AT&T Broadband Introduces Tiered Pricing

Joey Patterson writes "It had to happen sooner or later. CNET reports that AT&T Broadband has introduced a tiered pricing plan called UltraLink (3 Mbps down/384 kbps up) for $79.99/month if you buy your own modem and $82.95/month if you lease one of theirs."

Comments

Is this bad?

[Saib0t]

Could someone please explain why this is bad? I fail to understand...

Re:Is this bad?

[StupidKatz]

Why do you need more than 384kbps up? If you wanna run a warez server, buy a T1. :P

The big deal should be whether or not they put restrictions on what you can do with that 384. (I have 128 and run a full suite of services, tho obviously I'm not serving more than a half-dozen people.) "Give us our 384 and begone!" should be our battlecry. Since an ISP is an Internet Service Provider, that's all they should do: take your money, give you the line, and shut up.

What is the big deal?

[Wakko Warner]

Jesus! You people whine too much. At least they're not charging per bit, like just about every other country on the planet does.

For better service, in the real world, you do have to pay more. To me, this sounds like a good deal.

- A.P.

Power users?

[Ioldanach]

AT&T Broadband said UltraLink will serve power users, which it described as those who have "set up home networks, send or receive large files such as when downloading software, or enjoy other bandwidth-intensive applications."

Why must providers always assume that someone who sets up a home network is a bandwidth hog? Personally, I have several computers on my home network. However, none of them hog bandwidth unless I'm downloading a system upgrade. It just happens that the best way to have everyone able to access e-mail and surf at once is to network the computers. (Duh)

I'm on Time Warner Cable, and they prohibit servers. If they were to enforce that prohibition, would that mean their bandwidth usage would go down? I doubt it. How much e-mail does a normal, non-spamming personal e-mail server handle in a day? Come to think of it, the traffic isn't any more than I'd handle if I had to POP it all at once!

Re:Power users?

[Master Bait]

Stupid and ignorant people with home networks could benefit from clever and informed cable network companies. Don't you understand that home networking is an economic opportunity for cable ISPs, rather than a trouble? The ISP COULD sell switches and install everything for profit. I have yet to see the government-supported monopolies that sell cable go much beyond a stupid minimal revise of the failed @home's Terms of Service, which was only a rewrite of old-fashioned dialup TOS.

People want and need services that the government-supported cable monopolies are too lazy to supply. Some want fixed IP numbers, some want domain hosting. Some want fatter upstream, some want home networking, some want to serve their own email or web pages. Some don't want ISP-supplied webspace of ISP supplied POP email or a newsfeed. These are economic opportunities for ISPs in a free market, but competition in both cable and DSL is next to nothing, and this absurd level of service is our reward.