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Verizon Announces Pay-Per-Use 'Turbo Boost' For Smartphones
renek writes "In one of the most brazen attacks on net neutrality to date, Verizon has announced it will offer a so called 'Turbo Boost' for smart phones that run on its wireless network. 'Verizon will publish an API that could allow consumers to 'turbocharge' the network bandwidth their smartphone apps use for a small fee, executives said Tuesday. Verizon anticipates that a customer running an app on a smartphone will have the option to dynamically snatch more bandwidth for that app, if network congestion slows it down, said Hugh Fletcher, associate director for technology in Verizon's Product Development and Technology team. The app, however, must be running what Verizon referred to as the network optimization API it is currently developing, and hopes to publish by the third quarter of 2012.'"
this is simply local cache (like Akamai), which is what it sounds like, it's a service, not a violation of net neutrality.
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...from an ISP offering (for example) 1Mbps and 10Mbps connections at different prices?
It's actually better for the consumer, since you can buy the increased speed for a small amount of time as opposed to being forced to buy for a month or even multiple years at a time.
As long as this API is open to all developers, it's not a violation of Net Neutrality.
I've been around long enough to remember the Turbo Button - it slowed the CPU to 8Mhz to be compatible with some games.
Did a quick re-read and it turns out they are going to offer it for free to developers in hopes of forcing customers to click on a button to get charged for better network speeds.
Somehow if their network is too saturated this client api will speed up their network they are saying. Oh, no it wont, they will simply throttle other paying customers while charging you an additional fee for a service you are all ready paying for.
Oh and a great quote from the article :
"And just because you request a high quality of service doesn't mean you're gonna get it."
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"We'll sell you on bandwidth speed we don't have, and then charge you to actually use it."
This is bullshit for quite a few reasons.
Yeah, but this is cyberturbo. I hope you don't kill yourself after reading that.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Nothing seems to work so great without "turbo boost"..
As many already said, this has nothing to do with net neutrality. However it has everything to deal with fraud.
You, as a customer, are buying a cell phone and a plan that comes with it. You are expecting certain performance of the wireless link, and you are getting it for the moment. But later the cell operator decides to sell your bandwidth to the highest bidder! In the end everybody pays the "turbo" fee to get any bandwidth at all, but everybody is back to square one... except the cell company who has now more money. Time for the "hyper-turbo" sales campaign then, to fleece the sheep once more?
What if the "turbo boost" is still within the advertised, agreed upon, paid for bandwidth.. how can "network congestion" magically appear and disappear from within the same level of service?
Make sure this becomes their greatest failure - either slapped down by court with hefty fees, or driving away customers in droves, and nobody is buying it.
If this fails dramatically, chances that others will copy it are very much reduced.
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The issue is it sounds like it isn't the same quality of service. The cell phone providers are placing caps and other limits in place with claims the networks can't handle the increased demand. So if they are already congested, and people are paying more to have their apps/services bumped ahead of others who are paying the rates imposed to have certain speeds etc, its just a money maker for the cell carriers. Pretty soon you'd have to pay the extra fee just to have the same service quality you had before they offered the boost wince everyone is now doing it.
Think about it as the line skip at an amusement part. When its new and only a few use it, well its ok. But as more and more use it, suddenly the "skip the line" line is now just how the old regular line was, with all the people paying more getting pretty much the same service they had before, and those left in the original line are completely hosed. The only way you can keep this for getting out of control is to place limits on the "line skipping" (Turbo mode), but what incentive does the company have to limit it since everyone will end up paying as the "original line" gets worse and worse, and there's no other real options since the phones are locked, they're most likely under a contract, and I'm sure the other big carrier will end up doing the same thing.