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AT&T Could Cut Off P2P Users
malign noted that AT&T has stated that using P2P on their 3G wireless network is grounds for disconnection. The lobbyist told congress "Use of a P2P file sharing application would constitute a material breach of contract for which the user's service could be terminated."
It could widely open the door for such clauses in regular ISPs contracts...
Are there not a ton of continuous bandwith applications that are not p2p and completely legal and used heavily by many people? I mean come on AT&T, at least make the excuse believable. The people you are cutting off are smarter than that and will take you to court over it, I can already see the EFF jumping down your throat. Good luck with this!
Fuck. Off.
While this may be oppressive, at least users now know where they stand.This has to be better than an invisible, 'if we think you're using too much we may slow you down, and then lie about it repeatedly' policy.
Not to say that both are mutually exclusive, of course.
Is crushing a suspect's child's testicles illegal?
John Yoo: "No, [if] the President thinks he needs to do that."
3G wireless data networking is a service with very limited total bandwidth. It has a premium price, and is primarily targeted at business users. Given the basic physical limits involved with the radio spectrum in question, you really have to either do this or have specific bandwidth quotas to effectively manage a network.
Having said that, I prefer Verizon's solution of clearly stated 5GB quota with overage at a known and stated cost. I don't use their service as a primary internet connection, but it's invaluable for the ability to connect from *anywhere*. This is particularly useful as I run my own consulting company, and need to be able to have access no matter what.
(Ultimate lightweight setup: Xseries Thinkpad plus Verizon EVDO modem)
ERROR: Null
Why must they sell this "unlimited" crap that is actually very limited? Give me data and a rate schedule, just like with voice minutes. Let me specify a cap so that some errant process doesn't wipe me out financially.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Before the hordes of angry /.'ers start cursing AT&T into oblivion, let me start by saying it's their network and they can impose whatever rules they feel like. Nobody is forcing you to sign up; there are options.
Over their cell network, I don't think this is an unreasonable stance for them to take. Sure, it may be annoying for the .05% of users (or whatever miniscule percentage of people) who are affected by this, but this isn't about internet access for the home computer - it's about wireless internet access for a cell network. Sure, when our cell phones are much more advanced and p2p applications make sense I'll think they need to rethink their stance, but for now, it's pretty reasonable. imho.
fine the fuck out of them already! How dare they pull this kind of shit RIGHT AFTER Comcast was told to stop sending TCP reset packets to torrent clients.
I'm glad we're headed in the right direction.
What scares me the most is not AT&T alone, but the precedent they're setting for ISPs worldwide.
Whether it's their network or not shouldn't matter. ISPs due to infrastructure tend to have a natural monopolies. They have the responsibility of responding to the demands of their users. Who are they to choose how a user will use his connection? Does he really have many options if he wishes to choose another ISP?
I recently bought an EEE PC and enrolled in my cell carrier's data plan to allow tethering. It's great, I love being able to connect to the net relatively securely from anywhere. And it makes a great backup in case my home cable modem goes out. The problem is, I only use it occasionally, and most carriers have outrageous plans.
For someone who is interested in cellular internet in the US, what are your choices?
Verizon: $60/mo on top of voice plan, 5 GB/mo limit, service explicitly limited to "internet browsing and e-mail only".
AT&T: $60/mo on top of voice plan, 5 GB/mo limit, poor access unless you live in a major city, can have your contract terminated for violation of service whenever they feel like it.
Sprint: $50/mo on top of voice plan. Apparently no bandwidth or usage limits.
T-Mobile: No 3g service.
Alltel: $25/mo on top of voice plan (or $10/mo on top of PDA plan), no bandwidth or service limits.
Since Alltel was bought by Verizon, it seems like Sprint is the only way to go for cellular internet. I currently have Alltel, and am considering extending my data contract for 2 years to at least enjoy it while it lasts.
As long as they're clear about what they are and aren't selling for $XX.99 per month, they're free to not sell whatever they don't want to sell.
(The mistake that the ISPs made was in claiming to sell YYY Mbits/s 'unlimited' and then not actually providing that.)
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
Why are there no P2P apps that disguise themselves as "legitimate" traffic eg FTP/SMTP/POP3/HTTP/HTTPS/VOIP
Just wrap the packets in the appropriate container and it should be more or less undetectable no ?
