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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...
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)
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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.
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)
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.
Sprint has a $60/month unlimited plan, with no dependency on a voice plan. I'm using it now.
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"
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
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.
"Does he really have many options if he wishes to choose another ISP?"
If we were talking about land-based ISP service, the answer would depend on where you live, but in most places there's at least one other option if you know where to look.
But we're not talking about land-based ISP service. We're talking about 3G cell phone service.
"ISPs due to infrastructure tend to have a natural monopolies. They have the responsibility of responding to the demands of their users."
Ah, the good old sense of consumer entitlement. So if I own the only lake-side property in town, and the folks in the town want a lake-side restaurant, I'm obliged to operate one for them? Nonsense.
The only special obligation placed on a monopoly is that it not abuse the free market with the power that being a monopoly gives it. Not being in the business you want them to be in isn't an abuse.
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!
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.
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.
Except when you violate the TOS they charge you an Early Term Fee or you can keep paying monthly for no access. It's in the legalize you signed. Sorry no free subsidized Iphone for you ;P
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.
I recommend ATT or Verizon, both equally, and no one else.
I disagree. If you live in a major city both T-Mobile and Sprint are valid options. Both of them are focused on covering the areas where 90% of the population spends 90% of it's time. If you live in a decent sized city and rarely venture out into the countryside then why the hell should you pay half again as much (or more) for service with Verizon or AT&T?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
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
um...I hate to burst your rant, but for AT&T, it was in their contract saying wireless users can not use P2P. It's not like AT&T is booting them for copyright infringement...just lagging down networks with P2P.
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.
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.
This is not just a monopoly though, it's a govenment-granted monopoly. They can only operate their service at all because the public decides to grant them monopoly use of part of the public spectrum in exchange for their providing a service. A better analogy would be if you decided you wanted to live in the town square. The people may decide to let you do so, but it's unlikely. If you want to sell hot dogs, then they (or, specifically, the government acting on their behalf) might grant you a license to do so. If the people later decide that they would rather have a pretzel seller and you refuse to sell pretzels then they would take this into account when they come to renew your license.
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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.
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.
OP was referring to WoW using bit torrent to distribute updates.