Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Last month the BBC produced the following article which basically forecasts the demise of set-price broadband predominantly due to the large increase of peer-to-peer traffic. It likens the experience to going out for a meal and only having a small amount to eat in a group that pigs out. They then suggest that you split the bill equally which maddens you.....

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

The thought of paying per download for broadband horrifies me and I would object vehemently.

I know this issue has been discussed before but I wondered what you thought specifically about the following suggestion?

Broadband should be given for a set fee for unlimited usage. However if you want to use peer-to -peer then you are free to do so but you pay per megabyte. You could do this by monitoring a TCPIP port. Maybe this would stifle Peer-to-peer and the traffic would switch back to FTP? Maybe not....

Any thoughts?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I thought ISP's tried to block p2p ports, but then they adapted by using a variable port system.


What have we done to deserve this :cry::cry::cry::cry::cry:?

Why does every new NTL policy seem more like a punishment to their customers for not dying and continuing the payments?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

P2P programs do use variable ports. They have done ever since Napster was launched. It just means p2p programs can be a bugger to block at the firewall (we tried where I work). The only way to totally block them and still allow web access is to block every port apart from 21, 80 and whatever ports email uses. Mind you, even active FTP gets screwed up if you do this (although passive FTP works).

The sad thing is, because of a rise in P2P usage, I think that flat rate broadband will be history, and the easiest thing for the companies to charge for would be data per Megabyte (or Gigabyte).

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I'm not sure realistically that a company would just be able to charge based on P2P stuff, unless it is able to develop monitoring software that identified the contents of packets sent / received. As that would undoubtedly affect your privacy, ntl and others would have to make major changes to their T&Cs and AUP. As that would be a major change in contract they would have to notify us properly. Even ntl wouldnt want the outcry that would surely follow, the cap stuff was bad enough.

There might be a role for a very low user metered package, i.e. you pay a low fixed charge for your BB being always on for your email and limited browsing but if you exceed say a very low threshold of 1GB a month then the rest is paid for additional bandwidth. This would only appeal to low users perhaps on the 150k services.

Faster speed users, have the increased speed and bandwidth because they want to use it. I for one dont want to go back to the bad old days of being frightened to use my connection for fear of the bill next month. It is for the ISPs to establish the flat rate charge to meet their general costs. Market forces help to establish this price. There will always be higher and lower than average users, but until you are significantly lower than average use a metered option is not going to be what a customer wants or needs. Flat rate pricing works in so many walks of life. I fail to see why it is not approprate for Broadband.

I seem to recall seeing an ntl quote - possibly on that awfull Buy NTL channel - that "our customers like flat rate pricing" or words to that effect. Would this be another ntl change in the future for perceived short term financial gain?

We do need to be on our guard to ensure that flat rate pricing remains available and ISPs dont go down the metered route. That would stop the BB revolution in it's tracks.

To my mind moving to a metered rate is a cap by another name. I'm sure that anticap would get involved if this was anything more than a pipe dream.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

There is something inherently psychological that inhibits your online experience if you feel that the meter is running. It will be terrible if we go down that road again. I can appreciate the buisness model but not from a consumer angle.

Maybe a pay per MB over and above a predetermined cap is an acceptable compromise....

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Without turning this into another capping thread:

1) How do you determine what is an acceptable threshold for a such a limit? Is it set proportionate to the speed of connection, higher threshold for higher speed, or just arbitrary as the present cap policy?

2) With broadband content improving all the time, would a threshold take account of improved content and increasing downloads. After all we see elesewhere on this forum talk of ntl broadband plus which will result in increased downloading.

3) Many pundits say that the cost of moving data is reducing year on year (as companies reinvest and upgrade hardware and infrastructure (Oh I forgot ntl dont do that do they), so any price per data downloaded should also reduce. The effects of that reduction in cost should already show themselves to ntl as better margins as the bb service flat rate price has been fixed (600k) or even gone up (150k) over the last few years?

4) How do you allow users to know that they are going to go over the threshold (ntl have yet to provide any means of so doing despite the cap already in the AUP - even if they now choose not to enforce that)

5) Surely also a MB of data is too small a unit for any metering?

No compromise from me - flat rate uncapped broadband please.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Good questions and ones only that NTL can answer if they decided to alter their T&C...but my preferred option would be the same as your conclusion.... Flat rate uncapped broadband. The BBC article was inferring that things would have to change soon.
Maybe the onus should be on the user to show that they had not downloaded peer-to-peer stuff to excess. Although how you would do this would be an interesting question...

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Can we start a public outcry now to save time?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I suggest that anticap is well placed for this after all it's remit is quite simply to allow unlimited broadband. Certainly to go away from a flat rate tarrif is no longer unlimited use in the sense we have all come to expect.

Anticap does however only have very limited resources. To establish a vociferous voice, increased support would be needed, not only of words of encouragement, but ppl who are prepared to get off their backsides and stand up to be counted.

I recall the shock on many of the attendees at the ISPAs (Internet Service Providers Association - effectively the ISPs trade organisation awards where they all gave each other pats on the back for being so clever) earlier this year after the ntl cap had just come out. They couldn't believe that even only 4 of us had taken time to make a stand. That and numerous comment throughout the internet I'm sure had a major impact on ntl not having pursued the cap policy.

To achieve a similar impact would take commitment, but it's worth doing because I'm sure ntl will be looking at the metering option, when technology allows.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

One possible way to keep unlimited access is to have a flat rate system that is tiered by both download bandwidth and upload bandwidth. For instance the 600k service could have sub tiers of 32k 64k 128k and 256k uploads. The lower the upload speed chosen, the cheaper the service is. In general a home user would tend to want a high download speed for streaming video and downloading of legal software but does not need the higher upload speeds. The file sharers would then have to either choose a low upload speed which means less overall strain on the network or to pay extra for a higher upload speed.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Yes but the gamers keep saying they need fast uploads as well. Or are they confusing latency / ping with bandwidth needs?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I've been wondering about that too. Quite a number of people have subscribed to 1Mbps using the argument that to do otherwise would put them at a gaming disadvantage. However the throttling mechanism appears to allow bursts above the limit, provided the overall rate is low, so I'm not convinced that buying 1Mbps has any affect on latency.

:ducks - waiting for deluge of posts saying why there is an effect:

Back on topic: I think the biggest risk of metered access for an always on connection is inadvertantly running up a big bill. There have been a number of such cases down under, where expensive metered broadband is common. Folks install p2p and don't realise that acting as a server will cost them loads.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Maybe, I was under the impression that most games send individual packets, not large chunks of data. Maybe they are running servers...

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

To right - Thats half the reason people change from dial up to BB.

A fast upload is essential for gamers.. More so with the newer games coming out at the moment. Its the rate the connected clients can get in contact with your computer..

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I am not a gamer but cannot see the logic in that statement. I would have thought that there would be no difference in gaming between a 600k and a 1Mb connection unless you was hosting a game. :confused:

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Well maybe hes an xbox live user who wants to host?

Just like me, i want more than 8 in rtcw!

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

oops Sorry :blush:

Meant to say Hosting games.. and as IC said, especially XBOX Live games where a 1mb/256k connection can only hold 6-(maybe)8 players.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

This article is nothing more than PR and propaganda for a company that hopes to sell lot's of sw to ISP's. Shame on you BBC.

The only basis on which pay for usage could be justified at all would be by the MB/GB. The problem with this approach is the incremental cost of moving the data is so marginal, once the network is in place, and falling at such a rate that any 'system' put in place to monitor such usage and produce variable billing will be more expensive than the 'bandwidth' that is being charged for.

The vast bulk of the monthly payment a user makes goes to 'pay down' fixed costs and not incremental ones (ones based on usage). These are the same for "Mrs Gadekar" as they are for "Mr p2p nutter". If you were to offer a price difference to these two users, that truely related to 'cost of provision', both fixed and incremental, then it would be a minscule difference and not worth the trouble and cost to implement. Similarly if you were to bill users on usage in such a way you might have a user who does not use his conection at all being charged £25 pm and one saturating it paying £26pm, where 70p of the extra £1 is actualy the cost of of 'tracking and implementing' the variable billing and 30p for the extra incremental cost actualy created by the 'heavy user'. This is just madness.