Who would want to try and P2P anything over 3G, anyhow? I regularly end up using my cell as a tethered modem for EDGE when I have no other service available, and even if I had 3G, I don't see any situation where I'd be forced to rely on my cell for internet that I would just absolutely have to get on some P2P network. I'd rather just surf and check email with a connection less than DSL/Cable.
It could be that the only purpose of your life is to serve as a warning to others.
So are people buying internet access or the ability to shop only at approved media interface sites.
We need to take back the NET before we lose any more of it.
Honesty in advertising is something that must be enforced again. Where did it go?
Step 1) Buy 3G iPhone.
Step 2) Violate the TOS by using a p2p application.
Step 3) AT&T terminates the contract.
Step 4) Find a way to unlock the phone.
Step 5) Buy the plan that you want.
FTFA : "Because P2P file sharing applications typically engage in continuous (rather than bursty) transmissions at high data rates, a small number of users of P2P file sharing applications served by a particular cell site could severely degrade the service quality enjoyed by all customers served by that site."
Hey AT&T, it's called QoS, look it up!
And if their problem is with "continuous" transmissions, let's just make a new P2P protocol that instead uses lots of "bursty" transmissions to lots of different other P2P users. There, problem solved!
You just got troll'd!
Nice try, censoring my AC posting. But AT&T is quite right to do this - they don't want music and video thieves on their networks and they're finally taking action to boot these parasites off their bandwidth. Good for them.
From World of Warcraft players.
At the next patch/update of the game, you'll receive a boatload of calls from angry customers.
No, they should not be able to say that. Because if they say that, every ISP can and will say that, then they start preventing you from downloading competitor's material, then they start censoring, and then the internet begins a slow death spiral in the US.
ISPs should be covered under common carrier laws. That means they are not responsible for the content of the information they transmit, but that they can also not give preferential treatment to a specific type of information or deprecate another type of information. They key here is the content of information. Downloading one 5 MB file should not be any different than downloading another 5 MB file, no matter what's within the file or what program you use to download it.
Content providers are putting more and more pressure on ISPs because they can. The ISPs in turn put pressure on the consumer and start setting standards which they should not be setting. Content providers should not have this much control!
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
... WoW players who use their cellphone to connect to the internet. :D
Ok, maybe that will only be a splash instead of a wave.
Before the discussion wanders off topic, it's important to note that this is not about copyright violation, something that's not mentioned anywhere in the letter. But, to quote from the letter:
Todayâ(TM)s P2P file sharing applications are inappropriate for AT&Tâ(TM)s mobile wireless broadband network, which is optimized to efficiently support high data rates for multiple users that send and receive intermittent or âoeburstyâ traffic generated by activities such as browsing the Internet and sending email. Because P2P file sharing applications typically engage in continuous (rather than bursty) transmissions at high data rates, a small number of users of P2P file sharing applications served by a particular cell site could severely degrade the service quality enjoyed by all customers served by that site.
So really, the issue isn't even P2P - the issue is "continuous transmissions at high data rates."
Now, the other day I spent about 2.5 hours on a Skype video call, and a few days before that I downloaded an ISO over HTTP (Mythbuntu). Will activities like those eventually be labeled a breach of service, because of their nature as "continuous transmissions at high data rates"? What about visiting Hulu? I think those are all pretty legitimate questions.
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
unless you want to be taken as an RIAA lapdog.
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This sounds like an easy way to get out of your contract lol. Thanks AT&T.
By selectively banning accounts for certain types of traffic, AT&T has effectively disqualified themselves from the safe harbor provisions. All that someone needs to do is download some pics of kiddy diddling and AT&T could be sued to oblivion for providing child pornography. Safe harbor ONLY applies when the ISP doesn't bias network traffic.
AT&T's terms of service (as well as the TOS for most other carriers) bars the use of P2P applications on the wireless platform.
Apparently to conserve limited bandwidth.
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Wow, I just read through the comments at a threshold of 0, and it's clear that a whole lot of you can't seem to understand that WE'RE TALKING ABOUT A 3G DATA NETWORK. So all you people talking about downloading large files using BitTorrent or playing WOW, how many of you do that from YOUR FUCKING CELL PHONE?!?!?
This guy's the limit!
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/p2p_growth_trend_watch.php
[...]"Peer-to-Peer (P2P) traffic was 60% (and rising) of Internet traffic in 2004, with BitTorrent accounting for 30% of traffic"[...]
that article is from 2006 (2(!) years(!) ago) and was the first find using google...
