%...


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## JeffBowser (Dec 21, 2006)

That's also why I have a T1 at my office, rather than a DSL account. No metering, guaranteed up time. All comes down to what you are willing to pay for. $600 a month for my business class T1, or $60 a month for a DSL account. I had both once, people preferred the DSL because it was actually faster than my T1. However, it was up and down randomly, and we hit bandwidth limitatins frequently. Can't run a business like that, but it doesn't really matter at home.



Ken S said:


> Jay,
> 
> You can get that...they'll call it a guaranteed account or business account. It'll cost quite a bit more but just about every major ISP makes them available.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

JeffBowser said:


> Can't run a business like that, but it doesn't really matter at home.


Well it does if you want someone to use your Video-On-Demand service ... or are we talking about Video-Sort-Of-On-Demand ... check back in 30 minutes...


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## jimb726 (Jan 9, 2007)

highheater said:


> BINGO ... now Direct TV is the small player at the table ... and will be boo-hooing about fairness ... Direct TV manhandled its customers in setting up its business model ... now its Direct TV's turn to receive the same treatment from internet providers ... lesson ... BIG GUY wins ... LITTLE GUY loses ... except this time Direct TV is actually the LITTLE GUY.


This is going to come to a head long before it affects DirecTv. After all the caps being hit right now are not getting hit by DOD users they are getting maxed out by heavy data users. And since a fair number of people use DSL (myself included) who at this point are not even discussing this, it may just lead to a shift to different ISP providers, which then indirectly reduce the strain on the system, or the heavy users pony up and pay more based on their usage.


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## sean67854 (May 9, 2007)

I find it hard to believe that it's really such a small percentage of their customers using so much of the bandwidth. I don't personally know anyone that has cable for their internet that is a "casual" internet user. The reason they got cable internet over DSL is because of the higher bandwidth for their heavy usage, XBOX Live, Video Download, VOIP, etc.

This sort of thing is going to force a lot of companies to change their applications. Instant messaging applications constantly ping the server to update their lists, some web sites automatically refresh if left open, others have constant video streams. Hell, even windows itself is constantly online checking for updates, synching time, etc. 

The 40GB cap people are talking about seems like a lot to some of you, but I'd be willing to bet more than 70% of the people on cable internet exceed that in a month. If you really want to get at the hogs, and not just people that leave net enabled applications open 24/7, you need to cap it at like 250GB.


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## JeffBowser (Dec 21, 2006)

I disagree - I personally don't know anyone who still has dial-up, from my grandmother, and all the neighbors I have contact with, as well as all of my 40 some-odd employees. Dial-up is all but dead, so what's left ? Cable or DSL, pretty much. And a majority of these users are casual browsers and e-mailers. I imagine, though, that this mix might be different in more rural parts of the country...



sean67854 said:


> I find it hard to believe that it's really such a small percentage of their customers using so much of the bandwidth. I don't personally know anyone that has cable for their internet that is a "casual" internet user. The reason they got cable internet over DSL is because of the higher bandwidth for their heavy usage, XBOX Live, Video Download, VOIP, etc.
> 
> This sort of thing is going to force a lot of companies to change their applications. Instant messaging applications constantly ping the server to update their lists, some web sites automatically refresh if left open, others have constant video streams. Hell, even windows itself is constantly online checking for updates, synching time, etc.
> 
> The 40GB cap people are talking about seems like a lot to some of you, but I'd be willing to bet more than 70% of the people on cable internet exceed that in a month. If you really want to get at the hogs, and not just people that leave net enabled applications open 24/7, you need to cap it at like 250GB.


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## sean67854 (May 9, 2007)

JeffBowser said:


> I disagree - I personally don't know anyone who still has dial-up, from my grandmother, and all the neighbors I have contact with, as well as all of my 40 some-odd employees. Dial-up is all but dead, so what's left ? Cable or DSL, pretty much. And a majority of these users are casual browsers and e-mailers. I imagine, though, that this mix might be different in more rural parts of the country...


Does dial-up still exist? :grin: (actually up until last Christmas, there was a guy here at work that still had Compuserve)

Actually, that guy is the perfect example of what I'm talking about. He switched from dial-up to DSL. He could get a cheap plan that provided plenty of bandwidth for what he needed.

