Net neutrality threatened. Usage based billing rolls out! :(

[{ESC}Myth]

Seeing as there seems to be no topic discussing these issues facing the international online community I thought it wise to start one here.
For those not aware of wahts going on your ISPs are trying to push legislation to remove 'neutrality' from the internet. What this means for us is nothing but bad news.
Want to watch netflix on your PC? well you'd better hope that its part of your ISPs "preffered" traffic.
The basics are like this. Your ISPs are fighting for the right to treat various types of internet traffic differently, giving higher priority to certain forms of traffic over others.
So for example your ISP owns/runs a streaming video service but your trying to use netflix on thier network, they want the right to slow your traffic to "make room" for thier traffic generated by thier streaming video service. several ISPs also consider "heavy gamers" as bandwidth hogs (aside from being outright bullcrap) and will have the power to throttle your game traffic unless you sign up for thier "gamer service" (of course with a new higher premium fee)
Why this is a problem.
Simply put? Its the internet, an unlimited resource that has no finite beginning or end to it, there are no resources consumed through useage, something your ISP would have you believe isn't true.
An electron is an electron, a data packet is a data packet regardless of the source, purpose, destination or intended use of said data. Allowing ISPs to monitor and throttle data trasfer based on arbitrary rules of thier own creation would spell the end of free information sharing on a global scale and allow your ISP to force consumers to pay higher premiums for the same services we recieve now.

The second issue revolves around UBB or "Useage based billing"
AT&T recently rolled out a useage based billing program with a download cap of 150Gb per month, with a $10 fee for each 50Gb over that cap while many people individually will likely not exceed that downlod amount now...In the near future its very likely that even standard "low use" consumers would reach tha 150Gb cap, due to the proliferation of streaming media on a global scale. In addition they've added a higher "tier" of service with a 250Gb bandwidth cap.
For comparison, how often would you buy or rent a DVD if you had to pay per minute just to watch it? How likely would you be to take a book out at the local library if you had to pay for each page read? We cannot allow the telecom's to take advantage of our governments archaic notions of what the internet is and how it works. You know and I know that the suits in washington are not very tech savvy and i doubt a single congressman/House representative has a degree related to the computer field in any way. It's up to us to educate our politicians and prevent them from being steamrolled by the telecoms. We cannot sit back and "let things work themselves out" on this! Day by day we lose more and more rights to the big corporations and less and less do the people ever speak up much less fight back. I feel it is our responsibility as the generation standing to inherit these negative changes to our global community to stand up, speak out and let our leaders know that we will not stand for this!

Write your congressman, write to your state representative, write to your govenors, write the whitehouse directly but speak up! Help keep the internet free for everyone to use equally and let the telecoms know we're not going to stand for these changes.

If your curious and want more information on these issues a quick google search on "useage based billing" or "net neutrality" will both bring up a ton of stories on these issues many of which have very interesting and read worthy discussions following in thier comment sections.

To find out who your congressperson is
http://www.contactingthecongress.org/
Select your state,
input your address and viola! you have an email address.

Contacting the White house
email (limited to 2500 characters sadly)
http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact

physical mailing address
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Phone numbers
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461

TTY/TDD phone numbers
Comments: 202-456-6213
Visitors Office: 202-456-2121

For those of you overseas or not a US Citizen i urge you too, find out who your elected officials are and write them! these cahnges not only effect us here in the US but everyone around the globe who uses the internet. Using Canada as an example of what happens when the telecoms take over your communications rights, do you really want other nations to carry out similar plans without the voice of the citizenship being heard? I for one do not.

[Admin]

our government in Canada stop this from happening!!WWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

[{ESC}Pappy]

I didn't know Canadians got to vote........

[{ESC}Myth]

Comcast capped data at 250GB per month but could not limit beyond that really. I am on WOWWAY now and have still been hitting about 230GB per month. The moment any of them want to start prioritizing the web will be the day that I but a seed box and learn how to hack. I have my rights on the internet too. I am not willing to let people stand in my way if information or regulate hoe fast I can get it. I will start a group/consortium that will rally against the tyranny of the large and unscrupulous organization that are driven by greed. I will work to put a stop to it or fight back by making their service deplorable.







lll





Or I will just learn to read a book and sign off the net forever.

I would gladly join your campaign against the corporations, but writting a respectable well thought out letter to congress is so much simpler really :p

[PoW_CaptMonk]

Myth, first I want to agree with you that net neutrality in the context of content restriction, while very intangible, is necessary. Usage based billing is a sign of a maturing infrastructure, just as it was with traditional tele-communication.

However, while the information over the internet is infinite, the infrastructure is not. The equipment and manpower required to distribute bandwith to the home costs in the billions to maintain and upgrade.