Looks like AT&T's shiny product isn't worth shit if they have to bitch about protocols that were already a requirement in 2004...
The FSM only knows how big the bill would be if you torrent (or more likely run Limewire or Bearshare)
Andy
Poor AT&T didn't realize they were going to piss off over 40 million WoW players....
How many people ONLY play WOW over a 3G connection...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That Comcast is a ground based cable carrier, and hid it's interference, and AT&T is a wireless carrier whose TOS openly states that use of P2P applications on their wireless platform is grounds for termination of the contract? Slight differences there...
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1. Profanity on AT&T's network will be fined at $0.99 per incident
2. Failure to return mother-in-law's call will temporarily disable all other outgoing calls.
3. Calling ex-girlfriend after 10 pm will be charged at time-and-a-half.
4. Using map feature to locate a Verizon retail store will cause your handset to be remotely bricked.
5. Calling AT&T customer service will result in temporary data throughput reduction.
6. Calling three friends in a row within a three minute period will result in suspension of outgoing call privileges.
For once I'm actually happy wow exists. But in reality, those clowns would never do anything about it. Sheeple just keeps on rolling over the cliff indefinitely.
If you're so attached to WoW you need to get your latest patch over your cell phone, you probably need help.
If you're so attached to WoW you don't even read slashdot summaries ... well, maybe its time to take a break.
unless you want to be taken as an RIAA lapdog.
No, they're smart enough to create an account with a throwaway email and phony user information and then accuse others of being RIAA lapdogs. Best way to distract others from your own wrong doing. BTW, why is your IP address from RIAA.org?
Ha-ha, I use Sprint. Never got kicked off of EVDO for downloading some fan-subbed Anime :P (though they do have their own issues, don't get me wrong).
Seriously, though. Why do people still use AT&T? Aside from iPhone fever or living in a remote area where AT&T is the only game in town it sounds like there really aren't any compelling reasons to sign up with them.
Ever since getting my "3g" iphone, I've never seen a good 3g signal. Hope you like all that cash I send you AT&T.
... and looking over the contract terms, I think this gets me out of paying the early contract termination fee.
Poor AT&T didn't realize they were going to piss off over 40 million WoW players....
Someone's missing the point of TFA... Christ you didn't even have to read TFA to get it! How many people do you know that play WoW on their iPhone, chief? 40 million? Shit! And all this time I've been staying locked up in my bedroom! And who modded parent +3 Interesting? Are you serious?
Title should have been "AT&T to cut off P2P users on 3G".
Super, this is an easy way out of any ATT contract. Fire up a P2P client and you are out of your contract with no termination fees. Cool.
So all I have to do is put a p2p app on the iphone and they get cut off to get a iphone 3g without being locked in for 2 years.
From all those folks who are playing WoW over the cell network you mean?
Because soooooooo many people play WoW from their 3G phones....
Yeesh.
AT&T can certainly change their contract as they deem apropriate. I'm pretty certain that's become a common practice. But A lot of you decriers of 'FOUL' are kind of missing the point.
The whole "Legitimate" reason for using P2P / BitTorrent whatever is to try and ensure that there will be more bandwidth for a desired file than will be availible by any one provider.
That is to say, now adays files are so large and there is so much demand that unless you have oodles and oodles of upstream bandwidth, someone is going to get denied access because of too many users. (any of you who may remember ftp archives like WU) or downloads that are much slower than that 8Gb fiberline you just had run the last mile to your house.
It's the same philosophy that you all bitched about when you'd say MS Windows expands to fill all resources. Just because you can use P2P doesn't mean you should. A lot of you are savvy enough to know how to limit the number of upstream clients you can provide for. But in general uncontrolled P2P will consume as much of your upstream as it can while your downloading your Pr0n.
Anyone who plays WoW will know their P2P is vicious, and this is from a company with the most popular MMORPG in the world, Billions of dollars a month from user fees and such and they have to use your network to help spread their updates?
So cry if you get thumped by the 'Corporate Giant' trying to keep the hard working hacker down. It's not about unlimited data, it's about people using tools that crush everyone elses fun using that service.
Think about it, you paid to move data for yourself up and down that line, P2P makes you a data dealer for 2 - 100's more all on that one line you are paying for.
Probably blew my Karm but oh Well.
DS
This is not for regular internet service, this is for 3G. Why would you download a WoW patch on your cellphone?