The agenda here is not one of 'fairness' at all. It is a telco agenda of 'regaining control' and a sw producer agenda of selling product. The true agenda can be seen in the statments like

"The last four or five years has been about building this infrastructure of a high-speed network, providing a dumb access," Now, he says, service providers need to make their networks "intelligent" so they can identify users and the applications used.

So the real agenda starts to appear. The whole reason the internet is so powerful, so useful and has spread accross the world like wildfire, is that it is a 'dumb' network. This does not mean their is no intelligence in it, what it means is the intelligence is at the 'ends' of the network, ie in the hands of the 'users' and not the owners of the network. This is the very basis of its power. It is also an anethma to the network companies, reducing their role from one of controling and defining and billing for every application to one of 'commondity transport movers'. This is an attempt by telco's to 'regain' the 'control' they lost when TCP/IP moved that 'control' from their domain to the users domain. Any such efforts will ultimately prove futile but they are sure gonna try in the mean time.

further reading on this subject can be found via these links. The 'rise of the stupid network' is nothing short of a 'seminal' piece on this issue and should be read and understood by every internet user and more inportantly every CEO of a network company.

http://www.rageboy.com/stupidnet.html

and generaly at

http://www.isen.com

To finish off I will just highlight a couple more examples of 'insidious propaganda' being brought to play here.

"Between 60 and 80% of bandwidth is being eaten up by a fraction of customers - who are mainly engaged in peer-to-peer activity - and, according to the industry, the rest are penalised because of the heavy users sharing the network."

ahh an old chestnut here :) Where do these figures come from ? If they are saying during peak hours (when congestion occurs) that a tiny 'fraction' of users are using 60-80% of the bandwidth, they are quite simply lying. You can only use as much bandwidth as your connection allows and when congestion occurs all users slow down equally. This simply means it is impossible for one user, during peak hours, to use 60-80% of the 'bandwidth'. If they are saying '60-80%' during all hours, peak and off peak, then the statment is meaningless in terms of congestion and one users impact on other users. However this 'story' is highly 'emotive' and a great 'propaganda' tool for the telcos, trying to convince a public that all the gains of a 'dumb' network should be reversed and control should be restored to telco hands, who will then decide what 'services' are offered and bill for each one, regardless of the cost of provision.

next

"Ever been out to dinner with a big group of people, only to feel cheated when everyone splits the bill equally?"

Let's imagine a senario where the actual cost of food to the restuarant is neglegable and the vast bulk of the cost on your bill is for the 'fixed' costs of building the restuarant or renting it etc, so that if you have just a starter your bill is say £20 and if you have a 3 course full on meal it is £20.33, then no one would ever suggest at such a meal that the bill is not split equally. This is exactly the case with internet access. It is even the case with restaurants to some degree when they impose a 'minimum charge' regardless of what you eat or do not eat. When the ratio of these fixed costs to incremental costs is such that the incremental are marginal to the fixed, then flat rate pricing is the only sensible approach.

and finaly

"What could be difficult is to persuade new customers to plan what they want to do on the web. At least in the short-term, perhaps many would prefer to split the bill evenly while they sample what is on offer."

You are damm right is going to be difficult to 'persuade' customers that what they really want is for all control to be taken away from them and put back into the hands of the telcos. The biggest weapon 'users' have in this fight is knowledge and self education and ironicaly the greatest means to this is the internet itself. Of course under a 'telco' model this would be packaged and billed as a specfic service by them and under their control, and priced out of the hands of the mere 'average user'.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I think that you have to take account of both upstream and downstream bandwidth when you look at this. If you have an upstream channel on a UBR with 200 users on it and eight or ten 1Mb users are leaving their computers running on p2p with their upstreams being saturated by people downloading from them then those few can be using up 60-80% or even more of the available upstream bandwidth and slowing down the service for all users on that upstream card.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Upstream is 256k per user 1 Mb user.

NTL claim a maximum (guaranteed !!??) contention ratio of 20:1.

So if these figure are true, contention starts with the 11th user (200 potential users / 20 = 10 users with no effect from contention)

So at this point let's imagine 10 (heavy) users online. That is 5% (of potential users) using 100% of the bandwidth, or 100% of 'active users' unsing 100% of the bandwidth - but at this point no one else is using it so it don't matter.

Lets add another 10 'light users'

So now we have 20 users all getting 128K upstream instead of thier maximum 256k. So now we have 'heavy users' representing 5% of potential users using 50% of the bandwidth, or representing 50% of active users using 50% of the bandwidth. we have the same for 'light users'

Lets add another 10 'light users' (so now we have 10 heavy users and 20 light users)

So now we have 'heavy users' representing 5% of all potential users using 33% of the bandwidth, or representing 33% of 'active' users using 33% of bandwidth. We also have the light users representing 10% of all users using 66% of the bandwidth, or representing 66% of the 'active users' using 66% of the bandwidth.

and so and so (just keep adding another 10 'light users' untill all 200 users are online at the same time)

So where oh where do these _constant_ claims from the telcos (and not just from NTL I might add) of 5% of users using 80% of the bandwidth come from?
Either I have barked way way up the wrong tree here, or someone is telling porkies. If it is the former then please please explain to me where I am going wrong ? In the absense of someone pointing out where my gross stupidity has crept in, in the above, I will stick to the view that there is a strong porcine whiff comming from the telcos.

(hey this is good stuuf. Anticap guys you should use this and you are welcome to if you like)

For more 'interesting reading' on the general topic have a look here
http://www.ntlhell.co.uk/index.php?a...=1&t=3083&hl=&

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

It's nothing to do with contention really. If you have the eight or ten 1Mb users maxing out their upstreams it satutares the upstream channel which is less than 2000kb after you have taken DOCSIS overheads into account. Once that point is reached it starts to affect the downstream as everything being downloaded has to have data passing on the upstream and that is already saturated. You could have a situation where the uploaders who are maxing out the upstream channel are not downloading (leaving their p2p software running for others to download from them) and only a few other users are on that card and trying to download but find their downloads seriously restricted. Robin Walkers post is worth reading at http://www.nthellworld.com/forum/sho...2&postcount=15

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Thanks for the link. Heavy stuff from the 'wise man' himself but interesting none the less.

However even having read this posts (and understood a tiny fraction of it) I would _still_ maintain that the claim that 5% of 'heavy users' take uo 80% of the bandwidth or cause 80% of the congestion is at best grossly misleading and imo intentionaly so.

from Robin's post

"When we buy a train ticket, we don't get a train to ourselves. Sometimes, according to the behaviour of other customers, we don't even get a seat."

In this senario do we claim that 5% of the people on the train (that use the train when it is not packed almost continusly) do not get blamed for causing 80% of the congestion on the train when it is packed (or that they use 80% of the seats) . When it is packed they cause the same amount of congestion as every other passenger. No more, no less.

It is this constant claim that the telcos use that 5% are responsible for 80% etc that I am trying to debunk, nothin more and nothing less.

If there is a flaw in my use of Robin's analogy then I would genuinely like to know where it is because I can not see it and if it's there I would dearly love to be able to see it.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

The train analogy is rather flawed as a comparison. It assumes that one passenger takes up one seat. You could have the situation where several large people take up more than one seat each, somebody has vandalised a carriage and is virtually unusable or the ultimate that a gunman has forced all the passengers into the end carriage and his accomplice is pilfering from the luggage and bags left behind. In the latter case two people could occupy 80% of the train whilst 98% of the passengers are crowded ino the other 20%.

The other point to note is what is going on during non-peak times, particularly during the night. Most users are tucked up in bed or may be posting on a forum or in achat room. None of these consume much bandwidth. The file sharers though are likewise tucked up in bed but their computers are hard at work both downloading and uploading. They could be consuming well over 90% of the bandwidth at this time.

If you look at the total data moved by file sharers and compare it to the data moved by others you can see that a small percentage of customers can be responsible for a very large percentage of data moved.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

The 60 - 80% of total usage being attributable to 5% of users claim *is* true, at least 60% of an average ISPs network *is* peer to peer traffic, there is no disputing this these are facts, it's that simple.

Consider that your average user probably only really uses their connection at peak times for surfing, occasional downloading, maybe some messenger / IRC chat, and compare that to someone who maxes 24/7. Approximately 1% of broadband users in the UK use their connection at as close to 100% in BOTH DIRECTIONS as they can get it.

