1GB Cap Letter!!!!

[Stuartbe]

Originally Posted by etccarmageddon

I'm sure it wont be long before I give Justanoob a positive point!

Nice one m8 - are needed here .........

Its good that we can all chil out and remember that we are not at war

I'm sounding like Sociable

Edit : Just noticed that sociable is reading the thread - away now

[Florence]

I have to agree SMHarman there is no point in upgrading to 1mb for customers now. I might have to reconsider things and I might move down to 600K.

I am sad to say that red reps for posts in this thread don't seem to be warrented and will only stop some members particpating in the thread. We can agree and disagree without red repping IMPO.

[Sociable]

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

Apologies if I seem a tad sharp, I'm v tired thanks to my little not sleeping properly. All the same if at any point I've been unreasonable with you etc I certainly apologise, not my intention!

I like helping customers when I can though, one sent me a Christmas card thanking me for my work on their connection and described me as a credit to the company. That was a really good feeling

That's OK Apology accepted.

btw I did reply to your post but did so via my post to the other person who raised the identical point.

http://forum.nthellworld.co.uk/showp...&postcount=382

You may find the sub debate betweeen myself and Hell's Child that followed usefull as we managed to reach agreement on most points.

I have green repped you for your last post btw just to say thanks for your apology rather than red rep you for the earlier outburst.

[Sociable]

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

Felt rather besieged, butting out of this dispute, argue amongst yourselves I'll be over here. I still stand with a lot of what I said though, the way I put it could have been better though, but fundamentally position unchanged. Have fun.

No need to butt out of the debate Noob as it makes sense for all views to be included.

I have a question for you that may help in that respect.

Do you think it helps when people like myself take the middle ground and suggest a compromise where the principle of having a cap is accepted as being necessary but then looking at ways to make it both fair and most of all workable?

If so do you have any response to the point I and others make about the need to ensure any cap actually does the job it was intended to do by building in an element of load spreading into the mix?

[Sociable]

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

I am really defending the principle of it all rather than specifically ntl's current implementation, I'd regard it as something that can be refined, built on, with more granularity. The current 'one size fits all' guideline is ok though while it remains a guideline, which I think it for the most part still is. Should it ever become a hard cap I would hope to see more granularity between tiers, and ways to deal with those who want to use more, either through pay per GB or alternative pricing packages.

Must remember that it's still a guideline not 100% hard limitation for the time being.

Fair point and as with Hell's Child we are are very close in our positions in this.

The whole reason this thread re-opened the debate was that the sending out of the letters signified a change in NTL's policy indicating they are now starting to enforce the Cap.

Yes it is still being worded as "guidance" but you surely agree this is a step up from the lack of activity from NTL over the last year.

This is why I and others feel this is the time to do the building and refining of the AUP and are trying to suggest some constructive ways this can be achieved.

[etccarmageddon]

but at the end of the day... do our opinions (including Justanother's) make any difference? decisions on this subject are made by people who arent interested in customer feedback (power user group) or simply are 'too busy'?

[Peach]

I'm an average ntl customer, I download on average less than a gig a day. But on occasions I've downloaded a lot more than that.

I still fail to understand what people do with their endless gigs of downloads, legitmate or not, when do they get to listen or watch this stuff that they're constantly downloading. I'd suggest that p2p has turned people into data collectors. C'mon guys do you really need MPEG copies of every episode of friends?

[Sociable]

In a word YES!!!!

Just imagine how they would have implimented and enforced the current cap without any voice being raised to question it.

The impression given was that NTL may have been waiting for the objections to die down before taking action the fact we woke up and barked shows this dog still has teeth.

[Sociable]

Fair point Peach, but you and I both know that some will always be downloading more than others but that is not the main issue. Yes some of that will be either illegal or without practical use but much of it wont, especially to those actually doing it.

Congestion is caused when all users compete for the same bandwidth at the same time. This is where the first point actually becomes a positive in the equation as it allows for the possibility of that part of the load being moved to a different time slot.

The current AUP has the effect of concentrating all traffic in to the prime time segment thus increasing not decreasing traffic at that time.