The iphone isn't a business device. The only reason it gets any business cred is due to the fact that some managers want to own and use one, so they make policies that benefit themselves...
So how did 40 million WoW players get WoW running on their cellphones?
T-Mobile has EDGE in most areas in the US, and I believe it costs on the order of $20-30/mo in addition to voice, or about $40-50/mo for a standalone plan.
What bothers me is the statement that continuous download is not supported. Don't these 3G networks have more advanced flow control due to their telecom roots? I'd expect to see traffic shaping and prioritization, rather than some arbitrary download cap and termination.
Do they define actual applications or some sort of nebulous 'act' of sharing binary data among other users?
And that also means i cant perform a *legal* activity with their product, especially now that several media places use BT to distribute the content you purchased?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It is for the 3G wireless networks. The capacity of a network is calculated on a probabilistic model where a bunch of users communicate in intermittent quanta of downloads and uploads. So the bandwidth is provisioned, ( especially in a wireless network ) in such a way that you have the promised amount of bandwidth in spike. There is only that much you can put in a single wireless burst. A P2P application in sharp contradistinction, will generate a stream of steady and large volume of traffic in both directions, for as long as it is running. This will lock up a bunch of slots on a burst, starving other user terminals in the vicinity. The problem with torrents I think is not the amount of data transferred, but the pattern in which it is used. The attempt I think is to provide an uniform user experience for all.
It is understandable from a provisioning point of view, but let us see how it works out in the market.
hey if its theirs then so are the phishing emails i recieve and their viruses and their scam websites and their botnets and their fraud sites
so where do i make my claim for damages due to "their network"s content has inflicted on my family ?
Why are people using a wireless service to do P2P?
Surely the best way to use P2P is have a fixed, always on, wired connection that remains connected?
While "unlimited" sounds nice from a marketing perspective, when its clear that it is not the case why isnt advertising it as such not concidered fraud? I have no problem with a phone service or an isp for that matter blocking anything they want, its their network but I want it all spelled out for me in writing before I decide to use their service or not.
The moment they open the automatic patch downloader... DISCONNECTED. It uses Bittorrent, you see.
or the Internet for that matter. This is their vision of it, as they don't want to deploy the assets necessary to support the protocols necessary to call their offering 'Internet'.
It's now a private network-- something ATT knows and has been offering for years.
Let's call it what it is, a private network with access to some Internet functionality. One more reason that Verizon or others might eat ATT's lunch, and rightfully so if Verizon, Sprint, or others are able to offer REAL Internet access.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Unless they've changed it recently I've been able to play games fine with 3g internet. I have a blackjack and didn't have internet at my apartment for a couple of days, so I just turned on internet sharing. Unreal Tournament and WoW played fine even though I left it running for a day and a half.
The other week though I had Bittorrent running (slowly, 5KB up/down) and it kicked me off after ~5min.
It's not a matter of not caring, it's a matter of lack of choice.
In my neighborhood the choices for internet access are Comcast or Dialup. Verizon provides phone service for my neighboord(Houston metro area) but they don't offer FiOS, let alone DSL.
I'd love to switch off Comcast as until recently they'd been throttling my connection to less than dial-up speeds after exactly 2 minutes of a video conference via iChat. No P2P was involved, just iChat. I use iChat to keep in touch with my parents,my dad's job took them out of the country, and my brother, who lives in central Wisconsin.
Even though they've stopped the throttling in the past few weeks I'll be leaving Comcast as soon as FiOS is available because Comcast lied to my face, "we're not throttling", whenever I'd call about the iChat issue.
#include all the usual statements about blocking p2p being a stupid broad-brush approach to fighting piracy, then ask yourself why do AT&T and any other ISPs choking P2P actually care?
Is it really just high bandwidth usage they fear, or is it that the RIAA/MPAA have got to them?
You mean the WoW losers actually go so far as to sign up for mobile broadband so they can fill every last second of their day with that stupid game?
... why are we not asking the question: why has every cellular phone company so drastically underprovisioned their service that they have to resort to these measures in the first place? They're a UTILITY company, for crying out loud. That means that they can do capital investment in infrastructure with payback periods of centuries, without any particular risk. Does anybody seriously think "that Internet thang" is going to go away? This is what we get for allowing them to be run as private businesses full of business majors unable to run a company any other way but next-quarter's-profits.
