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BBC and ISPs Clash over iPlayer

randomtimes writes "A row about who should pay for extra network costs incurred by the iPlayer has broken out between internet service providers (ISPs) and the BBC. ISPs say the on-demand TV service is putting strain on their networks, which need to be upgraded to cope. '"The iPlayer has come along and made downloading a legal and mass market activity," said Michael Phillips, from broadband comparison service broadbandchoices.co.uk. He said he believed ISPs were partly to blame for the bandwidth problems they now face. "They have priced themselves as cheaply as possible on the assumption that people were just going to use e-mail and do a bit of web surfing," he said. ISPs needed to stop using the term 'unlimited' to describe their services and make it clear that if people wanted to watch hours of downloaded video content they would have to pay a higher tariff, he added.'"

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  1. Re:Common Sense is asking too much... by magarity · · Score: 5, Funny

    I use between 15GB and 100GB of "bandwidth" per month. Storage? zilch.
     
    Maybe *you* aren't using the storage yourself but it takes a lot of space on the government's servers to index and cross reference your 100GB of browsing habits.