In my experience, people like him, or older people that just want e-mail, web, etc, generally go with DSL because they can get a cheaper plan. People that go with cable are those that are planning on using the bandwidth.


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## JeffBowser (Dec 21, 2006)

You are making a bad assumption that DSL does not allow for plenty of bandwidth, and forgetting that it does not suffer from the shared node problems that cable does. I have DSL at my house, I get 6 down and 1 up, and it pretty much stays that way regardless of time of day. Further, they have not set up any metering limits.

I have a remote employee in Virginia that went with cable to VPN into my offices in Florida during the day. He ended up cancelling and going to DSL. Why ? Because even though the advertised gross bandwidth was better with cable, the reality was DSL was the only one that provided bandwidth and reliability consistently enough for a work day environment. He could tell every afternoon when the kiddies came home from school, he was not able to maintain a reliable connection.



sean67854 said:


> Does dial-up still exist? :grin: (actually up until last Christmas, there was a guy here at work that still had Compuserve)
> 
> Actually, that guy is the perfect example of what I'm talking about. He switched from dial-up to DSL. He could get a cheap plan that provided plenty of bandwidth for what he needed.
> 
> In my experience, people like him, or older people that just want e-mail, web, etc, generally go with DSL because they can get a cheaper plan. People that go with cable are those that are planning on using the bandwidth.


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## sean67854 (May 9, 2007)

JeffBowser said:


> You are making a bad assumption that DSL does not allow for plenty of bandwidth, and forgetting that it does not suffer from the shared node problems that cable does. I have DSL at my house, I get 6 down and 1 up, and it pretty much stays that way regardless of time of day. Further, they have not set up any metering limits.
> 
> I have a remote employee in Virginia that went with cable to VPN into my offices in Florida during the day. He ended up cancelling and going to DSL. Why ? Because even though the advertised gross bandwidth was better with cable, the reality was DSL was the only one that provided bandwidth and reliability consistently enough for a work day environment. He could tell every afternoon when the kiddies came home from school, he was not able to maintain a reliable connection.


Dude, you're not getting it. DSL has like 5 different bandwidth options in my area starting at 9.99 for 256k. Cable has 2 starting at 59.95. I'm saying that people who just want to surf and stuff are not going to pop for the $60 cable when then can get everything they need for 10 bucks.

The people who pay 60 bucks a month are planning on using that bandwidth, whether they are on cable or DSL. I'm saying I don't believe there are that large a number of lollygaggers on cable as TW would have us believe. I think they are using it as an excuse for what they want to do.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

sean67854 said:


> Dude, you're not getting it. DSL has like 5 different bandwidth options in my area starting at 9.99 for 256k. Cable has 2 starting at 59.95. I'm saying that people who just want to surf and stuff are not going to pop for the $60 cable when then can get everything they need for 10 bucks.
> 
> The people who pay 60 bucks a month are planning on using that bandwidth, whether they are on cable or DSL. I'm saying I don't believe there are that large a number of lollygaggers on cable as TW would have us believe. I think they are using it as an excuse for what they want to do.


You are correct. There already is a tiered system in place. Its just that those that thought they were at the top end ($ 60 Comcast broadband) are just about to find out they are not when they start to download video streams.

Soon you'll have to pony up even more for that privelege if you want VOD from someone other than your internet provider (Direct TV). I've seen a Slingbox with DSL. If you think you're going to be able to do VOD with DSL forget it.

This is just a bad idea, and the sooner Direct TV quits spending resources on it, the better we all will be.


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## JeffBowser (Dec 21, 2006)

First you were comparing DSL to cable, but now you finally get it right and compare price points. Not the same subject, hard to get you when you don't say what you really mean from the get go.



sean67854 said:


> Dude, you're not getting it. DSL has like 5 different bandwidth options in my area starting at 9.99 for 256k. Cable has 2 starting at 59.95. I'm saying that people who just want to surf and stuff are not going to pop for the $60 cable when then can get everything they need for 10 bucks.
> 
> The people who pay 60 bucks a month are planning on using that bandwidth, whether they are on cable or DSL. I'm saying I don't believe there are that large a number of lollygaggers on cable as TW would have us believe. I think they are using it as an excuse for what they want to do.