"High data rates" is something the ISP has control over. Banning p2p to preserve the ISP's limited bandwidth, is a choice that AT&T is making. It is not something that is thrust upon them.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
P2P traffic eats much more bandwidth than other types of traffic, and bandwidth isn't infinite. At least AT&T is open about what it's doing.
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Can someone point me to this mystery iPhone P2P client in the App store?
I think AT&T is just trying to say their mobile network is for mobile devices. 3G is not a replacement for your DSL/cable internet.
Not so many folks play Warcraft using a Cell-modem. (Picture, if you will, 2400 'minutes' on your cell phone bill...)
file sharing applications are inappropriate for AT&T(TM)s mobile wireless broadband network
Plugging in via router and FIOS/cable/DSL is different than what's being discussed.
When I stay at a hotel that does not have free internet access, I tether my 8525 and use it. And on occasion, I need to download a linux distro or something like that (nothing copyright infringing, of course) and I'll use a torrent or emule. 3G speeds, but LowIDs in emule. I use it sparingly, haven't gotten a letter or anything like that.
Banning because P2P will Tax the Wireless Phone Network. Stated in the Contact, Legit banning -- If this is not stated in the contract, there is a chance that the courts will side with the Phone Company. BUT without explicitly or implicitly stating anything, even remotely, about abusive use of Phone Network (ie P2P), AT & T has no grounds to terminate contract.
I do work on networks, and understand the extent of P2P problems, but instead of having AT&T bitch about it, how about they actually make the users pay a little more for more bandwidth to help pay for better servers to allow the P2P to work. As others has mentioned, it is a CASH COW that legit companies are - and should- look into to make more money.
Lets Face it! People are going to use P2P applications and tools (Bit Torrent, Blizzard's WoW, etc.) to obtain information. Some have the arguement that P2P is illegal, but Peer 2 Peer in general is not illegal, just some of the content shared on it.
Look, I have made attempts to use it for legitimate reasons (like a linux ISO download) and it overloads the system (probably given the latency over HSDPA, as well as the retries and concurrent connects to the "cloud").
Sorry, they just bog down the system to the point of uselessness (and that is from the client), so I can't even imagine how bad it is for their cell aggregators.
On a side note, had it worked, the second problem AT&T would have is that they've not bulked up their infrastructure enough at cell towers to handle full-on 3G traffic. I swear to God that I get only ISDN-ish speeds for internet surfing at airports where there's probably the highest concentration of HSDPA traffic in the area. Of course it is THEIR problem and THEIR false advertising for improperly selling a service that they did not allocate enough backend bandwidth for, not mine.
Doesn't this affect ATT's common carrier status? They are doing it as the customer agreed to in the contract, but does that mean anything at all? Whether by contract or not, they are still filtering the 3G network. I am curious what the statutes on the matter really say. It seems like the same situation as ISPs suddenly not liking USENET anymore, or deep inspection of packets on some networks.
If the practice becomes widespread one would wonder if the contract was even valid, as then it would be just like shrink wrap licenses where its David vs. Goliath, a collusion of companies. Thus, you have no choice to agree to it, as there is no other alternative so you are really signing under some sort of coercion.
It was a joke damnit...
Yes, I know no-one plays WoW over 3G.
I know there aren't 40 million players of WoW.
It is an example of a valid P2P use of network resources..
There's also several media companies looking at P2P to distribute their content (which an iPhone user would use).
sorry it went over people's heads...
Who is general failure, and why is he reading my hard drive?
I'm not a WoW player - read my other response...
Who is general failure, and why is he reading my hard drive?
They don't use P2P to play - they use it to patch... Duh.
Who is general failure, and why is he reading my hard drive?
Doesn't the iPhone use Bonjour? ...yes Won't at&t have to cripple their own golden boy?
Dear Valued Customer,
Stay in line, little sheep. You are only allowed to use the service we provide in the maner that we have planned, so that we can make lots of money from you. If you were to decide to you our service (that you pay for) any way you want, we may not be able to guarantee a 12% per annum growth to wall street.
So... do what you're told, or we won't let you particiapte in our money making enterprise.
Regards,
The Phone Compa^H^H^H^H Industry.
PS (WHAT NO ONE IS REALLY TALKING ABOUT IS THAT P2P SHIFTS COSTS, AND WE REALLY REALLY REALLY DON'T WANT THE COST, JUST THE PROFIT)
Ahh, youth. To quote:
Sorry, but you're flat out wrong here. The difference is how much you're willing to pay for the resources necessary to transmit the data. P2p users usually aren't willing to pay much, but wall street execs are willing to pay top dollar to get it there "yesterday, or sooner if possible".
