Comcast’s data caps are ‘just low enough to punish streaming’

[Bacstar]

I've got the most expensive internet package that my cable company offers. Up to gigabit speeds, currently at 660 mbits with a data cap of 750 gigabytes. They seem to improve every few months as well as bump up the cap without increasing price. Recently I exchanged my modem when the company sent out a notice for me to pick me up an upgraded modem.


I'm paying about $175.00. Access is pretty expensive up here in Alaska. What's it like in the lower 48 nowadays?

Edit: Oh, and when I do reach the limit which I've only done when it was at 500 gb, the connection gets throttled down until the billing period is done. Can't remember, but I think it was better than dialup, enough to watch Netflix.

 

[Ichinisan]

I've got the most expensive internet package that my cable company offers. Up to gigabit speeds, currently at 660 mbits with a data cap of 750 gigabytes. They seem to improve every few months as well as bump up the cap without increasing price. Recently I exchanged my modem when the company sent out a notice for me to pick me up an upgraded modem.


I'm paying about $175.00. Access is pretty expensive up here in Alaska. What's it like in the lower 48 nowadays?

Edit: Oh, and when I do reach the limit which I've only done when it was at 500 gb, the connection gets throttled down until the billing period is done. Can't remember, but I think it was better than dialup, enough to watch Netflix.

You probably have muuuuuuch better options than 99% of those outside of Anchorage.

 

[OverVolt]

My latest bill said Comcast is raising all the double/triple play packages 20-30 bucks a month in this area. Only other option is 6mb with AT&T.

Hoping Google decides to come to Chicagoland.

Haha, as more people cut the cord they raise prices on the rest to maintain revenue.

I assume the last person to cut the cord will be paying 18 billion a year or whatever.

 

[Ichinisan]

Haha, as more people cut the cord they raise prices on the rest to maintain revenue.

I assume the last person to cut the cord will be paying 18 billion a year or whatever.

That doesn't make sense. It would make more sense for telecoms to raise rates on Internet.

Media conglomerates are responsible for nearly all of the price increases in TV packages. They charge per-subscriber rates to the TV service provider, even for channels that people don't want. They extort the TV service providers and tell them they can't carry a popular channel customers demand -- unless they carry all these new networks and put them in the tiers demanded by the media conglomerates. If a TV service provider disputes the rate, they'll play one against the other. "[CarrierX] just lost [channelY]! Switch to [carrierZ] and keep [channelY]!" CarrierX bleeds subscribers until they agree to pay the extortion rates. During negotiations, the media conglomerates bombard customers with one-sided messages telling you to "call your provider and demand that they keep [channelX]!" These networks basically telling viewers to fight on behalf of the networks to raise their own prices!

This cycle repeats over-and-over...every time contract negotiations come up. It seems the per-subscriber cost only goes up, never down.

TV service providers would absolutely love to offer customers only the channels they actually care about. Obviously, more people could afford TV service and more people would be willing to pay for it. This bundle/tier stuff is forced by media conglomerates (Viacom, NBC, etc) and the more popular networks.

 

[Linux23]

Yes exactly which is why it isn't a great idea for these cable companies to be owned by big media conglomerates which then control your internet and then controls the media you get to consume.

 

[ElFenix]

That doesn't make sense. It would make more sense for telecoms to raise rates on Internet.

Media conglomerates are responsible for nearly all of the price increases in TV packages. They charge per-subscriber rates to the TV service provider, even for channels that people don't want. They extort the TV service providers and tell them they can't carry a popular channel customers demand -- unless they carry all these new networks and put them in the tiers demanded by the media conglomerates. If a TV service provider disputes the rate, they'll play one against the other. "[CarrierX] just lost [channelY]! Switch to [carrierZ] and keep [channelY]!" CarrierX bleeds subscribers until they agree to pay the extortion rates. During negotiations, the media conglomerates bombard customers with one-sided messages telling you to "call your provider and demand that they keep [channelX]!" These networks basically telling viewers to fight on behalf of the networks to raise their own prices!

This cycle repeats over-and-over...every time contract negotiations come up. It seems the per-subscriber cost only goes up, never down.

TV service providers would absolutely love to offer customers only the channels they actually care about. Obviously, more people could afford TV service and more people would be willing to pay for it. This bundle/tier stuff is forced by media conglomerates (Viacom, NBC, etc) and the more popular networks.

which is why the comcast - nbc merger was such an FU to consumers.