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## sean67854 (May 9, 2007)

JeffBowser said:


> First you were comparing DSL to cable, but now you finally get it right and compare price points. Not the same subject, hard to get you when you don't say what you really mean from the get go.


Technically I was comparing DSL USERS to cable USERS, but we'll ignore that point for a minute.

What TW is really trying to do is to create artificial bandwidth tiers without creating corresponding pricing tiers. They want to charge high bandwidth users more, but they won't then charge low bandwidth users less.


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## JeffBowser (Dec 21, 2006)

Well, I can agree with that, although in real terms, the price of bandwidth is way, way, way down from what it was even 5 years ago.


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## sean67854 (May 9, 2007)

JeffBowser said:


> Well, I can agree with that, although in real terms, the price of bandwidth is way, way, way down from what it was even 5 years ago.


I totally agree. The amount of bandwidth has scaled much faster than the subscriber cost for said bandwidth.

My argument here is that TW is being disingenuous when they say that they want to make things fair. To really be fair in addition to charging for bandwidth overages, they should give credits for bandwidth underages. Either that or get more freakin' tiers of service.

Edit: I just checked. Qwest in my area offers 6 different price tiers. Mediacom cable offers 2.


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## rabit ears (Nov 18, 2005)

What will happen is that the cable companies will implement the charge. The SHUs (Super Heavy Users) will move to DSL. The cable companies will lose revenue and upgrade their networks to entice the SHUs back.

The telcos will feel the revenue loss and upgrade their networks to offer even faster DSL speeds. Then the SHUs will move back to DSL.

The only winners in this are the plumbers like Cisco and Juniper. Having stock in both, I encourage Time Warner and Comcast to have at it, drive off your best customers.


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## David MacLeod (Jan 29, 2008)

potential problem I see from SHU going to DSL is in rural areas like mine dsl providers may need to upgrade. and in my town there is only 1 broadband provider, dsl, no cable. however next town over has cable, multiple dsl providers (including mine) and a lot of SHU in that area. once that happens the dsl provider in my are will probably (this is straight from them) need to raise rates to cover upgrades.

on my road there is one DSLAM. I personally have had to move across 18 ports on it due to it getting MULTIPLE lightning strikes in a 2 month period. something like 12 strikes, no idea why. so on that DSLAM there are only 2 ports open for most of a season, it took me threatening to cancel services (I'm the guy that pays most on this circuit) for them to finally replace the DSLAM.

then it got hit again, right now there are 14 ports still open and working but that could change at any time. and they have NO MORE spares in the region.

small telco's can give you a lot of bandwidth (80 gb) but have no resources for damage. and since a telco owns the lines and poles they will not allow anyone else to run lines or fiber on/near them.

but I digress, my point is I think (again, mostly in rural areas) that there stands to be a large chance of a cascade effect from this. again, the telco themselves also expects it might happen and they are keeping a close eye on it.
for their side of it, according to them, this is fairly closely related to net neutrality issues.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

rabit ears said:


> What will happen is that the cable companies will implement the charge. The SHUs (Super Heavy Users) will move to DSL. The cable companies will lose revenue and upgrade their networks to entice the SHUs back.
> 
> The telcos will feel the revenue loss and upgrade their networks to offer even faster DSL speeds. Then the SHUs will move back to DSL.
> 
> The only winners in this are the plumbers like Cisco and Juniper. Having stock in both, I encourage Time Warner and Comcast to have at it, drive off your best customers.


The super heavy customers are not their best customers...they're the worst. The best customers are the ones that pay for the service and use it lightly.

Also, at present DSL speeds, at best, are running about 6-7mbps. You should get at or near that speed to the CO, but there is no guarantee that you will get that speed all the way to the backbone.

ALL ISPs oversell their capacity.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

Ken S said:


> The super heavy customers are not their best customers...they're the worst. The best customers are the ones that pay for the service and use it lightly.


BINGO. In the case of Sprint and Verizon mobile broadband, they actually would prefer to get rid of these people. Not long until such considerations reach cable broadband.