The network is a limited resource, so latency and bandwidth will eventually end up being auctioned off to the highest bidder. P2p users will ultimately end up using the "sloppy seconds" bandwidth that gives you a few hours latency at best. That is of course unless you're willing to pay wall street money to share stupid shit with people you don't even know. ;)
If you ever get the feeling that you're pulling one over on a service company, then you clearly don't understand your contract. TANSTAAFL, so the contract always protects the company and limits you to what's "fair" for the amount you're paying.
What's really going to be interesting is the first case (P2P or just "continuous bandwidth") where an iPhone user was using a program they downloaded from the iTunes App store. I tend to figure that if Apple blesses it, and it is used as intended, then AT&T has a bone to pick with their business partner, not the end user.
There are already streaming radio and other apps in the App store I think. (I don't know if they only work over wifi) All it's going to take is one mistake on the part of the Apple screeners, and this will get interesting.
Just like the "early termination fee" is being ruled illegal in California, this over reaching use of "Unlimited" needs to be struck down.
tm
Yeah, I almost had a heart attack. I thought this was for DSL and fiber customers when I read the title. Cutting off wireless P2P is at least understandable.
Uh... fuck you, MPAA, RIAA. I am so tired of these wastes of space.
If I pick up my mail from another P, is that P2P file sharing, or does P2P implicitly involve many connections?
If it does involve many connections, then could I restrict bit torrent to a single connection and use it?
If I send huge attachments in my email (say .mp3 files) to a bunch of other people on a mailing list and pick up other music from their mailing lists, is that p2p? It's the same bandwidth overall (but a much bigger centralized load on an email server somewhere)
Maybe we need an automated mail-based encrypted multi-message attachment system that is as easy to use as bit torrent. They wouldn't dare start kicking people for too many email messages.
Hey, email is p2p isn't it? (anyone can run a server, anyone can pick up from anyone else). So if all clients ran servers and all clients picked up from all the other clients, you'd have a distributed file distribution system that ran on top of email, right? You could even make it bit-torrent like, just running on email messages with encrypted payloads.
I cut off AT&T a long time ago... after they tried to charge me $2 per call for "line forwarding" when I moved my business less than 15 miles, staying in the same area code and in the same city and tried to justify their charges as being "long distance call forwarding."
And the charges would apply whether I answered the phone or not because "the action of forwarding the call to your new office counts as a call pickup and is billed as such," according to several AT&T representatives that I dealt with during that particular round of telephonic rootcanal surgery without anesthesia.
Honestly they can't think anything remotely like that will happen. People would drop them for the alternative in a heartbeat.
There are already too many negative things about comcast that would have people switch like crazy. Not to mention the government would probably enter the picture and force them into net neutrality.
Also, far too many legit services are handled via P2P.
This will leave a lot of rom for other companies to come in and fill the gaps. DSL will surge, alternative cable services, etc.
If they drop the customer's cable the customer will drop the TV and phone.
No one said AT&T was a smart company. They absolutely have never demonstrated that.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
hahahahahahaah.
very funny mr posterbob funnypants.
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I don't know what's worse: that I misread the headline, or that it didn't seem all that surprising that AT&T would cut people's fingers off.
So what AT&T is saying to me as a purchasing decision maker in business is that I should consider another wireless carrier if I want to use p2p sharing tools to push marketing materials, training videos and other documents to our mobile sales staff?
Or maybe AT&T only intends to enforce that policy against individual users they think are using too much bandwidth?
One way they're saying they don't value my business. The other that they're arbitrary douchebags who don't deserve it.
Great marketing there guys. I'm really impressed. Really.
And I'm sure the corporate AT&T sales team on my calendar the middle of next month will really enjoy the opportunity to directly and pointedly address those concerns. Let me add that item to the agenda right now....
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
It is precisely because of the limited choices people have for broadband connectivity that these corporations can impose any kind of terms of service they choose with no little fear of losing customers.
In a real competitive marketplace, competing businesses could capitalize on the situation by offering a truly unrestricted access package.
One of many reasons why unregulated capitalism fails the average person.
This is the stupidest news post I have ever seen.
