ISP Bandwidth Limits Make a Comeback
BANDWIDTH HOGS, BEWARE : Cable operators are targeting power users who transfer massive media (and other) files. Comcast is testing a technique that slows traffic to and from heavy users during peak periods. Time Warner Cable is crying out a usage-based (or tiered) pricing system in Beaumont, Texas; and Bend-Broadband of Bend, Oregon, now charges customers a usage penalty if they exceed a monthly data-transfer quota. Even some noncable ISPs, such as DSL giant AT&T, are mulling usage-based pricing.
Why the crackdown? “The cable companies are feeling the pain the most from heavy bandwidth users,” says IDC analyst Amy Harris Lind. That’s because all cable broadband subscribers in a neighborhood share a single pipe to their ISP; each DSL user has a dedicated link.
Comcast says that less than 1 percent of its broadband customers use “excessive” bandwidth; examples of excess include sending 20,000 high-resolution photos, downloading 50,000 songs, or viewing 8000 movie trailers in a month.
Download Slowdowns
Initially, Comcast is testing bandwidth throttling in Chambers-burg, Pennsylvania; Colorado Springs, Colorado; and Warren-ton, Virginia. By going after heavy bandwidth users, Comcast has thus far avoided the controversy it encountered earlier this year when it throttled the speeds of users of peer-to-peer (P-to-P) applications such as BitTorrent. Critics accused Comcast of violating the Federal Communications Commission-endorsed principle of Net neutrality, which prohibits ISPs from slowing down data transfers of specific applications. Even consumer advocates have reacted favorably—though
warily—to Comcast’s tests. warily—co Comcast’s tests. Ben Scott, policy director of media watchdog group Free Press, calls bandwidth throttling “legal and appropriate.”BitTorrent chief technical officer Eric Klinker is upbeat, too: “It’s certainly a good step from where they were, because it’s a more neutral approach, and it allows users to decide what’s important to them, rather than the network deciding.”
Pay per Bit
In its Beaumont test, Time Warner Cable offers subscribers four tiers of service based on transfer speed and on usage caps that range from 5GB to 40GB. For $30 per month, for instance, Time Warner promises users a download speed of 768 kbps and imposes a 5GB monthly cap. $55 fetches downstream transfers at 1.5 mbps with a 40GB cap. Customers who exceed the usage limit must pay SI per additional gigabyte. BendBroadband is far more generous: All tiers—ranging from $37 to $65 per month—have a 100GB allowance, after which users must pay $1.50 per gigabyte.
Will U.S. customers balk, given that usage-based consumer broadband faded away back in 1996, when America Online switched to all-you-can-eat pricing? Justin Moravetz, a Bend-Broadband subscriber in Bend, Oregon, believes that