Nobody wants these people UNLESS they can get them to pony up for other bundled services ... So Direct TV is chasing a population with Video On Demand that will

a) have to pony up more for their internet service or
b) is more likely to get VOD through a cheaper bundled package

Hence Direct TV is wasting time, money, and effort in a game they can never win.


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## AFH (Nov 4, 2002)

JeffBowser said:


> You are making a bad assumption that DSL does not allow for plenty of bandwidth, and forgetting that it does not suffer from the shared node problems that cable does. I have DSL at my house, I get 6 down and 1 up, and it pretty much stays that way regardless of time of day. Further, they have not set up any metering limits.
> 
> I have a remote employee in Virginia that went with cable to VPN into my offices in Florida during the day. He ended up cancelling and going to DSL. Why ? Because even though the advertised gross bandwidth was better with cable, the reality was DSL was the only one that provided bandwidth and reliability consistently enough for a work day environment. He could tell every afternoon when the kiddies came home from school, he was not able to maintain a reliable connection.


You're right. My boss has TWC for internet and cable and I have Verizon for DSL and Directv for video. On Memorial Day she VPN'd into our company network and I also VPN'd into the network. I was trying to send her important information for a presentation we had the next day and she couldn't get it b/c her connection to the network kept getting disconnected. Meanwhile, I stayed connected to the VPN the entire day without being disconnected. It has happened to her before on numerous occasions. Everytime it happens, she can't stay connected for longer than a couple of minutes. I had no clue what was happening with her connection until I read your post and put two and two together.


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## machavez00 (Nov 2, 2006)

Qwest is now offering 7, 12 and 20 Mbps options in Phoenix.
http://www.qwest.com/residential/internet/fiber-optics.html


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## rabit ears (Nov 18, 2005)

Ken S said:


> The super heavy customers are not their best customers...they're the worst. The best customers are the ones that pay for the service and use it lightly.
> 
> Also, at present DSL speeds, at best, are running about 6-7mbps. You should get at or near that speed to the CO, but there is no guarantee that you will get that speed all the way to the backbone.
> 
> ALL ISPs oversell their capacity.


Well, if you're talking about some kid downloading stolen movie content, you're probably right. In my case we're moving data, voice and video in huge amounts for legitimate business purposes and as a result are pretty much interested in speed over cost.

I've had to force several of my team to drop a cable ISP because it was either too unreliable or too slow. If I have a $5 million product shipping and need a bunch of CAD documents before we can wrap it up and roll it on the truck, I could care less about anything but reliability and speed.

I don't see the cable operators going to WiMax because it's a different infrastructure, but most of the Telco's have a wireless operation and know the ins and outs of how to make it work. Once WiMax becomes ubiquitous the cable guys are going to be stuck with grandma and grandpa and they'll be left holding the bag from an infrastructure battle they started.


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## Ken S (Feb 13, 2007)

rabit ears said:


> Well, if you're talking about some kid downloading stolen movie content, you're probably right. In my case we're moving data, voice and video in huge amounts for legitimate business purposes and as a result are pretty much interested in speed over cost.
> 
> I've had to force several of my team to drop a cable ISP because it was either too unreliable or too slow. If I have a $5 million product shipping and need a bunch of CAD documents before we can wrap it up and roll it on the truck, I could care less about anything but reliability and speed.
> 
> I don't see the cable operators going to WiMax because it's a different infrastructure, but most of the Telco's have a wireless operation and know the ins and outs of how to make it work. Once WiMax becomes ubiquitous the cable guys are going to be stuck with grandma and grandpa and they'll be left holding the bag from an infrastructure battle they started.


rabit ears,

I don't think the ISPs care what the data is that is being moved. Customers that are paying approximately $50 a month and are using that connection all the time for large amounts of data are not their "best" customers. Those customers "cost" the most to service. This doesn't matter if you're on cable, DSL or a wireless.

As for reliability and speed. I run a dual WAN router here with Comcast and AT&T DSL. Over the past year the uptime between the two is about equal...both are over 99%. We've had more trouble with AT&T because of their goofy port 25 rules...but that's another issue.