[Chrysalis]

increased content comes from various things, streaming on the net is increasingly better quality (higher bitrate) maning bigger filesizes, within a year we will see some download a movie online rental sites, if its dvd images then we are talking 4 gig a peice although I expect it to be more likely compressed 1-2 gig size. The future is the problem, every day that goes by is making a 1 gig cap more and more outdated.

[Peach]

Yes, but this isn't the case presently.

The average user collects email, surfs the web, uses p2p, streams movies and games etc.

Anyone who does any of these things constantly isn't an 'average' user. Ntl broadband is a package for the masses. Ultimately, anyone who is unhappy with their services (which I often am, just to lazy to change suppliers) is free to not use them.

[Blake]

I only use 20-30kB/sec on streaming radio, now... that ain't overuse on a 1mbit connection is it.

But over a period of time, that 20-30kB/sec mounts up. Even within 12hours, it hits the current guideline.

So, if this is the case, then email, www browsing, other activites etc, can no longer be done, because of the low limit thats is in the AUP.

If i could stream on the 150 package, surf, mail and whatever else takes my fancy, I would.. but, it constantly re-buffers on the radio stream, and making the streaming a complete waste of time. I have tryed the 150 and didn't like it. Not for me.

So took advantage of the low price for the 1mbit.

Now, i'm considering looking elsewhere.. It's a little worring when I could be recieving a letter for streaming!.

So it says, call this number.. do you think they will make personal exceptions.. I don't.

[asdf]

Originally Posted by etccarmageddon

I tend to agree but what if NTL is your only choice? at least with ADSL you can pick a supplier who has no 'cap'.

or does the AOL/NTL offering offer a cap free service?

I don't know of that many places that offer cable but not ADSL options now. If ntl is your only choice then you either take it or go on dial-up.

You're not forced to use ntl!

[andygrif]

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

EDIT: Andygrif, ntl have just under 1 million 'always-on' customers, strictly speaking BT Retail is BT Broadband only and subscriber figures should be based as such. BT Yahoo is actually BT Openworld business unit.

Pipex has over 100,000 subscribers, according to your stats that leaves very few subscribers for all the other ADSL ISPs. Not sure where those stats come from but quite sure they're incorrect. Ofcom will have in its' document archives more accurate stats.

I don't think Ofcom publish breakdowns of individual companies' subs - in fact I'm pretty sure they don't becuase that is where I looked for the figures first. They only break it down by cable vs dsl.

I got the figures from the last publicly available stats direct from the two companies press releases and corporate governance information. BT Yahoo does not take into account the BT subscribers that do not take the added service - I forget what that was called, the one they launched without email, newsgroups etc.

The sum of 600,000 was from the last published ntl figures - any other figure is not in the public domain. Whilst these figures may be somewhat out of date in the case of ntl (published in Sept 03) they are all we can realistically go on. In it they claim in one section, connections of just over 2 million subs, and in a separate section figures of 30% of ntl home subs taking an always on internet connection, hence 600,000.

Originally Posted by JustAnotherN00b

2nd EDIT: Your post and follow ups took what I said out of context suggesting very strongly you had no idea where I was coming from and you didn't dispute this. I'll happily argue in private as you seem to be intent on not just admitting you got the wrong end of the stick and would rather be ignorant and obstinate, this thread is for discussion on other things.

How dare you question my attitude towards customers - if I had a bad attitude towards customers I wouldn't help as many as I have both through here and through the chat room, last person to accuse me of not caring about customers had several people bend his ear and remind him how much of my free time I spend assisting people through forums and the nthellworld chatroom.

May I point out that the above makes it look like I have questioned what you have said - whilst I know that you have edited your post in response to my previous, it doesn't make it clear that you are not directing your frustrations at me

[asdf]

And on reflecting... some serious rep whoring going on in this thread!

As to Blake's point. Is there really any justification on having the radio streaming whilst you're out and asleep? You're not only wasting your own bandwidth but the bandwidth of the station you listen to!

Not the best of things to argue with.