First off, it's AT&T Mobility. The wireless service has had a 5 GB "soft limit" (means no overage charges, but lots of reserved rights) since January and has prohibited P2P, Slingbox, using the service to host a website, etc, for even longer than that. (It used to ban video streaming like YouTube, but they have recently removed that from the T&C's, apparently, since I can't find it anymore.)
The wireless internet access is not designed to replace a home internet connection. It's designed for mobile internet usage.
But really? Since it's a soft limit? You'd have to go over 5 GB first and probably more than once. Which you agreed not to do anyway, as the plans haven't had the word 'unlimited' in them since January. If you have this service and your plan does say 'unlimited' you have even more leeway if you go over 5 GB.
So quit 'cher bitchin'. I already have to explain this to slack-jawed yokels all day, please don't inflict slashdotters on me too.
Because Winrar can and most commonly is used to package Pirated Software. Does AT&T consider the use of Winrar to be grounds for termination as well?
"In law, a default is the failure to do something required by law or to appear at a required time in legal proceedings." -wikipedia
IANAL, but failure to uphold your end of a contract (violating terms of service which results in a breach of contract) is a form of default.
failure is a funny word. all failure is of course a default. you can call any action a 'failure' to do what the opposition of any action is. interesting.
Wouldn't you still be liable for the $175 early termination fee since you broke the contract?
Since in every situation one computer has to be either host or client.. It just happens that one computer can be both.
OP was referring to WoW using bit torrent to distribute updates.
I see lots of griping about how they shouldn't say unlimited if it's not limited and they should have a clear limit on data volume like Verizon. I'm looking at AT&T's "data connect" (read: tethered) plan right now. It doesn't say unlimited. And it does say 5 gigs. Doesn't seem at all deceptive or misleading.
If they changed the rules on people mid-contract, that's certainly a bitchable offense but people who have signed up recently weren't deceived about the amount of data they could move through the account.
Grrr, getting tired of all these little slips down the hill.
Hey, AT&T, stop half-assing things! Just turn completely anti-consumer already! Make and enforce the most ridiculous draconian policies and fuck over all your customers in ways that everyone can see.
At least that way we won't be on the fence when it comes time to destroy you like we are supposed to.
You cant hand on heart say that this is a noble cause to fight against.. What legitimate application does p2p over 3g have? You cant run the said world of warcraft or a linux distro on your phone!! For the first time ever i tactually think that this is a reasonable constraint by at&t..
The filings state:
1) "Today's P2P file sharing applications are inappropriate for AT&Tâ(TM)s mobile wireless broadband network, which is optimized to efficiently support high data rates for multiple users that send and receive intermittent or âoeburstyâ traffic generated by activities such as
browsing the Internet and sending email. Because P2P file sharing applications typically engage in continuous (rather than bursty) transmissions at high data rates, a small number of users of P2P
file sharing applications served by a particular cell site could severely degrade the service quality enjoyed by all customers served by that site."
and
2) "AT&T's terms of service for mobile wireless broadband customers prohibit all uses that may cause extreme network capacity issues, and explicitly identify P2P file sharing applications as such a use."
HERE is the problem... under terms of (2) if any activity doesn't fit the use profile for the optimizations described in (1) then it MAY be interpreted as being in breach of contract.
That means at&t optimized a certain way and if my use profile doesn't fall in line with their optimized network (for example by holding 4-6 TCP sockets open for several hours and continuously feeding data across 2-3 of those connections) then my contract could be terminated because I'm doing more than reading email and watching youtubes.
Cell phone networks were, naturally enough, designed to carry phone calls. They can do a limited amount of Internet as an extra feature, but could easily be saturated by it. The government hasn't given them enough radio spectrum to carry megabits, constantly, for even a few customers per cell site. Would you rather have kiddies downloading porn and illegal copies of music, or have your 911 calls get through in emergencies?
I wonder if they mean any and all P2P applications? Not all P2P activity breaks copyright laws. World of Warcraft patches are distributed via its own P2P system, and Operating System Destros, such as Ubuntu http://releases.ubuntu.com/8.04/, can be downloaded via torrents
I've used WMWifiRouter many times with Sprint's SERO plan to bittorrent files (I max out at 100 kB/s up and down on EVDO) on my HTC Mogul.
Combined that with the fact that Sprint's early termination fees have recently been ruled illegal in one county and you have a pretty good setup, but most people can't see past the iPhone. *shrugs*
If a company threatens you upfront , you look for an alternative, right ? (unless you live in belgium ofcourse ...)
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
Next generation file sharing. www.singlewrench.com