Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?

Saw this article on the BBC webby today;

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm

You know, this really annoys me. They use the analogy of going out for
a meal with a group of people then feeling cheated when the bill is
split equally...well can I suggest that they don't arrange to go out
for a 3-course dinner if they plan to sit there nibbling on a piece of
celery all night?

Once again we find any hope of innovation and technological
advancement in the UK dragged down to the lowest common denominator
because some idiot signed a Broadband contract to check his emails
twice a day and feels he's being ripped off. I signed up for Broadband
for precisely the reasons advertised - always on, fast internet access
at a set speed for a set price. If BT's pipe is getting tight then
tough, get more and bigger pipes and leave the rest of us alone.

The article also says;

"Some organisations have tried imposing daily limits on how much
people can download, but this has not proved popular.

Now service providers are testing ways to tighten the bandwidth belt.
Many are trialling technology that helps manage traffic on the network
and also shows who is using broadband, what for and when"

Surely if you tighten the belt you restrict what can be downloaded in
any one day and therefore imposing the same unpopular limits anyway,
but by the back door?

At the end of the day, I'm not a big peer-to-peer downloader or
constant streamer of music and video, I just like to keep my PC as up
to date as possible (which was very time consuming over dial-up) and I
want to enjoy a bit of online-gaming without worrying if an
over-running Medal of Honor match is going to cost me a fortune when
the quarterly bill arrives.

Darren.

"Darren Owen" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> Saw this article on the BBC webby today;
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm
>
> You know, this really annoys me. They use the analogy of going out for
> a meal with a group of people then feeling cheated when the bill is
> split equally...well can I suggest that they don't arrange to go out
> for a 3-course dinner if they plan to sit there nibbling on a piece of
> celery all night?
>
Lol, i hate bastards like that, "Mehhh well i only had the souuup"

FOAD.

..S.

... and I had no popadoms (

"..Si.." <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:3f674e34$0$33807$(E-Mail Removed) ...
> "Darren Owen" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> > Saw this article on the BBC webby today;
> >
> > http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm
> >
> > You know, this really annoys me. They use the analogy of going out for
> > a meal with a group of people then feeling cheated when the bill is
> > split equally...well can I suggest that they don't arrange to go out
> > for a 3-course dinner if they plan to sit there nibbling on a piece of
> > celery all night?
> >
> Lol, i hate bastards like that, "Mehhh well i only had the souuup"
>
> FOAD.
>
> .S.
>
>

Darren Owen wrote:

> Saw this article on the BBC webby today;
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm

I wouldn't place much confidence in the predicitions of this article. It
claims:

"So with the technology, service providers could start to offer people like
Mrs Gadekar cheap broadband access - for, perhaps, ?20 a month, which
competes with dial-up access - which provides fast e-mail and slow
streaming."


Why do they need "intelligent networks" to do this? You can already get
broadband internet access for less than ?20 per month.


--
Chris Lambert (http://web.trout-fish.org.uk/)
Linux. The choice of a GNU generation.

In article <bk7jaa$1j0$(E-Mail Removed)>,
(E-Mail Removed) says...
>
> "..Si.." <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> news:3f674e34$0$33807$(E-Mail Removed) ...
> > "Darren Owen" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> > news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> > > Saw this article on the BBC webby today;
> > >
> > > http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm
> > >
> > > You know, this really annoys me. They use the analogy of going out for
> > > a meal with a group of people then feeling cheated when the bill is
> > > split equally...well can I suggest that they don't arrange to go out
> > > for a 3-course dinner if they plan to sit there nibbling on a piece of
> > > celery all night?
> > >
> > Lol, i hate bastards like that, "Mehhh well i only had the souuup"
> >
> ... and I had no popadoms (

That's OK. I ate all mine, and yours too, so it all works out the same ;-)

/me has a weakness for popadums

Pete.

--
NOTE! Email address is spamtrapped. Any email will be bounced to you
Remove the news and underscore from my address to reply by mail

I don't see what is so new or unusual about this - these sorts of
metred/semi-metred plans are already being offered/forced upon people in
Canada and Australia and even in some parts of the US. They're usually along
the lines of "you can download 5Gb a month and every 100Mb beyond that is
charged at x cents" or something similar.

Indeed over the years if technology like FTTH (optical Fibre To The Home)
takes off, it may well be a case of paying a standard charge for having a
connection to the network using fibre and a standard charge per Gigabyte
downloaded or uploaded.