Speed...Comcast is just plain faster than AT&T for me. Day or Night. They're both rated at 6mbps but when it comes to downloading large files Comcast is just faster. That's just here though.

I have no great love of either provider as both have been a headache at times. We run both to assure ourselves connectivity as close to 100% of the time as possible.

If my business really depended on speed and throughput I'd probably still have a dual WAN but would be using guaranteed/dedicated service. I think people that use consumer based internet services and then complain its hurting their business...well...what'd you expect? If a business letter is important I send it by a service I can track...if it's not I drop it in a mailbox.


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## David MacLeod (Jan 29, 2008)

> I run a dual WAN router here with Comcast and AT&T DSL. Over the past year the uptime between the two is about equal...both are over 99%


must be nice to have a choice 
sigh, maybe someday...


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## HIPAR (May 15, 2005)

ricksterinps said:


> I just caught this through Yahoo AP news. Just thought I would pass it on. What is this going to do about Directv On Demand???


Now that we have established some background on this metering matter, how will it affect the plans of DirecTV, Netflix and everyone else counting on the availability of a 'Wild West' internet in their plans for riches?

--- CHAS


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

HIPAR said:


> how will it affect the plans of DirecTV, Netflix and everyone else counting on the availability of a 'Wild West' internet in their plans for riches?


I don't think VOD is part of DirecTV's "plans for riches" in any significant way. It's there mainly so that DirecTV can say that they have it.


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## highheater (Aug 30, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> I don't think VOD is part of DirecTV's "plans for riches" in any significant way. It's there mainly so that DirecTV can say that they have it.


and hence as I said

Direct TV is wasting time, money, and effort in a game they can never win.

so the next time we hear about how they have to raise their rates or have to recoup equipment costs, just remember the money being wasted here.


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## gregjones (Sep 20, 2007)

Jeremy W said:


> I don't think VOD is part of DirecTV's "plans for riches" in any significant way. It's there mainly so that DirecTV can say that they have it.


While not a way for DirecTV to make a lot of money, the same cannot be said for the broadcast and cable networks. For a lot of these networks, VOD becomes a second chance to sell ads and build viewership. Look at the recent announcement from HBO describing its plans for a broad offering in VOD.

The cable company doesn't like a paying customer using their service to watch someone else's content. Oh, well. Let the market do its job. When cable companies impose a surcharge, switch to the phone company. Cable and phone companies really love the revenue generated from high-speed internet. As long as people want a service and are willing to pay a reasonable fee, the providers will find a way to provide it.

In the meantime, complain loudly and often. Talk to the group in charge of the local cable franchise and let them have it.

With a 10Mbps DSL connection, I get a lot of use out of DirecTV's VOD service just as it is. The local cable company doesn't even have a VOD offering.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

highheater said:


> so the next time we hear about how they have to raise their rates or have to recoup equipment costs, just remember the money being wasted here.


You call it a waste, I call it a nice service to have.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

highheater said:


> You are correct. There already is a tiered system in place. Its just that those that thought they were at the top end ($ 60 Comcast broadband) are just about to find out they are not when they start to download video streams.
> 
> Soon you'll have to pony up even more for that privelege if you want VOD from someone other than your internet provider (Direct TV). I've seen a Slingbox with DSL. If you think you're going to be able to do VOD with DSL forget it.
> 
> This is just a bad idea, and the sooner Direct TV quits spending resources on it, the better we all will be.


Youtube uses more bandwidth in a day than DirecTV on demand uses in a month. Are you seriously suggesting that if DirecTV ends DOD then all will be better?


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

sean67854 said:


> I find it hard to believe that it's really such a small percentage of their customers using so much of the bandwidth. I don't personally know anyone that has cable for their internet that is a "casual" internet user. The reason they got cable internet over DSL is because of the higher bandwidth for their heavy usage, XBOX Live, Video Download, VOIP, etc.
> 
> This sort of thing is going to force a lot of companies to change their applications. Instant messaging applications constantly ping the server to update their lists, some web sites automatically refresh if left open, others have constant video streams. Hell, even windows itself is constantly online checking for updates, synching time, etc.
> 
> The 40GB cap people are talking about seems like a lot to some of you, but I'd be willing to bet more than 70% of the people on cable internet exceed that in a month. If you really want to get at the hogs, and not just people that leave net enabled applications open 24/7, you need to cap it at like 250GB.