 

[futurefields]

its a fubar situation, internet and tv being run by same company and they are a monopoly

 

[Brian Stirling]

They are sitting on TONS of backbone capacity.

Where they are limited is last-mile runs to the doorstep. But even that is up-gradable but it will cost them a large amount of money to do that. And without direct competition, why take on that large expenditure if you can MAKE money by putting caps in place so you dont have to spend money allowing people to use the service freely.

I'm not so sure there's all that much spare capacity on the backbone during peak periods but certainly the capacity from the local office to the home is hugely limiting. Yes, they could expand that capacity but doing so will be expensive and even doubling that capacity would only push down the road the problem for a couple years by which time demand will be dragging down the network once again forcing the providers to wind up doubling the capacity about every 2-3 years.

And users want the providers to add that capacity for free -- yeah, no, not going to happen.

But again, I do think having more competition would increase spending on capacity and that would be good.


Brian

 

[Brian Stirling]

I've worked with ISPs in the past and agree. The pipe is only so big. The problem with caps is they only work if it persuades someone not to use the service during peak usage. "I'm not going to watch Netflix before bed because I might go over my cap", said no one ever.

I do believe that this current trend is simply a money grab to get over cable sub losses, but eventually it will truly be about capacity. We are already seeing metered connections that are cheaper during off-peak hours, it's only a matter of time before something similar is pushed to home users.

I don't know what the answer is, caps don't work but the dam will burst some day.

Yeah, I've been saying that metered billing is on the way for about 4 years now and so far it's not happened, but sooner-or-later it will happen. It is unfair to charge someone that eats 100GB/month the same as someone that eats 5TB/month and arguing that you should pay based on your connection speed isn't fair either. Why should I have to tolerate lower speed service because I eat less data per month -- lower speed service makes web pages slower even if I do very little video streaming.

Honestly, video streaming is the thing that's causing the greatest demand on the network and the most accurate method to track and bill for that is total data usage. Billing based on connection speed doesn't capture this as video streaming doesn't necessarily push the connection speed but it's nearly constant high usage. Someone using a web browser may wish a fast connection to have the pages paint fast but the data usage, though high in bursts, is not constant and therefore not the huge driver of bandwidth consumption.


Brian

 

[BarkingGhostar]

I don't understand why folks complaining about the Comcast caps just don't go business class and have no caps. How many actually saturate their Internet connection as a norm?

 

[Brian Stirling]

I do 1TB/wk.

How's that even possible? If you figure about 5GB/hour for video that would be 200 hours and there's only 168 hours in a week if you stream 24/7. So, what are you doing to eat 1TB/week?


Brian

 

[Brian Stirling]

I don't understand why folks complaining about the Comcast caps just don't go business class and have no caps. How many actually saturate their Internet connection as a norm?

Individuals aren't saturating the network -- hundreds of people simultaneously streaming video are.


Brian

 

[Fenixgoon]

Yeah, I've been saying that metered billing is on the way for about 4 years now and so far it's not happened, but sooner-or-later it will happen. It is unfair to charge someone that eats 100GB/month the same as someone that eats 5TB/month and arguing that you should pay based on your connection speed isn't fair either. Why should I have to tolerate lower speed service because I eat less data per month -- lower speed service makes web pages slower even if I do very little video streaming.

Honestly, video streaming is the thing that's causing the greatest demand on the network and the most accurate method to track and bill for that is total data usage. Billing based on connection speed doesn't capture this as video streaming doesn't necessarily push the connection speed but it's nearly constant high usage. Someone using a web browser may wish a fast connection to have the pages paint fast but the data usage, though high in bursts, is not constant and therefore not the huge driver of bandwidth consumption.


Brian

For a limited quantity item, billing based on usage makes sense, but data is limitless. There is no finite amount of data.

Additionally, since billing is currently based on rate, you shouldn't be penalized for using it. After all, you're paying for a rate, not a quantity.

And to top it off, Internet growth has relied on unlimited data usage but faster speeds. That's the whole reason YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, etc became successful. And ISPs themselves have taken advantage of this with their own content services, too.

 

[mnewsham]

And users want the providers to add that capacity for free -- yeah, no, not going to happen.

i've been a customer of my ISP for 7 years. I pay every month. Why aren't they taking my monthly payments and investing some of that back into infrastructure upgrades? I'm paying for that in my monthly payments I would hope. I am not expecting them to do it for free because I have been paying them for years to be doing this constantly. What else is my monthly payment FOR? It certainly doesn't cost them that much to upkeep or pay for techs and customer service reps. The data itself is free once the infrastructure is paid for, and my ISP took hundreds of millions in tax $ for a large portion of their existing infrastructure anyway.

