people who complain about data caps...this is why its needed

[rudeguy]

52 gigs in one month

http://www.androidcentral.com/man-who-gets-his-moneys-worth-forums

 

[Deeko]

I am fine with data caps. I think they're perfectly reasonable.

 

[gsaldivar]

I'm also fine with paying more for less. I think that's perfectly reasonable.

 

[rudeguy]

I'm also fine with paying more for less. I think that's perfectly reasonable.

Just out of curiosity....are you ok with torrenting tv shows?

 

[NikolaeVarius]

How the hell do you manage that. Does he stream HD movies while playing pandora and watching youtube at the same time?

You have to be TRYING to get that kind of use.

 

[Deeko]

I'm also fine with paying more for less. I think that's perfectly reasonable.

AT&T's new plans are both cheaper than the old $30 "unlimited". I use my smartphones pretty heavily and I've never eclipsed 2GB.

 

[Brian Stirling]

You will note that he is absolutely unapologetic about eating over 50GB in a month and that there are a lot of people that also think it's OK. If 25% of users ate data like that the network would grind to a halt and you'd be hard pressed to be able to do anything with it.

But, the carriers marketed "unlimited" plans and now they are paying the price with users thinking -- hey, I paid for unlimited so I going to use all I can. Streaming music 40 hours/week will eat, by itself, almost 6GB and that it the bit rate is on the low side. Streaming high quality (high bit rate) music 16 hours a day every day would put you in the 20GB range. Of course, if you already have most of your music with you on your phone you don't waste that bandwidth at all.


Brian

 

[jpeyton]

Anecdotal evidence brought to you by Ma Bell.

Millions of Americans have "unlimited" broadband at home, and yet my broadband is still fast. Just because it's unlimited doesn't mean they all stream HD movies and Pandora 24/7 just for kicks.

Between this and the mobile display thread, rudeguy is shooting 0/2 today.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

There is no way you can get 50GB of data from streaming video or audio. It would have to come from something like tethering (which may or may not be acceptable for the $30 plan).

 

[coolVariable]

I have considered ditching cable internet at home and getting a 3G/4G hotspot ...

With netflix/hulu streaming (as my primary source for TV content besides OTA) I could easily surpass 52GB for month (which is the only reason I have not ditched TWC for cable internet)

 

[gsaldivar]

AT&T's new plans are both cheaper than the old $30 "unlimited". I use my smartphones pretty heavily and I've never eclipsed 2GB.

By doing away with "unlimited", the effective cost per GB has increased. Users are simply getting a discounted rate of $12.50/GB/mo on the first 2GB per each line.

The fact that "most" users don't exceed that arbitrary amount is rather meaningless. The many thousands of non-abusive customers who do, will be paying more than before...

 

[Deeko]

By doing away with "unlimited", the effective cost per GB has increased. Users are simply getting a discounted rate of $12.50/GB/mo on the first 2GB per each line.

The fact that "most" users don't exceed that arbitrary amount is rather meaningless. The many thousands of non-abusive customers who do, will be paying more than before...

I figured that's where you were going with it. The vast majority of customers see a rate cut, regardless of what the per-GB cost is. Those customers that are using excessive amounts of data - the ones who *should* be paying more, well, will now pay more. Seems fair to me.

 

[gsaldivar]

I figured that's where you were going with it. The vast majority of customers see a rate cut, regardless of what the per-GB cost is. Those customers that are using excessive amounts of data - the ones who *should* be paying more, well, will now pay more. Seems fair to me.

Well sir, it's a shame AT&T isn't paying for your endorsement.

52GB is ridiculous. That's a customer that should have been either cut off or bumped up to a business plan a long time ago. If a carrier chooses to tolerate that type of service abuse, then that decision shouldn't be used to badger its contract-abiding customers into paying more for their service.

I personally don't equate >2GB of data with "excessive". Especially not when I'm paying in excess of $1200/year for phone service. However, AT&T's marketing department has done a remarkable job convincing people that paying more for less is a desirable thing.

 

[zerocool84]

I am all for keeping the 5GB limit. I've hit near the 5GB limit many times but I am all for tiered pricing but getting rid of the 5GB all together is ridiculous and only slows down the progress we've made. Companies are barely starting to make streaming services and with such low caps, we won't be able to really take advantage of them at all.

 

[gsaldivar]

Companies are barely starting to make streaming services and with such low caps, we won't be able to really take advantage of them at all.

Exactly. Carriers honestly need to get their act together and prune abusive users from their system rather than using them as an excuse to raise prices by pushing people into metered plans...

 

[Deeko]

Well sir, it's a shame AT&T isn't paying for your endorsement.

52GB is ridiculous. That's a customer that should have been either cut off or bumped up to a business plan a long time ago. If a carrier chooses to tolerate that type of service abuse, then that decision shouldn't be used to badger its contract-abiding customers into paying more for their service.

I personally don't equate >2GB of data with "excessive". Especially not when I'm paying in excess of $1200/year for phone service. However, AT&T's marketing department has done a remarkable job convincing people that paying more for less is a desirable thing.

The problem is you keep tossing out the "paying more for less" line, and for the vast majority of their customers, that is simply untrue. If a customer pays $25 for 2GB, and *never* goes over that 2GB (which, like I said, the vast majority never do), they will be getting exactly the same and paying less than the old $30 "unlimited" plan.

By your logic, no one should have a minute rate plan less than unlimited, either. Nevermind the fact that I don't use more than 300 minutes a month - I'm paying more for less if I don't get the $99 unlimited plan!!!

