Slashdot Mirror
UK ISP Imposes Download Limits
Richard_at_work writes "The BBC news site is reporting that NTL have announced it will be imposing 1GB download limits per day for its users. As you can guess, reactions have not been mild :) One thing to note, NTL has said that they will only be persuing persistent offenders, so i guess they understand you cant track your usage to the byte! Also with NTL, they appear to ban the usage of VPNs, citing that their service is for resedential use only. Does this mean I can't email work now?"
Many countries have been living with monthly download caps for a while now. For example, Videotron (the largest cable ISP in Quebec, Canada) limits its users to 10gigabytes/month, which is 1/3 the amount NTL allows. 1GB per day is MORE than enough for anyone, even hardcore warez downloaders (30gb/month!) If someone has to download more than 1GB worth of software/music/etc it is easily possible to schedule your downloads. Even with 15 hours of streamed audio at 128Kbps, someone would only do about ~850megabytes. Stop putting your panties in such a fit for something other people have suffered through and accepted to live with already.
Now the best they could do is to sue for false advertising on "unlimited access". But once the cable company takes it out of the ads... everybody is screwd.
Didn't read the article did you? It's averaged over a month so go ahead and download your distro and porn. Just don't do it every day.
That's the point of limited broadband, as you ask. It's not that customers sit on an always on service they never use, it's that customers sit on an always on service with normal use.
I doubt this move is to stop piracy or anything else except to stop them bleeding cash. It's kind of like flipping the closed sign on your buffet restaurant when the Klumps pull into the parking lot. Not that nice but good business sense, especially when too many of your customers are like that.
I've been staying on top of this right over the weekend (and had a /. story about it rejected 36 hours ago, grrrrr), so for those new to it, some links:
Massive thread on nthellworld.com, a offical ntl gripe site.
Complaint site
Basically, ntl are somewhat losing their nerve. I've exchanged emails with the MD of their home products range who claims to have only found out about this key strategic business decision on Saturday morning; he's either lying or incompetent, I suggest. The biggest gripe amongst the sane posters (barring all the "I pay for 24/7 and I'm going to damn well get it" breast-beating") is that the 128bps, 600kbps and 1024kps services all have the same download limit, making you wonder why you pay for the higher speed service.
It should also be pointed out that, unlike many other ISP's schemes, NTL offer no FTP mirror service with "free" bandwidth and recently started dropping alt.binaries groups from their newsspool, which is in any event so slow as to be unusable. So for big alt.binaries downloads or Linux ISOs, for example, customers are forced to external sites, pushing up ntl's bandwidth.
The biggest fear is that this is the thin end of the wedge. In the last two weeks, ntl have dropped a few warez newsgroups and introduced a fairly generous cap that won't inconvenience too many people. That's all well and good, but many think it won't stop there; once you get the caps in place and the groups erased, you can squeeze them down and down. ntl is desperately short of cash, newly emerged from Chapter 11 protection, and this would appear to be a beancounter-led efficiency drive that is turning into a PR nightmare.
I was part of a similar revolt over a no-servers line in the AUP a few years back (more info) and ntl backed down and clarified their position with a set of clear-cut and sensible rules. Let's hope that happens again.
You win again, gravity!
Did you read even the slashdot story? NTL has said that they will only be persuing persistent offenders - I hope this clears up the fog in your brain a bit ;-)
Cheers!