It's bullshit that now they want to start capping people AND even move to metered billing? No fuck off.

 

[Majcric]

I have both Windstream and Mediacom. If Windstream finally has their act together and can deliver solid internet speeds then Mediacom can go kick rocks. Neither company has blazing speeds in my area (I think somewhere in the ballpark of 50-100mb) but it's more than adequate for me

Mediacom is pure evil I would say even more so than Comcast. But to be fair all the cable companies are that want to sell their precious TV at a high ass premium.

 

[Brian Stirling]

i've been a customer of my ISP for 7 years. I pay every month. Why aren't they taking my monthly payments and investing some of that back into infrastructure upgrades? I'm paying for that in my monthly payments I would hope. I am not expecting them to do it for free because I have been paying them for years to be doing this constantly. What else is my monthly payment FOR? It certainly doesn't cost them that much to upkeep or pay for techs and customer service reps. The data itself is free once the infrastructure is paid for, and my ISP took hundreds of millions in tax $ for a large portion of their existing infrastructure anyway.

It's bullshit that now they want to start capping people AND even move to metered billing? No fuck off.

And in the seven years you've been a customer the data usage has increased by about a factor of ten. Did there price increase by a factor of ten in that period?

We are doing things on the internet that we we're not doing seven years ago. Back then Youtube was just getting started and the amount of data being used by video streaming was not too much. Since then, however, not only have many more people been using Youtube but many other video streaming services have gotten big.

If the providers doubled there capacity today at great expense how long before that capacity is crushed by 4K video usage? The providers are increasing the cost for service as they know they have no choice but to spend big on infrastructure improvements.

Again, I'm not saying the providers are 100% honest here, not at all, but at some point people have to understand the mathematics here.


Brian

 

[BxgJ]

For a limited quantity item, billing based on usage makes sense, but data is limitless. There is no finite amount of data.

Additionally, since billing is currently based on rate, you shouldn't be penalized for using it. After all, you're paying for a rate, not a quantity.

This point is often lost on people. There is plenty of proof - in areas with real competition caps aren't an issue. And isp's find ways to give faster speeds real quick, often for the same price, when someone like google fiber comes to town.

Another point, was mentioned earlier. Caps won't do anything for prime time congestion. Sorry. That is the last thing people will give up. They will cut back on everything else so they can have their normal prime time activities. That is why it's prime time. Metered billing here would reduce isp revenues. It's also been mentioned that well run networks don't have congestion issues to the point where you notice when surfing the web. If you notice that, how is anyone streaming?

And to top it off, Internet growth has relied on unlimited data usage but faster speeds. That's the whole reason YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, etc became successful. And ISPs themselves have taken advantage of this with their own content services, too.

Most new uses for the internet, and many of the advances in tech in general, rely on this.

Not to mention all the advances in the delivery of data over existing lines - you guys know that they are getting more and more out of what is already there (with some upgrades, but not wholesale replacement), just as the cell carriers do to get more out of their spectrum?

 

[mnewsham]

Again, I'm not saying the providers are 100% honest here, not at all, but at some point people have to understand the mathematics here.

The math shows that once the infrastructure is in place it costs them basically nothing if you use 10kb/s or 50mb/s. As long as you aren't fully saturating the connection, it doesn't matter in the slightest to them. And in my area at least, it has been fiber G-PON network all these 7 years, they are upgrading infrastructure to 10G-PON for free in 2016/17 because my ISP isn't total shit I guess. But for people who aren't so lucky, they will be stuck on ancient connections for god knows how long.

I realize I am personally one of the lucky few with a somewhat decent ISP, at least in this area.

If my ISP can do it, so can the rest.

 

[13Gigatons]

And in the seven years you've been a customer the data usage has increased by about a factor of ten. Did there price increase by a factor of ten in that period?

We are doing things on the internet that we we're not doing seven years ago. Back then Youtube was just getting started and the amount of data being used by video streaming was not too much. Since then, however, not only have many more people been using Youtube but many other video streaming services have gotten big.

If the providers doubled there capacity today at great expense how long before that capacity is crushed by 4K video usage? The providers are increasing the cost for service as they know they have no choice but to spend big on infrastructure improvements.

