OSNews

Those who consume more pay more. I don't download that much torrent files or view long duration video's on the web. So I hope my bill goes down and people who hog the network pay more. That would make more sense. Just like for Electricity.

IMHO - This is going to go to court and am not sure if the FCC could prevail. They sold a large chunck of bandwidth for $$$$ and explicitly stated that much of it will not be subject to such regulation. I guess many of the carriers will be asking for a refund.

Edited 2009-09-21 21:29 UTC

Those who consume more pay more. I don't download that much torrent files or view long duration video's on the web. So I hope my bill goes down and people who hog the network pay more. That would make more sense. Just like for Electricity.

IMHO - This is going to go to court and am not sure if the FCC could prevail. They sold a large chunck of bandwidth for $$$$ and explicitly stated that much of it will not be subject to such regulation. I guess many of the carriers will be asking for a refund. "

I'll buy into that pay as you go when all the Telcos in the US [hardlines and Wireless] pay back the hundreds of Billions in Loans outstanding, first.

We don't even have to discuss the hundreds of Billions in US Subsidies right?

Edited 2009-09-21 23:04 UTC

I see where you're coming from and I agree with your sentiment, as far as saving money for you is concerned, but I'm paying for a flat rate internet connection. That basically means I have a no size limit download agreement with my ISP. Network "quality of service" is not something I agreed on when I signed the contract, yet I notice more and more that my connection is severely faster for the first 15 to 30 seconds, then the QoS kicks in and my downloads drop. The amount they drop by depends on the time of day but they always drop. That in itself is already bad enough. For my ISP to start dictating at what speed I use various applications is intolerable.


Yeah, I doubt they are going down without a fight. The problem is the FCC had their heads up their ass when they let that particular Genie out of the bottle. To suddenly do a 180 is going to cost them in more than just money.

You people trip me out!

So I suppose you don't use any programs on your computer that are of download nature? Because the very people that may offer you a free program have to upload it somewhere! So that person that gives you a product (with nothing in return) should pay a higher bill then you because you don't use torrents and this happens to be a great way to spread FOSS software (like Linux)?

I don't share in your excitement my friend!

On a side note, liked the article! Seems as if something may be done for the consumer here (what a rarity).

Your ISP probably provides different plans based on how much per month one may download and what maximum speed it may run at. Select a plan closer to your needs, don't suggest everyone buy the highest plan available then expect the fee to be adjusted because they didn't use all of there allotted transfer rate.

the internet is global and unchained and shouldn't be messed around with by the government of any country. I don't want the FCC to censor the internet like they do with broadcast TV and radio.

Edited 2009-09-21 21:55 UTC

This isn't censorship, and if you had paid any form of attention instead of kneejerking, you would've seen that the rules do not interfere with the internet, but merely with US ISPs.

Please read the article before commenting. Thank you.

To my eyes, a big problem is that the majority of ISPs have vested interests in holding back VoIP (telcos) and online video (cable companies) as much as they possibly can.

I pay my pound of flesh per month for a connection from my wall socket to the internet. I expect a rate of data transfer regardless of what those 1s and 0s happen to be. At the transport layer, it's all one binary streaming blob. Filtering parts of that binary stream based on the ISP'd arbitrary feelings is not acceptable. It's barely tolerable that my upload speed does not remotely match my download speed.

I don't want my ISP's "value add".. It's a simply deal, I give you money every month, you give me a dump-pipe feed. Don't bust my balls over what ports I have open or what order the 1s and 0s happen to arrive in.

I agree with your general sentiment, but isn't this a technical characteristic of ADSL?

Your analogy fails, electricity is paid by amount but net speed is bought as slice. Again like I said these freedoms are pee, they look like fanta but it's really pee. That means your heavy torrent traffic can be seen as "harmful", thus you get kicked in nuts.

Good point, my analogy is flawed. I guess what I'm trying to say is I signed a contract with my ISP to get a data pipe. Except for breaking the law or purposely damaging the network, nowhere does it say in that contract what I'm allowed and not allowed to use that connection for. I'd much rather it stayed that way.