So far this month (the last 5 days) I have downloaded over 20GB and uploaded over 2GB. My usage hasn't been what I would consider to be heavy (no bittorrent, no big file downloads, mostly just web browsing and email). When I work from home through my company's VPN (occasionally) I can end up using over 20GB in about 8 hours. Is this abuse? Am I somehow stealing from my ISP?

A 40GB per month cap (what TWC is in the process of implementing) is rediculously low. A lot of people are going to find that they use more than 40GB is one month. This is nothing more than a money grab by TWC. As I said before, its just a way for them to raise their rates without saying they raised their rates.


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## dhines (Aug 16, 2006)

trekologer said:


> A 40GB per month cap (what TWC is in the process of implementing) is rediculously low.


does anyone have a source that confirms this 40GB per month figure? i find it hard reconciling their statements that only 5% of the users will be impacted by this change, yet capping it at 40GB.

thanks,


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## Bob Coxner (Dec 28, 2005)

It's extremely discouraging for those of us who have no options on broadband. I'm lucky enough to even have cable broadband. It's only been available in my neighborhood for about 3 years. I don't have the faintest hope for DSL. I'm at least 6 miles away from the nearest switching office. I've talked to DSL techs at AT&T and they basically told me forget it forever. Time Warner is my ISP, so I'm very nervous about these tests they're running in Beaumont.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

dhines said:


> does anyone have a source that confirms this 40GB per month figure? i find it hard reconciling their statements that only 5% of the users will be impacted by this change, yet capping it at 40GB.
> 
> thanks,


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080602/ap_on_hi_te/tec_time_warner_cable_internet

Note that 40GB is the highest cap for their biggest speed package. The caps differ per speed tiers, starting at 5GB per month for the slowest.


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## dhines (Aug 16, 2006)

trekologer said:


> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080602/ap_on_hi_te/tec_time_warner_cable_internet
> 
> Note that 40GB is the highest cap for their biggest speed package. The caps differ per speed tiers, starting at 5GB per month for the slowest.


good lord. i would think a 40GB cap would impact more than half the user base. seems like a very stupid business decision on their part. i use time warner cable, but i actually have earthlink by way of time warner. i wonder if this will ever impact users like me, i am thinking no.

either way, i don't expect this change to stick . . . as no one in their right mind will take this over DSL. on the other hand, comcast's cap of 250GB seems tollerable. it wouldn't shock me one bit if a cap of 250GB sticks.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

dhines said:


> seems like a very stupid business decision on their part.


Actually, from their standpoint, its a very smart business descision for them. They get to charge their customers more for the same service while at the same time being able to say they didn't raise their rates and have some of their customers think its actually a good thing...until they get their bill. TWC sees the $$$$$.


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

Looks like AT&T is considering service based on usage as well:

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080612/D918P12O0.html


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## bidger (Nov 19, 2005)

Pffft...it's like when one multichannel provider raises their rates, they _all_ fall in line right behind.


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## boxster99t (Mar 9, 2008)

DodgerKing said:


> I use TWC for my internet (Road Runner) and phone. If they tried this on my I would immediately switch to FiOS for my phone and internet.


Me too but RR only. As it is, I very nearly switched to Fios but didn't because it would not save me any money. Of course, different story if I get charged some form of over the limit fee, which seems unlikely. I'd be on to Fios as quickly as I could set up a Saturday install.


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## Steve Mehs (Mar 21, 2002)

trekologer said:


> So far this month (the last 5 days) I have downloaded over 20GB and uploaded over 2GB. My usage hasn't been what I would consider to be heavy (no bittorrent, no big file downloads, mostly just web browsing and email). When I work from home through my company's VPN (occasionally) I can end up using over 20GB in about 8 hours. Is this abuse? Am I somehow stealing from my ISP?


You are using Business Class service right? I guess not. I'm a bandwidth hog myself, but not that bad, if I were doing what you're doing I'd get off a residential connection.