Compare somone who uses 13GB a day to someone who averages less than 100MB a day, then tell this person who averages less than 100MB a day that their connection is more expensive so that Johnny 'Warez Hub' Smith can trade the latest moviez, gamez, appz + mp3z with his mates, and see if they don't mind.

When someone can tell me they don't mind this and prove I'm talking nonsense THEN I'll shut up. Personally like so much else in life you should get what you pay for, and pay for what you get. P2P traffic is the most expensive, providing bandwidth at local level isn't that cheap either, upgrading networks to cope with Captain Warez Hub costs.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

The analogy is good when Robin uses it and flawed when I use it?

The analogy is not flawed as far as trying to make the point that I am. Yes you might get very small passengers (children) or very large passengers that take up two seats. These in alanlogy temrs would relate to 150kbs connection or the 1mbs connection. The point is there is a limit. No one person is so big that they take up 20 seats, or 50 seats. The limit is the size. As for gunmen / vandalised that is irrelevant (to the point I am trying to make) and interms of the analogy would relate to the network being broken or a gunman taking over NTL and closing the network down.

Where the anaolgy is flawed however is when you consider what happens when the train reaches congestion point (when there are more passengers trying to travel than there are seats). When this happens on a train, then yes you get an unfair situation because some get seats and some do not. When a network reaches this point however things are still fair, because everyone slows down EQUALLY. There is no equivalent of one user 'getting the seat' and another not.

If they are consuming 90% of 'the bandwidth' at these times that means that there is no problem at all. All they are doing is getting value from a resource that has already been paid for and which if they were not using would still have to be paid for. In train analogy terms again - a train that is 90% full still costs the same to run as one that is 10% full. The problems occur when the train reaches congestion point. Before that there is no problem.

The problem is one of 'congestion' not volumes moved. The 'argument' is that one person usage is affecting another person usage (unfairly) and it ratios of 5% to 80%. This is not true and not physicaly possible.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Well if you say it is fact I guess it must be. Even accepting this fact what makes you think that the 60% of traffic that relates to p2p traffic is not being caused by 60% of the users of the network? Why, just because one application is popular does it have to mean that only 5% of users are using this application? You are also getting data volumes moved confused with congestion imo. How much data is moved on a network is not the same as one persons use affecting anothers. Any time a network is running at less than 100% capacity, it is actualy 'wasteful'.

Let's say that approximately 1% of road users use their cars almost 24/7, where as majority use them occasionaly. Do you then say that these 1% are responsible for 60-80% of all congestion on the roads ?? Then why do you support this argument in network use ?

The cost of providing the network to mr '13GB a day' and to mr '<100MB a day' are almost identical. They both have to have the roads dug up and cable laid. They both have to have UBR's and POP's etc etc etc. As the cost of providing the network to them is almost identical then it is perfectly fair that they pay the same price. There is some incremental cost (ie cost that relates to the _usage_ of a connection) but these are marginal comapred to the cost of putting the network in and running, which is EQUAL for both users.

Costs that are incremental should be paid for on a 'pay for what you use' basis. Costs that are fixed whould be paid for on a 'fixed fee' basis. The reality is with BB almost all of the costs are fixed - hence flat rate pricing. It's simple really.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

To be honest I simply give up

JustAnotherN00b and ianathuth WANT to believe that _their_ connections are being slowed down by a mysterious '5%' and nothing, it would seem, will convince them otherwise, not logic or facts. That is their perogative I guess.

Of course _their_ usage never impinges on anyone else's. It is only the usage of this mysterious 5% that ever effects anyone else. They want a pay as you use model because they don't use it very much, but they also want to ingnore that the bulk of cost of _their_ conection is the same regardless of how much they use it. This reality does not fit their desired belief, so they ignore it.

This is not intended to be personal, I merely use these two as examples because they have been vocal on the issue. It could be any 'they' that holds this same 'mythical' belief.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

[QUOTE=erol]They want a pay as you use model because they don't use it very much[QUOTE]

it's already available...

http://www.metronet.co.uk/adsl/paygo

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

So why don't those that want such a model just use such a service, I wonder, rather than try and insist that _everyone_ use a pay as you go model on the grounds that anything else is 'unfair' ?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I would say that you have got an idea into your head and nothing will persuade you to change your mind.

The train and the gunman analogy is valid because a few users can affect the service of many. The two gunmen are grabbing the majority of the seating capacity because of their actions. If ten 1Mb users are online using p2p and maxing out their upstreams (there may be very little us of their downstreams) then they will have saturated that upstream card. The upstream card has a capacity of probably less than 2000 kbps after DOCSIS overheads are taken into account and the 1Mb users at max are using 256kbps. 10 x 256 = 2560 in my book and that is more than the card can accomodate so there is already a slowdown in performance for those ten. Along comes anothr 1Mb user who just wants to download a large legal ISO from a website. He can not achieve the 1048 kbps download that his connection is capable of because his upstream ack packets are slowed down because of the upstream being saturated. Another 100 users come on line at any speed and wish to browse, download or watch streaming video. What will their experience be like? Everyone on that upstream card will have a performance which is slower than dial-up. If the ten p2p users then go offline the other users will more than likely enjoy a normal experience.

Bandwidth can be said to be the amount of data that can be passed along a communications channel in a given period of time (look it up on dictionary.com). If the given time is 24 hours then it should be easy to see that a relatively small number of customers on the fastest connections that are using them to the max 24/7 can pass a hell of a lot more data than a very large number of customers that are only on for short periods and may be on much slower connections and just doing a bit of browsing and e-mail checking.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

My apologies, the network stats must be lying.

The same can be said of the telephone network. I guess that low user tariff must be nonsense. Costs may be equal, but why shouldn't those that use the available facilities more pay more? Those whose usage forces upgrades well before they would normally be required (as occured in Coventry thanks to extreme upstream use new equipment had to be fitted well before would be expected going by normal measures of expected use) but it's ok for those who weren't using much to pay for this along with those who were uploading/downloading 24x7?

Transit bandwidth is the main incremental cost. That of course and upgrades forced through people raping their connections which wouldn't normally be required.

There are a few problems here Erol. First one is that allowing a network to reach 100% utilisation at any point is a very bad idea. You constantly go on about congestion and utilisation. Would you be happy with using your connection for a couple of hours in the evening and getting a nice slow service due to people constantly soaking up bandwidth? As I showed you on graphs from Plusnet difference in load isn't that great between peak time load and offpeak load. This is simply due to people who use their connection all the time queueing up the downloads on the peer to peer. Therefore it's safe to assume that at least 50% of the usage in peak times is due to said users, so your arguments about them not causing congestion over what would be seen is nonsense. It does cost companies more as they have to provide over and above expected bandwidth requirements due to these users, though of course your Gran should pay just as much for this as Mr Warez Monkey.

If people want connections to use uncontended they can bloody well pay for what they are using. Compare the cost difference between 5:1 contended service and 20:1 and try telling me people using their connections 1:1 shouldn't pay more. They should pay more, both for the data transfer and a higher proportion of the fixed costs.

And no this is nothing to do with my internet service, I always get the bandwidth I pay for, and I want it to stay that way. Those people using the bandwidth 24/7 are slowing down the progress towards higher speed connections now. Have you not thought that a good reason for not providing higher speed services is that as soon as you do warez monkeys start leeching 20, 40, 50GB a day on them, messing up contention and indeed costing money due to large use of transit bandwidth, and forcing of upgrades well before expected?

If we want faster and more competitively priced connections for all of us those patterns of use absolutely must be addressed. bredbandsbolaget.se addresses it with traffic shaping but their network is under the cosh quite badly at peak times - this cannot be allowed to happen with cable as it would result in packet loss and other issues up to and including modems falling offline.

This is ok though, I'm sure the people wouldn't mind this so long as Mr Warez Monkey down the road can leech his 1.5 Terabytes of warez a month and send his 750GB out (assuming 5Mbit / 2.5Mbit connection, won't happen for a while though ;) ).

I would quite like to see 2 things you hate, capping of usage, tiered depending on how much you pay, followed by x pence per gig after this is exceeded.

I know you'll absolutely disagree but please no more horrible analogies ;)

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

My position is:

I do not want capping.

I do not want metered broadband.

I just want to use my connection when I want and as much as I want without being unduly affected by other users at a reasonable cost.

In essence this situation is unachievable unless there is some control over how we all use the internet.

