“In times like these, surfing the web might seem like one of life’s cheaper entertainment options. But the next time you fire up your home computer, consider this: If some Internet service providers get their way, the meter could be running while you’re shopping, emailing or reading news reports like this one,” Stacey L. Bradford reports for SmartMoney.
“That’s because cable and telecommunications companies are forging ahead with plans to radically change their familiar flat-rate monthly Internet plans – even as new options for watching movies and TV online proliferate,” Bradford reports. “What should web surfers expect? ‘Usage caps’ that would penalize those who send and receive too much data.”
Bradford reports, “Time Warner Cable, for instance, is currently running a test in Beaumont, Texas, that offers a range of plans that allow between five gigabytes and 40 gigabytes of bandwidth for new customers. The five-gigabyte plan costs $29.95 a month, while customers pay $54.90 monthly for the 40-gigabyte plan. Go over the limit and customers have to pay $1 for every extra gigabyte. AT&T is testing a similar plan in Reno, Nev., with cap ranges between 20 GB to 150 GB for its new customers.”
Bradford reports, “How easy is it to run over that cap? Just a few years ago it would have been difficult. But now the rise of video and other data-heavy applications on the web means more consumers are eating up large amounts of data — downloading movies and music from Apple’s iTunes… and engaging in other ‘bandwidth intensive’ activities.”
Bradford reports, “To put the caps in perspective, purchasing and downloading the movie ‘Wall-E’ from iTunes would use up over one gigabyte alone. Working through the first season of TV’s “Mad Men”? In total, those episodes would consume nearly seven gigabytes.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Carl H” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: Heavy Apple TV and/or iTunes Store users along with BitTorrent hogs might be shopping for new ISPs sometime soon.
greedy bastards
Slow web innovation in 3…2…1…
This is the problem with MBAs who can’t think their way out of a paper bag running the world. Time/Warner and their sister companies are probably selling content through iTunes and gain exposure and advertising revenue through sites like Hulu, which would be the first to suffer under this plan.
Great way to shoot oneself in the foot.
So they sell movies online for more than the physical product costs, they then try and effectively charge you for delivery of that product on top, at a rate that far exceeds what any postage would for the same physical product. What a world we’ve made for ourselves.
Now, if I don’t use all 40 gig, do I get a $1 back for every gig I don’t use?
These companies are testing the market’s sensitivity to the concept. Either they’ll be smart about it and adjust their caps for real-world usage or they’ll be passed over in favor of their competition. I don’t see a world where all providers enforce a uniform cap on bandwidth that will make an active iTMS user suffer. It’s not like they’re proposing to throttle you as soon as you fire up a torrent As soon as Fios comes to my town, I will terminate Comcrap with extreme prejudice.
Where I would be worried about this practice is in those markets where competition is non-existent. Fortunately I don’t happen to be in one.
40 gig plan = $54.90
20 gig plan + 20 gig over = $29.95 + $20 = $49.95
That’s nothing new, the tight bastards in the UK have been doing that for a while. I’m with Virgin and they sneeked in a ‘fair use’ policy a year ago that if you download too much between certain hours they will cut you connection speed for 5 hours!
It’ll bring a whole new meaning to running ad blocking software….
Rarely do I object to an MDN take, however, where does the iTunes/AppleTV user go when all ISP’s do this?
Plus, this is related to the concept of Net Neutrality. Some packets should not be more equal than others. Extorted or not.
@ jtsync47
try my place, malaysia, in which the sole ISP is offered by TM, which is a Government Linked company… we have WIMAX here, by 4 companies whom charge exorbitant rates.
1Mbps is MYR 88.00, or USD24
4Mbps is MYR 200+ or at least USD55
I’m surprised that no one has mentioned this yet. But this would seem to be a violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. Now that more people are watching TV from online sources, cable TV companies that are also ISP’s are essentially pricing their competition out of business. The same could be said of VOIP and telco companies.
Collusion is easily accomplished when the FCC allowed the destruction of competition.
It appears no one seems to be looking out for the consumer. But no surprises there.
What happens to those poor people who have a wireless connection, but don’t have proper security and their neighbors end up using it?
I wonder what would happen if you were on vacation and didn’t use any internet, but seven different people in neighboring apartments did and you come home to a $300 bill.
It won’t work…ISP’s will get undercut by every small ISP in town offering bandwidth for free.
Americans haven’t been too smart, but the economy downturn is making them smarter…less frivolous. If it does happen, then Apple should make .Mac for free with unlimited everything. iPod sales makes up for iTunes, it can also make up for .Mac. I would use it heavily if it were conveniently free.
@ Mungo
Not quite, I’m afraid. That’s a FIVE-gigabyte plan, not twenty. The 40-gig plan works out as more cost-effective if you’re using 30 gigs or more.
@ mwmwmw
“Now, if I don’t use all 40 gig, do I get a $1 back for every gig I don’t use?”
Umm… have you met the cell phone carriers yet? AT&T;is about the nicest with the “rollover” minutes.
THe Dude abides.
So much greedy whining on this thread. I’m no fan of cable companies, but do you all really expect anything to be truly UNLIMITED? The only reason ISP providers offered “unlimited” plans until now was because almost no one could use so much bandwith that it mattered to them. Now that downloading large files is becoming more common, cable companies will have to increase their investment in infrastructure to handle that OR make consumers ration their usage. The natural way to do that is to attach a price to heavy users. Either those users then decide it’s not worth it, or they pay the extra dollars that allow for the increased investment necessary to handle the heavier loads. That said, there should be the normal oversight to ensure that there is no “collusion” or other cartel behavior. But the fact that multiple ISPs are coming to the conclusion that they have to charge heavy users more is NOT evidence of that. There is never really a “free lunch”! Someone, somewhere has to pay for it.
want to kill the economy… is it not enough that I already pay $1800 a year to Time Warner for cable and internet?
So it costs you $1 to download a movie, but only if you have already downloaded 40 this month. How is that unfair?
Seems like any bandwidth provider that doesn’t charge those huge bandwidth hogs more YET, will eventually, since they kill the bandwidth for everybody.
We’ve had caps on Rogers for years. That said, I get a pretty good deal (thanks to bundling) on my service with 10 Mbit down/1 MBit up and a 95 GB limit.
Going from unlimited to 40 GB is draconian and will lose customers for sure…
I just bought 3-disc Wall-E with Digital Copy and saved some bandwidth
Hey Jake, wires that used to give you 10 mbps mow give you 1000.
So if these guys start charging you this way, there will be no incentive to expand and increase and update their networks.
Initially, we were told paying for cable service will give us ad-free programming. Now we get the ads and we have to pay extra for the ad-free channels. Here we will have the same situation. Most web pages are littered with ads, some of which are video. In fact this page you are reading has more junk than the data you are interested in. And you will be paying to get this junk.
Do I get rollover gigabytes?
The 250 gig cap is more reasonable. 40 gigs a month? No way.