Third Major ISP AT&T Testing Bandwidth Caps in the Fall [with a comment by me djf]

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

I am at a loss to see how such a cap will really help. The issue is  
not the amount of bits you move but when you move it. If the  
competition for the bandwidth is sleeping then you can send with no  
impact. If you try when the kids get home from school things are busy  
and so large transfers slow things down. All an issue of busy hour  
design.  What such caps DO create is an additional cost for people who  
are transferring large objects across the net -- like HD programs  
LEGALLY. Several of such transfers can eat up your allocation and then  
if they charge say $1/gig -- a HD can cost you what $3 to $4.  Now  
usually the cable operator (and the FIOS) uses another channel to  
deliver VOD  so, if I understand it right, they have created, by such  
a capacity model, a CLEAR competitive advantage in favor of themselves.

Neat way around the NetNeurality potholes.

Am I missing something.

Dave



http://gizmodo.com/5014290/welcome-to-the-future-of-broadband-third-major-isp-att-testing-bandwidth-caps-in-the-fall

AT&T chief tech officer John Donovan has told Wired that they're going  
to test bandwidth caps in the fall, making them the third of the four  
major ISPs to do so. (Verizon stands alone, but for how long?) He lays  
out the familiar rationale, a small group of users (5 percent) pillage  
the network (40 percent) and they've got to stop them. But then he  
slips what's probably the real reason they've moving to caps: "Traffic  
on our backbone is growing 60 percent per year, but our revenue is not."

It is more or less accepted that a minority of users use  
disproportionate of bandwidth, but what they're using it for is  
changing. It's increasingly video, not BitTorrent. The whole pro- 
BitTorrent thing is a smokescreen, because BitTorrent is less and less  
of an issue—video, and increasingly, HD video will be the real one.  
(Along with any number of other increasingly bandwidth-intensive  
apps.) And it'll be more and more competitive with providers' TV  
offerings—we've already seen Time Warner cry about it. But there's no  
legitimate way to block it and protect their content.

They can, however, make it more expensive for you to download with  
bandwidth caps (which is conveniently net neutral). And that's what I  
think this is partially about—protecting their TV business, not just  
curbing voracious bandwidth appetites. Regardless of the motivations,  
it's definitely coming. Comcast's tests will probably start soon, Time  
Warner's are already underwayand regional ISPs have been doing it for  
a while. It's looking very much like the future of broadband here.

At least if we're using it less maybe the internet won't explode now.  
[Wired]





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