My belief is that the situation is achievable at this moment in time if every user was willing to obey the laws of this land.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

No it is not. Just as you can only take up as much seat space as the size of your 'bum', so you can only take up as much resource as the the size of your connection. What is more with a connection when all the seat space is taken up the amount of seat space you occupy actualy reduces. In effect when the 'BB train' reaches congestion point _everyones_ bum shrinks equally!

I appreciate that because of the total 'bodge' that is Cable BB, upstream usage has a disproportionate effect on downstream (via the need for downstream to use the upstream to say 'hey yeah i got that packet'). What you have described here is a one of the biggest weaknesses of Cable BB btw.

Sounds to me what you want is P2P apps banned. What you hope to get is a connection that shows no signs to you of slow down due to other users usage. OK tomorrow we magicaly 'wave a wand' and on day one your connection starts to improve. Do you really not think that NTL will not just then load more users onto the network until you creep back to the point you started with ?

So what about other applications that use a lot of upstream bandwidth, do you want those banned as well. Like users sending video out from thier machines, or voice, or games or people constantly uploading to their webspace, or accessing data on their machines from remote locations. Do you want these to be 'restricted applications' ?

Do you never upload yourself (apart from 'ak packets caused by your download') ? If and when you upload, do you consider the impact on others both upload and download ?

Of course one user can use more bandwidth than another. What matters is how one users usage affects others. Just like you can measure how much road congestion a driver creates by his 'total milage' but only by his milage in 'rush hour', so too is any 'total bandwidth used' figure for a user meaningless in assesing his impact on other users. My problem is not with a statement that '5% of users use 80% of bandwith'. My problem is with statements that 5% of users cause 80% of the congestion.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I just tried a rather long reply and got the following

"The following errors occured when this post was submitted:
You have included too many images in your signature or in your previous post. Please go back and correct the problem and then continue again.

Images include use of smilies, the vB code [img] tag and HTML <img> tags. The use of these is all subject to them being enabled by the administrator.
"

So I am gonna try chopping it into more than one post. Mods if you can rejoin them later (and remove the stuff above) please do so.


Can I see these stats, that show that the 60% usage overnight is being caused by 5% of users and not by 20%, or 30% or even 60% ?

It is not just said of the telephone network it is the case with the telephone network, acording to OFTEL. In their calculations the monthly line rental does not cover the fixed costs of of the line (and BT has had over 100 years to 'pay down' the capital cost of thier network!). As such BT are allowed an 'uplift' on the per minute cost of calls to 'recoup' this subsidy. If OFTELs figures are to be believed then heavy phone users subsidise low usage users.

It's not nonsense. It is a 'social inclusion' requirment forced on BT by OFTEL (does NTL offer such a low user telephony service?) that recognises that certain groups (namely the very poor) would be unable to have a phone, even for incomming calls only, if the line rental were to be priced according to cost. Low usage phone users, even without the low users tarrif, are already being susbsidised by heavy users. With it the heavy users are paying even more susbsidy every time they make a call.

Sure you _could_ price internet access and telephony on a 'what the market will bear' basis. However in a market as fundamentaly vital as these to the UK's future, and one where the term 'natural monopoly / duolpoly' could have been invented for it, it would be madness to do so. I want to see as much internet usage in the UK as possible. If the costs are fixed then I want the price to be fixed.

Absoloutely right. Totaly right. And the cost of transit bandwidth is miniscule in the over all cost base of provision and it is falling at a rate faster than moores law in relation to processors. What is more something like 90% of the transit fibre has not even been lit yet. It is also worth noting that NTL's congestion problems have _nothing_ to do with transit costs, as they have stated themselves. Sure if you live in Australia that has a relatively small population and is geographicaly about as remote as you can get, so there are limit undersea fiber links, then the cost of tranist can start to rise to levels that it represents a 'significant' proportion of the toal cost of provision. Transit bandwith in somewhere like Oz can be anywhere from 10-100 times more exensive than in the UK. Even then, with the cost of transit falling faster than the demand for it, due to technologies like DWDM, this is a temporary situation.

Just what is it that you think has driven the 'core' network of the internet to increase it's capacity by many orders of magnitude of the last 10-20 years? It is 'usage' that has driven that. Without usage there would be no need to increase capacity and we would all be using our BB conections to send emails and nothing else. Usage is good. Usage is the driver for progress.

No one is saying that. What I am saying is that anytime usage is under 100% then resource that has been paid for already is being effectively 'wasted'. Sure you can not avoid this situation in a real world network but it is true non the less. Anyone that uses the network when utilisation is under 100% is affecting _non one_ and thats has to be a fact.

Why would I blame 'other people' and not myself? My usage affects them as much as thiers affects me (when utilisation is over 100% of capacity) ? I might blame the service provider, if it was very bad, for not scaling their network properly but I would not blame 'other people'. I am as much an 'other person' to them as they are to me.

Plusnet specificaly provide this info so that people can help them to 'level out' their (plusnets) usage. Judging by the graphs I saw it's pretty effective and all in all a great idea. The closer plusnets users combined usage can get to 'constant' over a 24hr period the better it is for plusnet (and by extension their customers). For NTL to do this however it would have to be usage at the UBR, for that is where the problems occur.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

reply continued

Usage past 100% of capcity cause congestion. Every user using the net (ignoring differnet service levels) at these times is causing as much congestion as the next user. No more no less. Even if 50% of peak time usage is P2P, so what? So we ban P2P and peak time usage drops to 30%. So the ISP says hey we are only getting 30% usage during peak times. We need to load more users onto this network. They keep going until peak time usage approaches 80% again. So what do you do then, ban the next single application that generates the most usage ? and the next and then next until we have 1000:1 contention ratios and dirt cheap connections that can only be used for sending a couple of emails a day, because all other usage has been baaned as 'selfish abuse' by the likes of you.

Does your Gran go into 'all you can eat for £20' restuarants and say she only wants one slice of toast and 'moans' about all the selfish greedy pigs that are forcing the price of her toast upto £20? There are low price services designed for low usage users. Use those. Even ignoring all that, if the cost of provision of the service is the same for your Gran as for mr Heavy users (and it IS possible to use the internet a lot without being MR Warez) then yes I am afraid she should have to pay the same. If there is a social inclusion issue there, then the government can and will force some subsisdising for those that need it, but for all I know your gran may be the queen, so I see no need to susbsidise her connection at the expense of anyone else.

here I am just going to refer you to a peice I wrote for the 'Anticap lot'
http://www.anticap.co.uk/mythbusters.php

No, exactly the opposite. Those people that use the internet a lot are _driving_ progress and the ever expanding nature of the internet. Without them what would be the point in increasing capacity at all?

Yeah that is a great reason to not provide higher speed services, beacause if you do people might use it! A great reason if you are a telco or cable co maybe. What about people that might want to use it to have 'live in house' links to university (beacuse they are perhaps disabled) or to monitor their house or kids remotely or any other number of legitimate and empowering possibilites. Are they too to be branded 'selfish ****' ?

Sure if what you want is cheaper internet access (via higher contention ratios) then go to a service provider that offers such. Don't insist that we all have to have. When the 'moores law' type price curve that exists for moving data around finally levels off, then maybe it will be time to look at restricting usage. to do so before then is to waste the potential of these wonderous new technolgies and their abilty to empwer and change peoples lives for the better.

Ahh bredandsbolaget. These are the people that are sucsessfuly offering 10mbs symetrical uncapped connections into peoples homes at about 20euros per month are they not? And you are using them as an argument for why NTL, offering capped 600k/128k BB at (what is it now £25pm?) should start restricting people usage and charging by the MB ? Hmmm

Here we go again. Anyone who use the internet a lot is Mr Warez. Hmm. If you have a problem with P2P then campaign against P2P. It is not P2P that cause congestion but usage. Remove P2P and there wil _still_ be usage. Restrict usage and the internet will never 'grow', not to the 5/2.5 that you think is way off, or to the symetrical 10mbs that bred???? (if you think I am gonna spell that!) are providing _today_ in Sweeden at less than NTLs 600k service.

And you are welcome to them, just do not force them on _everyone_. There are ISPs that offer these or better still move to Oz the land of perfect BB (NOT!)

I'll try.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

All you need to do is go to a service provider that uses contention ratios that suit your usage (and is well run).