Regards,
Far

"Darren Owen" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed) m...
> Saw this article on the BBC webby today;
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3109146.stm
>
> You know, this really annoys me. They use the analogy of going out for
> a meal with a group of people then feeling cheated when the bill is
> split equally...well can I suggest that they don't arrange to go out
> for a 3-course dinner if they plan to sit there nibbling on a piece of
> celery all night?
>
> Once again we find any hope of innovation and technological
> advancement in the UK dragged down to the lowest common denominator
> because some idiot signed a Broadband contract to check his emails
> twice a day and feels he's being ripped off. I signed up for Broadband
> for precisely the reasons advertised - always on, fast internet access
> at a set speed for a set price. If BT's pipe is getting tight then
> tough, get more and bigger pipes and leave the rest of us alone.
>
> The article also says;
>
> "Some organisations have tried imposing daily limits on how much
> people can download, but this has not proved popular.
>
> Now service providers are testing ways to tighten the bandwidth belt.
> Many are trialling technology that helps manage traffic on the network
> and also shows who is using broadband, what for and when"
>
> Surely if you tighten the belt you restrict what can be downloaded in
> any one day and therefore imposing the same unpopular limits anyway,
> but by the back door?
>
> At the end of the day, I'm not a big peer-to-peer downloader or
> constant streamer of music and video, I just like to keep my PC as up
> to date as possible (which was very time consuming over dial-up) and I
> want to enjoy a bit of online-gaming without worrying if an
> over-running Medal of Honor match is going to cost me a fortune when
> the quarterly bill arrives.
>
> Darren.

> Indeed over the years if technology like FTTH (optical Fibre To The Home)
> takes off, it may well be a case of paying a standard charge for having a
> connection to the network using fibre and a standard charge per Gigabyte
> downloaded or uploaded.

The thing is, that is an awful way of doing things. I wouldn't mind (in
principle) if there were tiers, for say <500MB/week, <2GB/week, etc, and if
you were constantly over your own tier you got moved up to the next one and
paid more, but I would really hate to have something where you find yourself
paying per MB or per GB, or per minute as in standard modem connection
charges. It would really limit your use of the internet, and you'd find
youself constantly thinking "well if I download this patch it'll cost me
50p, if I play this game it'll cost me £1 per hour, if I listen to this
radio station i'll be paying 75p to listen to it for the day... You
couldn't just sit back and enjoy what you're doing. Having ADSL has
completely changed the way I use the internet because you aren't constantly
thinking about how long you are connected for, and it is all the better for
it. I wouldn't mind if ADSL was more per month (as long as it was
reasonable and I could afford it), but I would much prefer to pay a higher
fixed rate than I would want to pay a per MB, per GB, per minute charges,
even if they turned out to be cheaper!

David

On Wed, 17 Sep 2003 00:48:14 +0100, "David Walker"
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> I wouldn't mind if ADSL was more per month (as long as it was
>reasonable and I could afford it),
How can you say this it ISN'T reasonable now, when the monthly
subscriptions come down to around a tenner a month then I will say it
is reasonable. Its people like you who are basically giving the ISP's
and BT wholesale an open invetation to up the prices when you start to
make statements like you have done here
> but I would much prefer to pay a higher
>fixed rate than I would want to pay a per MB, per GB, per minute charges,
>even if they turned out to be cheaper!
So you want me and the many others who do not download all that much
and do not play games like little school kids over then to pay for
your pleasure . If you use it you should pay for it not expect others
to pay also and its exactly the same with the road fund license it
should be scrapped and the charge put on the price of petrol then
people like myself who are doing less than 1000 miles a year are not
paying for the people doing hundreds of miles a week .
Damn it I have been very extravagant today I have done eight miles
first time the car has moved since Friday morning though .
Monty .

> > I wouldn't mind if ADSL was more per month (as long as it was
> >reasonable and I could afford it),
> How can you say this it ISN'T reasonable now, when the monthly
> subscriptions come down to around a tenner a month then I will say it
> is reasonable. Its people like you who are basically giving the ISP's

I think it is more than reasonable now. When you can still pay £10-£15 for
a freephone modem number, or £20 for always on high speed ADSL, I think what
we get now is very good value. For the coming year i've just signed up to
2MB ADSL for £60 a month, which is probably a lot, but we felt it offered
good value shared between four of us - between us we would be quite
demanding on a 512k connection, so we paid for a more expensive and capable
service, which is quite fair in my opinion.

> > but I would much prefer to pay a higher
> >fixed rate than I would want to pay a per MB, per GB, per minute charges,
> >even if they turned out to be cheaper!
> So you want me and the many others who do not download all that much
> and do not play games like little school kids over then to pay for

You don't seem to have read anything I've said. I wouldn't mind paying more
for more usage, but not on simple per MB, per GB usage or per minute usage -
these simply discourage use of a resource which I don't see as a good thing.
That is why I said I wouldn't mind having levels of access, with low users
paying less per month, but with a 'soft-limit' which if they exceed
regularly then they'd be moved up to the next level of tarrif and pay a
little more. That way high usage users will pay more, but not have to worry
that every MB they download is costing them money. If they do go over their
limit in one month, but have a history of very low usage, then their tarrif
level would be unaffected, where as someone who repeatedly exceeded their
allowable levels would be moved up to the next tarrif level. I would see
that as a far more positive pricing policy, with broad levels of usage
rather than charging for every last byte downloaded.
And I don't play games over the internet, nor am I a 'little school kid' - I
was using it as an example.

David

On Wed, 17 Sep 2003 02:15:17 +0100, Monty <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote:

>How can you say this it ISN'T reasonable now

in a country where the average household income is pushing £3,000 per
month you think £20-25 is too much for a 512k broadband connection ?
half the price of a tank of petrol ?

Phil