It is my hope a personal belief nothing comes of this and this whole test thing is just a test in a small Texas town, but if I goes go nationwide, I'll switch to Road Runner Biz Class Service where all this won't apply. I'll be damned if I ever leave TW.

And no I don't believe this is a way to increase rates, RR has never increased in price here, while speed has tripled. My cost has actually decreased. I used to pay $85 for Road Runner Premium at 6Mb Down/512Kb up, now I pay $50 for 15Mb Down/1 Mb up. If they wanted in increase rate, there's no reason for rates to stay about the same for the past ten years on standard service, this is just an attempt at bandwidth management.


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## Upstream (Jul 4, 2006)

I don't know Steve. The article says that TWC will offer different rates with usage caps between 5GB and 40GB of data per month. On the surface it sounds like price reductions, especially since users can now move down to the 5GB cap for $30 per month.

But when Trek posted what his comments several weeks ago about already being over 20GB, I tried a similar experiment. I logged into my company's VPN (since it meters data transmission, not just packets). I went to ESPN to check out the previous evening's baseball scores and then I went to DBSTalk to reread this thread. I let my computer just sit there, while I went and did something else. After an hour of sitting on this page, I checked the total dataflow and extrapolated it to 160 hours per month. It came out to just over 5GB.

If you can hit 5GB by essentially doing nothing, there are very few people who will actually qualify and use the $30 service without surcharges. And if you had hit 5GB by doing nothing, how easy will it be to hit 40GB and pay surcharges if you actually do something?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Steve Mehs said:


> this is just an attempt at bandwidth management.


What this really is, is indefensible. :nono2:


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## DawgLink (Nov 5, 2006)

I am somewhere in between I believe (bandwith hogs/normal user)

I don't download movies that often but I have bought a few videos on iTunes that were a gig or so. I do play online with my PS3. I do download some music here and there.

I really doubt I would ever cross more than a few gigs a month but I would still worry about whether I am crossing that line or not

What I worry about is how high/low the companies will make that "cap". If the cap was fairly high so only the "top 5%" people would hit it normally, I could get it but I really don't like seeing any sort of caps at just a few gigs. 

That to me shows that it isn't just about getting rid of the hogs but also wanting to nickle and dime as much as possible....which of course shouldn't surprise me as most companies do that including DirecTV.


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## Bob Coxner (Dec 28, 2005)

DawgLink said:


> I am somewhere in between I believe (bandwith hogs/normal user)
> 
> That to me shows that it isn't just about getting rid of the hogs but also wanting to nickle and dime as much as possible....which of course shouldn't surprise me as most companies do that including DirecTV.


I think it's more of a defensive measure. Cablecos have been using On Demand to distinguish themselves from the sat providers. Now DTV and Dish are doing it via the Net. If the cableco can prevent you from downloading from the sat servers then you have to go with cable if you want On Demand. One HD movie downloaded from DTV would put you close to or over the 5gb a month cap.

More important in the long run, cablecos are terrified by IPTV. If you can get all your tv from the Net, why would you need to sub to cable tv? If they have caps, IPTV dies on the vine.

The same goes for VOIP. If you can't sub to Vonage, due to cap limits, then Comcast or Time Warner will be happy to sell you a sub to their in-house phone system - with no cap limits on it.


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## trekologer (Jun 30, 2007)

Bob Coxner said:


> More important in the long run, cablecos are terrified by IPTV. If you can get all your tv from the Net, why would you need to sub to cable tv? If they have caps, IPTV dies on the vine.


You hit the nail right on the head. IPTV is what the cable co's are scared about. DirecTV on Demand isn't even on the radar to them. VoIP, in most cases, is just a loss leader. TV is where their money is.


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## dhines (Aug 16, 2006)

the cable co's are full of it. they state that 5% of the userbase hogs 50% of the bandwith, and to resolve this they have come up with a plan to meter usage. yet the metered usage will end up dinging significantly more than 5% of the userbase.

it is all BS if you ask me, and personally i don't think it will fly. if they (the cable co's and AT&T) insist on going through with this, it will cause new DSL companies to pop-up and steal their market share. I too believe this is nothing more than an attempt to go after IPTV and VOIP, but the thing is . . . in the long run this strategy will fail.


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