See http://www.anticap.co.uk/mythbusters.php
(same link I used in post above btw)

If you reduce usage by (somehow? how?) banning P2P all that will happen is that ISP will load more users onto the network (and it you are _lucky_ reduce the price, but i doubt it with most) until you are back where you started, except with a lower capcity infrastructure (than if they had upgrade the network to meet demand). So what do you do then ? Find some other usage to ban ?

You think that P2P cause congestion but it is USAGE that causes congestion. Remove one kind of usage and either another will take it's place or the ISP will 'load up' thier networks till you are back where you started.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Phew, you must be swaying about on your soapbox after all that Erol. All that in answer to a simple statement that: "Between 60 and 80% of bandwidth is being eaten up by a fraction of customers - who are mainly engaged in peer-to-peer activity - and, according to the industry, the rest are penalised because of the heavy users sharing the network."

There are many myths, misconceptions, presumptions and instances of the lack of understanding of the subject and the technology behind it in your many, many responses and drifting off topic to boot that I doubt anyone would have the energy to fully put you right.

It would seem that you are unable to accept that any usage figures published are correct as they are provided by organisations that have an agenda to distort the truth. You seem to prefer your own ideas of what is going on, which have no scientific or logical explanation.

Your final post of "You think that P2P cause congestion but it is USAGE that causes congestion." is quite correct. But that takes us right back to the start as all p2p is usage and if 60-80% of that is p2p then that is the primary cause of congestion and most of this would not exist if everyone was law abiding.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Having waded through many lengthy and turgid postings on this topic, I think this sums it up nicely for me. I can't criticise p2p per se; ntl and others are to blame if they wrote their business plans without accounting for the use of this technology. However, I am deeply peeved at the thought that I might not be getting the download speed I pay for thanks to illegal exchanging of warez via p2p.

Can anyone - simply - lay out any statistics illustrating what proportion of p2p traffic is estimated to be legal?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I doubt it, but you can form your own opinion of this by looking at various forums and using a little common sense.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I suspected as much ... :grind:

*sigh*

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Going to reply more in depth at some point, however the above is a weakness of all Internet connectivity that uses TCP/IP - which is everything apart from gaming and realtime applications such as voice and video over IP.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

So you really believe that if P2P were to vanish then there would be no congestion on your conection ever again ? That ISP's would never overload too many users on too small a connection ever again ?

If your problem is people breaking the law, then let the law deal with it.

and finally a horrible analagoy.

I like beer. I like pubs. However my enjoyment is spoilt by a 'tiny minority' that spend all day drinking vast amounts, where as I like to drink in the evenings from 9-11. This tiny minority are the cause for 60-80% of all the 'drunken crimes' comitted in my area, ****ing in the street, flashing their bums, causing a public nuicance and more besides. What's more as the pub is open 24/7 and they are almost always there they drink like fishes. So best estimates are that they consume 60-80% of all the beer. So this _must_ mean that when _I_ come in for my evening beer, and can not get to the bar, that it is this this same 5% that is causing all the 'bar congestion'. So not olnly are the responsible for 80% of the 'bar congestion' they are also responsible for 80% of _illegal activities_ associated with it. This can not go on.

Now I do not want beer to be £50 a pint. I do not want there to be a restriction on how many pints a person can order in a day, but what else is to be done. The whole thing is gonna colapse otherwise. So I guess that £50 a pint and restrictions on how many pints you can buy a day is the only option. At least when I do pop in for a pint, I will not be blocked by a 'tiny minority', and will be able to get my pint quickly.

:)

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

If p2p was to vanish there would be far less chance of congestion. With todays technology and pricing there is bound to be situations where congestion occurs. Statistical diversity allows contention to work and give us our connections at a reasonable price but 24/7 maxing out of a connection does not give that diversity. You could have a situation where there are a couple of hundred very light users on a card but there is always a chance that at any particular moment they all want to do something that uses most of their bandwidth at the same time. We are using a contented service that is priced because it is so and therefore we must expect there to be congestion at times.

Do you not agree that the download of copyright material without the copyright holders permission is illegal. Yes or no?

Do you condone people breaking the law. Yes or no?

Do you think that someone who is performing illegal activities on their connections and activities that are not allowed under the terms and conditions of the service provider should be allowed to affect the service of others. Yes or no?

What is your solution to service levels being degraded?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Really? So if every car user that is using his car for an illegal activity was to be removed from the roads there would be far less chance of road congestion would there? Or maybe the more you free up the road, the more cars that then come and fill the void until you are back where you started, regardless of whether the journies are illegal or not ?

If you are so het up about this and so convinced that all your problems lay at the door of this 'mythical' 5% of heavy P2P users, then why not go to a ISP that _does_ ban such users and usage? That's not a 'trite' question, I really want to know the answer. Maybe you do not have any options other than cable (though there is satelite and I can _guarantee_ that no self respecting crazed warez theif would use a sat connection) ?

Of course I do. Where have I said different ?

Of course not. Where have I said different ?

I think the ISP should warn and then remove service from such people if they ignore the warning. Where have I said different ?

Just a couple of questions for you. What has any of the above got to do with my disagreement that 5% of BB users do (or even physical can) create 60-80% of the congestion in peak periods ?

and

Did you like my 'beer' analogy ?

My solution to people doing illegal things is to use the law to stop them (not service restriction, not caps and not pay per MB (as the _only_ option)).

My solution to service levels being degraded beyond aceptable levels is for ISPs to properly scale thier networks (and price them accordingly). It would also help if they were up front an honest about thier services, and did not 'over promise' when selling them.

You see they are two different problems with two different solutions.

So what exactly is your 'solution' ?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Erol, if you wish to use analogies, please use ones that are realistic and comparable.

I am not so het up over the situation and if you think that the "mythical" 5% is not correct then what would your percentage be. It would seem logical to anyone that has an iota of commonsense and has followed these forums over the past year that a very small percentage of users consume a very large percentage of bandwidth and that they are primarily file traders using p2p or newsgroups.

Your statement of "What has any of the above got to do with my disagreement that 5% of BB users do (or even physical can) create 60-80% of the congestion in peak periods ?" is posing a question that was not the initial subject of the thread. 5% of users CAN consume 60-80% of the bandwidth and this is very easily proved, just think about it for a moment and then tell me how they can't.

Your solutions are theoretically correct, but practically have NTL for one got the financial resources to properly scale their resources and what should be the "price". If I or you had the solution to the problems we would be the ones getting £3,500 per day, not Barclay.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I must say that is pretty rich comming from the person that introduced a _gunman_ into the train analogy !
You are _still_ confusing the usage of BW with the cause of congestion. I am not in the business of 'making up' figures, just countering the telcos 'made up' figures. So the reason you do not move to an ISP that would block P2P traffic and give you the connection you 'want' is that you are not the bothered really ? Strange thats not the impression I got.

You still do not get it. Just because (if it is ture) 5 % use 60%-80% of the total bandwidth, that does NOT mean that they are responsible for the same % of _congestion_ in peak periods. Just because my 5% of beer drinkers might consume 60-80% of the total beer serverd in 24hrs, it does not mean they are responsible for 60-80% of the bar congestion. When they are in the bar during peak periods they cause _exactly_ one person's worth of congestion per person, anything more is _physically_ impossible. Just because a driver might do 1000's of miles on the roads, when there is congestion, they cause _exactly_ one cars worth of congestion, anything more is _physically impossible_. Yet if an BB users consumes 'higher than average' bandwidth, then when they are usinf it during busy periods, they somehow cause way more congestion that one connection can, at least according to you and telco propaganda. This is simply as _physicaly impossible_ as my two analogies and is at the root of my problems with statements that '5% are responsible for 60-80% of CONGESTION'. Just not possible. That's logic.

You are priceless. So NTL have got themselves into a total mess finacialy, wiped out 1000s of original shareholder money through bad management, strategic incompetence and acquisitional follies, so we can't expect them to scale their networks properly. And the man most responsible for this state of affairs ? Yep you got, it's the same BK, that you seem to think must have all the answers because he is paid £3500 per day ! Priceless.

I think that is about all for me on this thread now. I have done my best to explain why one person can cause no more than one person's amount of congestion (something so eveidently self obvious to me that I sometimes despair for others). I am obviously getting no where and to be honest I am not sure I can 'keep on' without slipping into the 'personal' which is something I do not want to do.