Operational costs undercut the main driving factor for a business: profit. The ISPs are going to push their limits of charging their users, and the users are going to look for better options, and the market will stabilize. Unfrotunately, it will suck for a very long while. Just look at the history of billing structures for traditional telco products.

[{ESC}Myth]

Myth, first I want to agree with you that net neutrality in the context of content restriction, while very intangible, is necessary. Usage based billing is a sign of a maturing infrastructure, just as it was with traditional tele-communication.

However, while the information over the internet is infinite, the infrastructure is not. The equipment and manpower required to distribute bandwith to the home costs in the billions to maintain and upgrade.

Operational costs undercut the main driving factor for a business: profit. The ISPs are going to push their limits of charging their users, and the users are going to look for better options, and the market will stabilize. Unfrotunately, it will suck for a very long while. Just look at the history of billing structures for traditional telco products.

I would disagree about the costs for infrastructure as there is a LOT of documentation coming out showing a CLEAR DECREAS in infrastructure spending by AT&T (and other telecoms) yet useage charges are continuosly going up. Internet traffic does NOT function like highway traffic, there is no limit on the amount of lanes that can be opened. Consider this also the "operating costs" that the telecoms in the US cry about was initially paid for by our tax dollars via uncle sam. I highly reccomend people doa little google-fu of thier own, spend an hour or so reading some of these articles/documents and thier associated discussions.

Right now in the US cable internet is a virtual duopoly with only two large parent companies vying for customers. With next to no room for smaller independant competition, there is no incentive for the current Telecoms here to compete over our money as we only have 2 actual choices. hell last year TWC sued a town for attempting to build there own independant Wi-Fi network for citizens. Citing Monetary damages due to undercutting TWCs prices and network. how's that for a competative bussines envoirnment?

IMO Gamers and internet users in general have become intirely too complacant and laxadasial (big words!) about defending thier rights. gaming companies "lease" us our games no,we dont "Own' them anymore, and can revoke that lease at any with with or without cuase and offer us no compensation for it. Telecommunication companies have us all by the short hairs and we have no options to turn to (legal ones at least, no piggybacking the nieghbors wi-fi!) to alleviate the finacial strains enacted on our rights to information. Yes the internet should be treated as a right, not as a finite resource. Our greated tool for education (sure its mostly squandered on pRon, but still) is hampered by greed for the almighty dollar. Would you still watch a movie if you ahd to pay everytime you popped it in the DVD/Blu-ray player? Would you be okay with Disney coming to tak back thier DVDs becuase they didnt' like something you said on there forums? Why then do we allow ourselves to be treated such on the internet?

It's complete crap and until we open enough eyes and shout loud enough that we are in fact being taken advantage of hand over fist it won't change.
As it is I'm angry that i'm paying $3.35 for a gallon of gasoline becuase some jerkwad marke speculators are driving the price of oil through the roof by inflating its actual value beyond the demand of the citizenship. yet we're all sitting back sucking that one up to.

Write a letter folks. One letter from you, can help change the world. (or at least the USA :p )

[{ESC}Myth]

P.S this message wasn't posted to start a debate over the issue, but to get people to do something about it! If you disagree with a specific point I've made excellent, it shows your thinking and paying attention to the topic. Still write your elected officials and give them YOUR point of view on these topics. Every letter recieved is one more vote they'll have to worry about come election day.

[BENSTER]

Regarding Comcast 250 GB cap:

I just signed up with netflix 3 days ago, so I'm watching my bandwith carefully. Comcast was "throttling" connections back in the napster days, and as a result, I quit them, and went to DSL. NOTE: I wasn't doing napster, But from 4pm until 10pm, my pings and download speeds were all over the place. As long as the kids were in school or bed, I could play just fine. After 4 years of DSL, I switched back to comcast tripple play to save $100/month on my bills.

Well I digress, after Comcast took heat of the "throttling" they changed their policy, and put some things in to writing.....namely the 250 GB/month cap. This is a Calendar month cap, not a billing month cap, and "OnDemand" counts against your bandwith......meaning OnDemand is treated the same as NetFlix or other streaming sites. When you exceed this limit, they will telephone you to notify you've gone over, and they will attempt to help you figure it out. If you happen to have an open wifi connection, or a virus infected machine, they'll give you a chance to fix it, then turn you back on. Otherwise you are cut off until the end of the month (I know someone who ran in to this with bit torrent). If you exceed your limit a 2nd time with in 6 months, they will suspend/cancel your service for 12 months.

They have no mechanism to purchase additional GB in a month, there is no roll over. The only thing you can do is to purchase "Business Class" internet which has no limits at all. I haven't priced this option.