Again, I'm not saying the providers are 100% honest here, not at all, but at some point people have to understand the mathematics here.


Brian

My area has a small unknown fiber company that charges $65 for 1Gb up/down. The engineer just laughs when he hears about metered connections or how 4K is going to destroy the internet. Netflix 4K is 15mb/s and seems to work fine.

They don't offer pay TV just internet. Most things can be streamed now so I hardly watch regular TV except maybe sports. I hope more companies like this spring up all over the country, people will be a lot happier.

 

[OverVolt]

That doesn't make sense. It would make more sense for telecoms to raise rates on Internet.

Media conglomerates are responsible for nearly all of the price increases in TV packages. They charge per-subscriber rates to the TV service provider, even for channels that people don't want. They extort the TV service providers and tell them they can't carry a popular channel customers demand -- unless they carry all these new networks and put them in the tiers demanded by the media conglomerates. If a TV service provider disputes the rate, they'll play one against the other. "[CarrierX] just lost [channelY]! Switch to [carrierZ] and keep [channelY]!" CarrierX bleeds subscribers until they agree to pay the extortion rates. During negotiations, the media conglomerates bombard customers with one-sided messages telling you to "call your provider and demand that they keep [channelX]!" These networks basically telling viewers to fight on behalf of the networks to raise their own prices!

This cycle repeats over-and-over...every time contract negotiations come up. It seems the per-subscriber cost only goes up, never down.

TV service providers would absolutely love to offer customers only the channels they actually care about. Obviously, more people could afford TV service and more people would be willing to pay for it. This bundle/tier stuff is forced by media conglomerates (Viacom, NBC, etc) and the more popular networks.

I knew someone who had so many bundles that it went up to $290/mo when the deals expired. Kept calling to lower their bill which of course could only be done with some kind of bundle that would expire.

All Comcast cares about is revenue per line IMO.

 

[Charmonium]

Wasn't there an FCC decision this past year about net neutrality and wasn't the main issue that services like netflix were getting a free ride from the ISPs. I can understand wanting to throttle a service like that if you have capacity limitations but I have to wonder how many ISPs really have them.

Mine for example lets me stream shows that I've "recorded" on their servers. The set top box is only there for encryption purposes and to give me a convenient interface to use. But if they're streaming 1080i video to me all day long plus handling my bit torrent downloads, it's hard to argue that they have capacity limitations.

So I have to agree with the general sentiment here that data caps are really just a money grab by greedy ISPs who don't have any competition. This is especially true when you consider that the data encoding used to transmit over fiber might very well so huge as to be virtually infinite.

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/physicists-made-an-infinite-hilbert-hotel-out-of-light

Sure, it would require some equipment upgrade and this probably won't apply to copper transmission lines, but still, for all practical purposes there are no capacity limits.

 

[mnewsham]

netflix were getting a free ride from the ISPs.

The thing is netflix sends out servers literally filled with their movies. If you are an ISP, you can request one of these servers from netflix FOR FREE. They are 100-200TB boxes that netflix preloads with a set library based on your physical location (certain regions have certain preferences). Then they get updates every day downloaded to add new shows or remove old things, etc.

http://gizmodo.com/this-box-can-hold-an-entire-netflix-1592590450


There is no excuse for ISPs to throttle netflix connections.

 

[master_shake_]

i don't see how Netflix was getting a free ride.

they paid their isps.

their customers paid their isp.

shouldn't the customer paying for 2 services get to enjoy an unthrottled version of a service that everyone has been paid for?

 

[Phoenix86]

Individuals aren't saturating the network -- hundreds of people simultaneously streaming video are.


Brian

The congestion argument is bullshit and the ISP have admitted as much to various government agencies.

http://arstechnica.com/business/201...ion-is-not-a-problem-impose-data-caps-anyway/

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/2...caps-have-nothing-to-do-with-congestion.shtml

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/2...are-cash-grab-not-engineering-necessity.shtml

 

[Charmonium]

The thing is netflix sends out servers literally filled with their movies. If you are an ISP, you can request one of these servers from netflix FOR FREE. They are 100-200TB boxes that netflix preloads with a set library based on your physical location (certain regions have certain preferences). Then they get updates every day downloaded to add new shows or remove old things, etc.

http://gizmodo.com/this-box-can-hold-an-entire-netflix-1592590450


There is no excuse for ISPs to throttle netflix connections.

Wow, that's pretty cool. I wonder if Donald Trump with next be asking to 'shut off the netflix.'