So thanks for the discussion so far. I like to say it's been fun but I try and avoid lying as much as I can. I'll just leave you with one final analogy from my part of the world.

You can lead a camel to water but you can't make him drink, bacause 5 camels have somehow expanded their body size, through some mytstical process, that allows them to take up all the space round the water that can normaly accomodate 50-100 camels simultaneously.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

The problem with cable in particular is that broadband is running on a system that was not designed specifically for it. The planning and infrastructure was based on the model of a customer that does certain things, but that model is no longer valid. Times have changed and current days applications consume far more bandwidth than the planners ever thought. The more that todays customers use their available bandwidth, the sooner you get to a state of congestion. If NTL was to implement even higher service tiers then the congestion would arrive much sooner and there is a limit to what cablecos can increase the service tiers to without a very radical change in their infrastructure which they cannot afford.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

As has been quoted before, each DOCSIS upload stream is about 2Meg. If you get ten 1 Meg users on one upload stream and they all upload at full speed, then that connection will be fully loaded.

As you may or may not know, TCP/IP requires acknowlegement signals sent back to the server before the server can send the next packet, so if you do get ten 1 Meg users on one DOCSIS upstream, and they are all uploading at maximum speed, then it will slow internet access for everyone else. This to me sounds like a congested connection.

As you say NTL got themselves into this mess. Unfortunately,because of the mess, they don't have the money to expand the network. QED.

Having said that, BK is responsible for the mess, so they shouldn't reward him with £3.5K a day.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

OK I said that was about it from me in this thread but goalposts seemed to have moved a bit, and any pledges from me to 'shut up' are always a little suspect as I can not stop myself sometimes



I quite agree. In fact I have said so on many times in the past, such that the above could easily have been a 'quote' from me.

If commercial organisations make bad decisions and fail to plan properly for the future then that is their look out. The solution to this should not be for customers or the government to 'bail them out' imo.

This is all quite true and correct. At no point did I suggest that a 2mbs service would help any of these problems. All I 'wanted' in terms of this thread is for NTL (and others) to stop saying or implying that a single user can cause any more _congestion_ when things are overloaded than a 'single users worth' of congestion. This is clearly (to me at least) just not possible and yet it is a _constsnt_ refrain from telcos/cablecos and sw companies trying to sell 'solutions', in one form or another and i object to it, strongly.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

believe it or not I actualy understand all this. Yes 10 users (ish) can saturate the upstream. When the 11th user comes on all 11 slow down _equally_ and so and so on as users more user come online. So in your senario each of the 11 users is causing 1/11th of the congestion. No more and no less. My problem is with the idea that if 1 of these users use the connection a lot when it is not overloaded, or his/her use happens to be a P2P app, then they suddenly are creating more than this 1/11th (ie the 5% cause 60-80% of congestion). They cause exactly '1 users worth', no more and no less. Similarly 5% of users can only cause 5% of the congestion. Just because of thier usage in non peak times may be high or of what they use it for does NOT mean they suddenly become able to cause more than 'one users worth' of congestion. See my point ?

It's a free(ish) market jungle out there. If you make bad commerical decisions then you suffer the consequences. I hold no truck with the argument that users (or the government) should some how 'help out' to correct these problems caused by by commercial decsions. Either NTL are in a position where they can offer competetive BB products or not. If they are not then they should be 'allowed to fail and fail fast'*

* another great Isenberg piece btw at
http://www.netparadox.com/fccletter.html

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Erol. when the 11th user comes online in the example that you have just quoted they do not all slow down equally. It depends on what they are doing.

Can't you see that there can be 100 users on line on a upstream card and they can all be suffering extreme degradation of service. You can then have 5 users come off line (5 p2p users thrashing their connections) and the remaining 95, still doing what they were previously, then don't experience any degradation of service. To me. in my way of thinking, those 5 users were causing all of the degradation. In your way of thinking it would be that the 5 users were causing 5% of the degradation and if they came offline there would still be 95% degradation in service.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

So just what are these other 95 people doing then ? None of them are downloading anything? Or uploading anything ? Or watching streaming video or listening to web radio or looking at a flash based website or playing online games or any number of other things (that actualy require data to be sent up and down) ? If they are not doing anything that requires data to be sent up and down then they are not being effected and if they are they are contributing to the congestion. When I pull off the congested motorway I stop contributing my 'one cars worth of congestion' to the problem and I in turn am not effected by the congestion. When I pull back onto the motorway I am effected by the congestion and I contribute my 'one cars worth again'.

So now you can start telling me about 1mbs users that only want to send and recieve data at 500kbs being effected by those that want to use it at full speed but the argument is the same if you think about it (along with the obvious question , why have they got the 1mbs service an not the 600kbs one). Again in analogy terms you could argue that big cars cause more congestion than small ones - and you would be right, but in turn small cars are more able to nip in and out than big cars (or use bikes if you prefer) and thus the effect of the congestion on them is proportionately less that someone in the big car.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

This analogy falls flat in two ways that I can see.

First, have you ever been on a motorway in very heavy traffic with lorries filling two of the three lanes? Mr Warez Monkey is like a 40 ton truck complete with extra trailer, and there are so many of them on the road, that even if I'm in a Smart car I have limited room to manoeuvre around them.

Second, smaller cars are by no means guaranteed to be able to make best use of small gaps in the traffic. Small cars generally have small engines. It's the Jaguars and BMWs that have the power to exploit gaps in the traffic flow. And so at this point the analogy breaks down all together.

A contended service relies on the 20 or so people to whom the same chunk of bandwidth has been sold, not all trying to use it at once. It would be reasonable to say that, in any 24 hour period, my fair usage of the system would therefore amount to 1/20th of the time ... 72 minutes of download, if used in one constant block. This is a very rough sketch of the principle, but hopefully you get the idea. I accept this, because I accept the economics of it. If I want truly limitless service unipeded by other users, I would have to pay a lot more for it.

Now, I don't want a capped or metered service, but I don't want high petrol prices either. I just have to accept that fuel duty is the weapon of choice in a fight to reduce traffic on our congested roads. Similarly, if there is no effective way to beat the warez monkeys, then it is not unreasonable to discuss pricing them out of their illegal activities. This does not have to mean 'all pints are £50' as was suggested earlier; perhaps a pricing scale that only gets punitive with very excessive use.

Yes, the cost of using the service is the same regardless of how heavily you use it, but to make this the basis of a campaign to retain flat-rate broadband internet at all costs completely fails to take aaccount of basic world economics. It just aint like that.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

All anlogies have thier limits and can be pushed too far. However the point is in my analogy terms is that the 'size of your car' realtes to the 'size of your connection' (which tier of service you are on - 150k,600k or 1Mbs). I only introduced the idea of different size cars (to match the different sized 'connection') because I felt that was where ian would go next. It was probably a mistake to do so. The point is though that 'Mr Warez Monkey' can not be the equivalent of a 40 ton truck in terms of my analogy, because NTL do not offer 40Mbs connections. Simple as that really.

Like I say all anlogies have their limits. Their real use is to highlight certain points to help in understanding / conceptualising an idea that is trying to be conveyed. However if the person 'listening' does not want to understand then they are bad, because they can allways be attacked because no analogy is a 100% representation. It does not try to be, just to highlight the point.

Maybe a better way to have tried to explain my point would have been to have suggested that a 500kbs user is half as affected by congestion than a 1mbs user, because they can only do half as much to start with.

[snip] *

I understand you are happy at 'these peoples' illegal activites, but illegal activites should be dealt with by the _law_. You don't stop shop lifting by charging an 'entrance fee' to shopping centres. You stop it by arresting people.

There are already ISP's that charge on usage. To make all ISp's charge on useage would be a mamoth undermining of the potential of the Internet to be useful to people (doing _legal_ things). This is because the incremental cost of _provision_ of the service (IE that cost to NTL that goes up when it is used more is _tiny_ in relation to the fixed cost _of provision_ )

Now you have serious misread and misunderstood me here.

