SomeJoe7777 wrote:
lanbrown wrote:
It has everything to do with net neutrality. The FCC slapped the hands of Comcast as they were trying to control bit torrent traffic. So since they can't protect the network from the actions of a few from impacting all of the other subscribers, caps will be used.
There is a problem with your math, you think the 2% only use slightly more. Know why AT&T Mobility imposed the caps? Some of those 2% users well well above 100GB and some were above 200GB. They were using their iPhoney as a hotspot for everything including an Xbox.
Your 50GB additional is way too low.
Even if that's true, there's still no evidence at all of congestion. Suppose those people use 500GB (double the limit). Capping them still only reduces the total monthly bandwidth usage by around 20%, which still isn't significant enough to point to a capacity issue.
You, as many other people do, are confusing the concept of Net Neutrality with bandwidth management. The two concepts have nothing to do with each other. They are two different things with two different stated purposes.
Caps are one method used for bandwidth management. You use more bandwidth, you pay for it.
The concept of Net Neutrality states that there shall be no difference in the quality of service provided that depends on the contents of the packet. The ISP should not discriminate against this traffic or that traffic because of any particular reason. Discrimination of the traffic could be:
- Refusing to deliver a particular packet
- Delaying the delivery of a particular packet
- Modifying the contents of a particular packet
- Imposing additional costs to deliver a particular packet
None of these are the ISP's job. There is no difference in cost to the ISP to deliver packet A vs. packet B, therefore there is absolutely no legitimate reason to discriminate against packet A but not packet B.
That is because they have continued to spend more and more money on network upgrades. At some point, they need to do one of two things; caps or raise prices. What would you rather have? Price increases across the board or having that 2% paying more?
AT&T is working on 100GigE backhaul links to replace 10Gig and 40Gig links they currently have.
The congestion is not at the DSLAM but in the core. If they are like other large ISP's, they are seeing 50% or over data growth year over year and at times over 100%.
So, you don't see congestion because they are trying to stay ahead of the curve, eventually you start to lose money as the money being spent on the upgrades is not being recouped before the next upgrade is required.
Your ideas of network administration is flawed, seriously flawed! Comcast got sick of upgrading their network to accommodate that 2% and decided to do something about it and that was the traffic causing the problems and would invoke congestion like symptoms before congestion occurred. The FCC didn't like that, so caps have been done. So nothing is done to any of the traffic but now when people go over the limit, Comcast can easily do whatever they want to the customer. The FCC under their net neutrality guidelines also allows traffic management to be used at times and that the ISP must be open about their policies. That was the major issue that Comcast had; they were not open about it.