If you're in the bucket of 2-5GB people that you think are being "wronged" here...well, go to another carrier or pay more. You really do have to work to use that much data without tethering. It certainly can be done, but its not easy. This could change once LTE and more video streaming comes available - and when it does, maybe carriers will have different data plans. There's no point in arguing about plans that don't exist.

 

[ew915]

I can easily go over that if i wanted, i eat about 500Gb of month from my land connection so i'd just need to shift some of it.
If you ask what i do, well i stream 1080p movies that are about 20gb per movie.

 

[coolVariable]

I can easily go over that if i wanted, i eat about 500Gb of month from my land connection so i'd just need to shift some of it.
If you ask what i do, well i stream 1080p movies that are about 20gb per movie.

BS alarm! That is impossible unless you are in Sweden and have an ethernet-like internet connection.

 

[gsaldivar]

The problem is that AT&T's cheerleaders keep asserting that since "most" or "majority" of customers don't exceed the 2GB mark, the rest of their law-abiding, contract-abiding, customers should gratefully accept price increases. I'm sorry but that's bullshit.

Yes, a segment of users will pay $25 instead of $30 - I get it. But there remain many thousands of 2-5gb users who will be paying more. Why? Because the carrier needs to subsidize the abusers on their network? Forgive me for asking the obvious - but why aren't the abusers being kicked off the network?

With GPS, maps, web, streaming, and productivity apps, it is quite easy to exceed 2GB on a modern cell phone without tethering or abusing the network. Hell, I was able to get close to that limit on my ancient Treo with heavy email and streaming music on my commute.

 

[Anubis]

ill break 5gb this month on VZ and 90% of that is from streaming music, ive never tethered my phone

 

[yh125d]

not really any worse than those folks who have like 8k texts a month

 

[sjwaste]

not really any worse than those folks who have like 8k texts a month

Seriously? A text is, at most, 160 characters...

 

[Deeko]

The problem is that AT&T's cheerleaders keep asserting that since "most" or "majority" of customers don't exceed the 2GB mark, the rest of their law-abiding, contract-abiding, customers should gratefully accept price increases. I'm sorry but that's bullshit.

Yes, a segment of users will pay $25 instead of $30 - I get it. But there remain many thousands of 2-5gb users who will be paying more. Why? Because the carrier needs to subsidize the abusers on their network? Forgive me for asking the obvious - but why aren't the abusers being kicked off the network?

With GPS, maps, web, streaming, and productivity apps, it is quite easy to exceed 2GB on a modern cell phone without tethering or abusing the network. Hell, I was able to get close to that limit on my ancient Treo with heavy email and streaming music on my commute.

lol @ "AT&T cheerleader", AT&T is the only of the big four that I haven't had an account with. I'm by no means an AT&T cheerleader just because I won't join you in your nerd rage.

AT&T states that 98% of their smartphone users use under 2GB of data. So they are lowered prices for 98% of their users!! And the vocal - yet very small - nerd minority that exceeds that can either choose to pay overages, or go to another carrier. Overages are not as egregious as they are for minutes. Its $10 for an additional GB. So if you use 3GB, you pay $35 if you can't bring yourself to lower your usage a little. Doesn't seem like the end of the world either way.

(also, save your cutsey little "law abiding contract abiding nonsense. If you're still on a contract, you keep your old plan. If you don't want to change, don't sign a new contract.)

AT&T has made it clear that they think the reasonable limit you should use is 2GB. Considering the vast amount of complaints they get about the reliability of their network, its obvious they are taking steps to improve it. If that means they lose, say 1.5% of their customers that refuse to lower their data usage or pay more, all the while improving the quality of their service for the other 98.5%....I'm sure as a business they'd take that.

If you don't like it, rather than bitching and crying on a forum, go to another carrier. If its really as much of an outrage as you suggest, other carriers will not follow suit.

 

[yh125d]

Seriously? A text is, at most, 160 characters...

As far as level of ridiculousness, not data usage

 

[zerocool84]

lol @ "AT&T cheerleader", AT&T is the only of the big four that I haven't had an account with. I'm by no means an AT&T cheerleader just because I won't join you in your nerd rage.

AT&T states that 98% of their smartphone users use under 2GB of data. So they are lowered prices for 98% of their users!! And the vocal - yet very small - nerd minority that exceeds that can either choose to pay overages, or go to another carrier. Overages are not as egregious as they are for minutes. Its $10 for an additional GB. So if you use 3GB, you pay $35 if you can't bring yourself to lower your usage a little. Doesn't seem like the end of the world either way.

(also, save your cutsey little "law abiding contract abiding nonsense. If you're still on a contract, you keep your old plan. If you don't want to change, don't sign a new contract.)

AT&T has made it clear that they think the reasonable limit you should use is 2GB. Considering the vast amount of complaints they get about the reliability of their network, its obvious they are taking steps to improve it. If that means they lose, say 1.5% of their customers that refuse to lower their data usage or pay more, all the while improving the quality of their service for the other 98.5%....I'm sure as a business they'd take that.

If you don't like it, rather than bitching and crying on a forum, go to another carrier. If its really as much of an outrage as you suggest, other carriers will not follow suit.

What's funny is that AT&T is the only carrier that has such a big problem with data. Verizon has more customers yet doesn't have the same problem at all. It's just because AT&T's network sucks and blame it on the users when it just their network.