Its not that the cost to the customer is fixed, it's that the cost of _provision_ of the service (ie the cost to NTL to provided it) is almost entirely fixed (which is why the vast majority of net connection around the worls are fixed price, btw.)
This was exactly the argument we used when arguing for flat rate dial up and eventualy Oftel agreed and mandated a wholesale flat rate dial product on BT and flat rate dail up access in the UK was born. If anything the incremental costs on dial up were higher and less prone to halving every 12months (as the incremntal cost of provsion of BB halves) yet still the argument was won and sustainable unmetered dial up was a boon to internet access in the UK

(as an aside soon after it was mandated on BT, the cablecos also introduced it, as unlike anyone else they could have done at any time previously but did not. Remarkable situation with BT driving the competition vs companies that were designed to drive competition with BT)

If you read back my posts Towny I think you will have to agree that I have always been clear that it was 'cost of provision' and not 'cost to customer' that I was tlaking about ? An appolgy is optional ;)

* I was just going to ignore this because it has been covered time and again. Try the link to the anticap site I provided.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

It is not as tiny as you may at first think. The more that the service is used the more there is need to balance UBRs. Because it takes so few users, particularly 1Mb p2p users who are thrashing their connections, to saturate the upstream channel of a card, it is so easy for all the users on that card to experience problems. What happens then? Many calls to Customer Services and Technical Support complaining of the degraded service. Each and every one of these calls costs NTL to answer them. This has a knock on effect of increasing the queues on the phone for these departments with increased frustration for both the customers and the agents answering the calls. Increased frustration amongst agents leads to the frustration being spread to subsequent callers to those agents and the likelyhood of increased absenteeism amongst the agents. All these items increase the costs of NTL. Frustrated customers with problems are more prone to say "that's it, Ive had enough" and so the churn rate increases and they lose customers that may be spending quite a lot on all the NTL services but leave them all because of their perception of the service levels of the company.

A last analogy for you :

I was on the M1 the other day and was involved in a massive traffic jam. The eventual cause I found to be a very large lorry spanning two lanes with a police escort and travelling very slow. That one lorry was solely responsible for the congestion.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Well any calls to NTL that are not on freephone numbers generate income for NTL. As for the rest, if calls to CS causes the costs and impact you are implying then NTL would first be best of fixing their mail servers, their news servers and avoiding things like the balls up 'enforced use of dialer sw' on offnet dial up customers.

As I have already explained , in terms of the way I was using the analogy (car size = connection size) NTL do not allow lorries onto their network at all.

Oh all right I will accept that a single user can cause congestion greater than the size of their connection - by going out and cutting the main cable from the street cabinet to the UBR. There, happy now ?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

All calls to NTL concerning service levels generate an element of cost to them. It's a viscous circle in that the more that calls increase, the more it costs and the less there is to sort out the problems causing the calls.



Replace the oversize lorry with a normal family size car that has a drunk at the wheel and is weaving about so much that nobody dare overtake him.

Let's face it, there is no analogy that corresponds to the situation we are trying to prove or disprove. Common sense and knowledge of the system are the answers but a person who refuses to accept any view but his own isn't using these to the full.
:argue:

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

A civilised society relies not just on the force of law to maintain order; it relies very heavily on pressure from other areas to force would-be offenders to think twice about doing something illegal. The law is of course a valid means of dealing with warez monkeys, but in my view a pricing structure that makes their activities less attractive to them is also a fair and reasonable means of dealing with the problem. You and I would both prefer it if this was not so, but such is human nature.

I snipped out the bit about reading back through your posts because some of the posts (not just yours) in this thread are so long they are not effective as a means of conveying an opinion. This is a discussion forum, not an essay-writing competition! ;)

However, with due apologies for my loose use of language and terminology, I think you have misunderstood me. Regardless of whether it is cost of provision or cost to customer that is fixed (and I do appreciate the difference), what I am reluctantly advocating is a pricing structure designed to manage usage of the network, not a pricing structure designed to reflect actual costs, whatever those costs may be. As I said in my previous post, this country's tax regime is an example of how pricing can be used to encourage or discourage certain behaviour. I don't like it, but I see no effective alternative. The Law never dealt effectively with widespread copyright infringement pre- the digital age; I see no reason why it should work now, without help.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Fair to the paraplegic who uses the internet constantly for voice and video links? Fair to the low income earners ? Fair to those that are 'heavy users' and NOT engaged in illegal activity?

As far as I am concerned the Internet is a vital utility. It is essential to the future health of UK PLC. To price such a 'service of general ecconomic interest' on a what the market will bear basis and not a cost + basis, espcially when it is also a natural monoploy/duopoly would be nothing short of madness. Luckily the government and the EU seem to feel the same.

If the cost of provision was incremantal on usage then customer pricing on such a basis would be fair right an proper. If it is a fixed cost then the customer / user / citizen should have every expectation of being able to accrue the benefits of this (within the law).

Thats my view anyway

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

60% (approx) of people on the road aren't using their cars illegally, though.

60% of traffic on most networks, higher on some, lower on others, is P2P traffic. We don't know whether it's legal or illegal P2P traffic, but come on, let's not be naieve it's hardly ever likely to be legal. I've prolly only downloaded one or two legal things via WinMX et al.

If 60% of the traffic was removed from the network then yes it would reduce overall network traffic would decrease and there would be at that point more available bandwidth!

Look at it this way, 60% of traffic accross most residential ISPs is P2P. If P2P vanished (which isn't likely!) then there would be 60% less traffic, assuming that userbase stayed the same and network capacity wasn't reduced.

Taking your car analogy again. Leave all the roads as they are, same amount of lanes etc. Now take away 60% of the cars. I imagine that even in rush hour there would be a lot less congestion, sure there would still be some, as there would on the 'net. But a lot less. 60% less, in fact!

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

So you remove 60% of the 'alledged' illegal traffic.

Do you think that internet average usage will not continue to grow at an exponential rate, as it has done to date?

Do you really think that ISP/telcos/cablecos will not just load more users onto the infrastructure untill the congestion levels are exactly as they were before you removed the 60% ?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

How do you equate the above to the pricing of telephone services which to me are an even more vital utility than the internet. I know that there are various talk schemes about but there is no catch all fixed price telephone service.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

My arthritic mother has had a motability car for the last 10 years. Perhaps we should be lobbying Government to make similar provision for those with a disability that increases their need for broadband internet services.

Petrol tax is proportionately harsher on lower income earners but that has never stopped successive Governments from using it as a means of trying to control traffic levels. Nevertheless, free or very cheap web access is becoming more and more available through public libraries and the like.

Frankly, yes. Heavy users on the same UBR as me make it more likely that when I want to use the net, it will perform poorly. I understand perfectly well that they will also feel the effects of this, but I'm not worried about that - they are the authors of their own misfortune. There is a cost associated with their network-jamming activities, even if that cost is only my time, your time and their time spent waiting. They need to have some visibility of that cost, even if their activities are legitimate. And I am unconvinced that the majority of heavy usage is legitimate in any case.

NTL's business plan was based on being able to load a certain number of people onto the network at a fixed rate per month. That network supports fewer users than expected because a relatively small number of people are using it more than anticipated. NTL therefore has less revenue and less cash for investment in the infrastructure. The only solution for this is either cap the heavy users, allowing more users to be loaded onto the network, increasing the number of monthly subscriptions and therefore the amount of cash available for investment, or make the heavy users pay more. I would prefer neither, but if pushed, the latter.

The online economy, as far as I am aware, generates a lot of cash from online sales. Visiting a web site to buy online requires very little bandwidth, so increasing charges for heavy users would not affect this. Could you post an example of how increasing the cost of heavy bandwidth usage among domestic users would adversely impact the economy?[/quote]And you are perfectly entitled to it. As I have said, however, I think there are factors other than cost of provision that can legitimately affect the price of a product.

Begging your pardon, now I'm writing essays too ... ;) :erm:

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

It is really enraging when companies do this. The website www.breathe.com used to give free text message, no registration required. This in it's self just shows how cheap it is. But the companies soon figured out they can charge large amounts of money for the service and they haven't looked back since.


This is definately a step in the wrong direction.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

If service providers load more users on they will get the extra revenue from those users which can be utilised to maintain and improve the networks. Using the 60% figure mentioned they could probably increase their revenue by 150% before their services were any worse than they are now and if they were reinvesting this additional revenue this percentage increase in revenue would be even higher.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

First of voice telephony is much more 'price incremental' than internet access is. This is because voice telphony is still dominated by a 'circuit switched' architecture and not a packet switched one.

Having said that fixed price telephony does exist for local and national calls now. If and when VoIP becaomes common then ultimately fixed price voice to anywhere in the world will be commercialy viable and possible - provided the telco's do not manage to have their commercial interests placed above those of the more important 'social' interest of all of us.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Remember, telephone calls can only be recieved/made one at a time. Internet activity can be any number of things combined.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

How do you arrive at that conclusion? Look at the pricing of NTL telephony for example. They charge 20p per minute for calls to France unless you are on their international plan when it is only 5p. Another company Call 18866 can give you the same call for 1p per minute and even calls to Australia, New zealand and USA and USA mobiles are only 1p per minute.

Yes, fixed price telephony does exist for SOME local and national calls but there is NO catch all fixed price option like the broadband pricing model that you advocate.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Yes, but NTL are charged more for international calls, the internet cost is uniform.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Each car user creates 'external costs' in polution and other effects. If car use had not polution effects, and if roads could be made to carry 2x as much traffic year on year, for the same cost and if increased road usage was growing at a smaller rate than this, then yes taxing usage to reduce it would be madness. Just as it is with internet access.

This just sounds like 'thier usage effects me but my usage does not effect anyone else'. Your usage is 'valid' and theirs is not - whatever they might be doing.

And you are perfectly entitled to it. As I have said, however, I think there are factors other than cost of provision that can legitimately affect the price of a product.
[/QUOTE]

BB impact on the UK economy is about much more than 'online sales'. Just as the importance of other transport systems is about much more than money raised in bus fares etc. It is an 'enabler'. Allowing people access to education, training and much more besides. It enables companies to be more efficent. I could go on and on. This is why the EU is looking to have it deemed a 'service of genral economic interest' like transport and other infrastructure and serivces.

No need to beg my pardon for writing essays as I never expressed any problem with it. Begging my pardon for your apparent hypocrasy is another matter ;)

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Do you know anyone that uses Kazaa/WinMX/Bearshare (all the popular ones, where most of the traffic is being used) for legitimate reasons?

I'm not suggesting all P2P traffic is illegal. I've used other P2P services (not commerically available stuff, but private companies P2P stuff) for legitamate work purposes. But I'm not gonna be naieve in thinking that people aren't just constantly downloading illegal materials!

I know several "friends" who got 600kbps installed the other month and have constantly saturated their connection since getting it downloading videos and music.

As to your point:

Well, individuals who dump x amount of rubbish have to pay to dispose of it at the local tip, whereas us that dispose the odd bag get it for free. Heavy users of anything are always charged more. For example, why do I pay £50 more than your average person for my mobile phone contract? Because I use it heavily.

When you use things more than everyone else you expect to pay more. This is not an ideal world, remember!

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

NTL are a major telephony provider, call 18866 are not, they just buy carriage from major suppliers. I would assume that call 18866 make a profit out of their international calls so what must NTL be making and why the differential in the NTL prices of 20p per minute and 5p per minute for the same call.

Is internet cost uniform? Do you know the costs involved in routing internet requests?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

that's how the dial-up system worked, but they promised that broadband would bring a single charge. The problem is not so much the policy but more of the fact they are reversing a previous change because it have become inconveniant.

People have been saying for years, "Oh I'll get broadband when it's cheaper" well at this rate it's going to be more expensive by the time they get around to it

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

I'm coming into this discussion a little late, but the thread did make interesting reading.

I'm not sure which side of the fence I'm on in relation to flat rate vs pay what you use. The things I'm considering are:

Internet take up - we need to speed up roll out to the masses of broadband internet connections. This will be impeded with limitations on what you download, unpredictable costs etc.

However, important as the internet is (and as much as I hate these silly analogies which bear no relation to a unique product, e.g cars) they did it with water meters, and water is a matter is a matter of life and death.

Another angle is that internet providers buy bandwidth based on useage. However, why is this? If I am an ISp and I pay for 1TB link, surely I should be negotiating a price based on using the 1TB, not if I use half of it. If it is good enough for the ISP's to charge their customers on this bases, why don't they negotiate the same deal with their providers?

I think the bottom line for most people can be summed up pretty easily - neither for nor against, as long as it works well and doesn't cost any more a month.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Product progression. Broadband may get more expensive, but you'll get a faster service.

So you think all users should pay the same? From the old boy who collects his email every day to the warez kids who saturate their upstream all day?

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Because the cost of dealing with rubbish (or providing water) is incremental on usage.

If it cost the same to deal with any amount of rubbish (or provide water) then such incremental charges on such important services would be madness.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

np. good to have you here :)

as above, the cost of providing water _is_ incremental on usage. The argument with modern packet based digital networks is that it is not.

Almost all transit bandwidth bought by ISP's is not paid for by usage. They pay a flat rate for a certain size of connection, regardless of how much they use it. Why is that ? Because almost all of the cost of such bandwidth are fixed, regardless of usage :)

I would like to see both options available to users. Pay for MS's used and flat rate. Both are commercialy viable.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

As I have said many times before I would like to see both options available (that is pay for usage and flat rate)

What I do not want to see is _no_ flat rate options available.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Who do you think has to make enough money to afford salaries and maintenance of the phone network?? :rolleyes:

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

If you consider the internet to be a vital service that everyone must have then where do you put all those people who are not currently internet users? Cable systems in particular do not have unlimited scope for expansion of the user base. Where does the vast amount of money required to maintain, improve and increase the capacity of the network come from. It can only come from increased prices paid by users or by putting more users on the existing system and controlling (capping) their usage. If the networks continue to have low, fixed priced subscriptions then they will eventually be subject to congestion so severe that the service is unusable. On top of all that there is also the problem of some users wanting even more and more bandwidth.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

The phone network owners of course who also have to cover R&D and other costs and then generate a profit. But that does not explain the disparity between charging 5p and 20p for the same thing and how they can sell carriage to suppliers such as call 18866 who can resell it for 1p and still make a profit. I cannot see that they are selling that carriage at below cost price.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

So it costs the same to transfer 10TB a day as it does 1TB a day? If so, please email me which data carrier you are using and I will sign up my employers with them straight away!

Data carriage still costs a pretty penny. :/

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

FWIW, As the NTL newsservers are Virtually non-existant (for Binaries anyway) I do pay by the GB for premium newsgroup access, Astraweb in my case.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Transfer from where to where ?

If it is from point to point and the volumes are that high, then it may well be sensible renting,leasing or even laying some fibre (lit or unlit in the leasing rental case). If you went down this route then usage would not figure, just the capacity of the fibre you rent. All fixed cost you see.

If you are saying that they transfer 10TB per day onto and or off of the internet then I would have to ask what they are doing ? Without knowing what they are doing it is hard to offer any input.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

They're not selling below cost price, just renting out spare capacity in their vastly over-sized international links which are still there, partly as a result of the massive expansion in the 90s.

And as for the price disparity, most telcos, like most businesses, will try to maximise revenue by pricing at what the market will stand rather than cost-based pricing (ie cost plus overhead plus a little profit). As little companies like 18866 have such low overheads, they can afford to charge rock-bottom prices.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

This thread and the discussions prompted me to try and write an 'essay' about the 'old' and 'new' worlds of telecomms.

It is not finished but is just a draft and very much a 'work in progress'. It totaly peters out towards the end, due to fatigue. However I offer a link to it here none the less in the chance that it might be considered interesting to some.

A warning however if 'essays' are not to your tastes then it most definately is not for you

http://www.visionmatters.co.uk/oldandnew.htm

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

Companies price as you point out because in general the British public lets them. They do not look for the best deals, they prefer the safety of staying with those they know. Look at the gas and electricity supply position and how many people have not changed suppliers even though they know that they could save money by doing so. It's not that people don't know about changing suppliers, there are enough knocks on the door from different suppliers trying to get your business. There is quite often a lot of talk about things being cheaper in the USA. One of the reasons for this is the American mentality towards saving money. Shop in any American supermarket and the locals are all pulling wads of money saving coupons out. Americans by and large will not allow companies to make excessive profits and vote with their feet if they think they are paying too much.

Re: Goodbye to a flat rate for broadband?
 

There is an interesting article called "The contentious debate on peer-to-peer management" at http://www.adslguide.org.uk/

There is a point made in this article that bargain price products may come onto the market to woo the light users. If light users take up these services it could leave traditional fixed price ISPs with mainly the high bandwidth users and it would be financially unviable to run the service with just those.