The UK's 5-Minute 4G Data Cap

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The UK's 5-Minute 4G Data Cap

Posted by timothy on Tuesday October 23, 2012 @03:14AM from the better-be-some-great-youtube dept.

Barence writes "The tariffs have been announced for Britain's first 4G network and they include a data cap that customers will break within five minutes. EE's high-speed data service will start from £36 a month — or £21 a month SIM-only — although the lowest package's 500MB download limit might put data-focused early adopters off. With EE claiming average network speeds of up to 12Mbits/sec, that means users could theoretically exceed their cap in just over five minutes of full-speed downloads — or a little over ten seconds a day. There are no unlimited data deals."

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Mobile bandwidth by girlintraining · 2012-10-23 03:16 · Score: 5, Insightful

So, guys... how's that whole "Let the market decide" argument working out for you? Capitalism works great for non-critical, non-infrastructure goods and services... but when it gets its hands on something everybody needs, it's gonna take you to the cleaners. Every single time.

--
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
1. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Quakeulf · 2012-10-23 03:17 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Introduce competition.
2. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Racemaniac · 2012-10-23 03:20 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  because we've seen in the past that the "competitors" wouldn't ever dare to make deals to keep the prices artificially high
3. Re:Mobile bandwidth by pr0nbot · 2012-10-23 03:24 · Score: 2
  
  Not sure this is the example I'd choose for the failure of capitalism... the rail fiasco, or energy prices, are much clearer examples. 4G isn't exactly a critical infrastructure service, and if it ever becomes one, by then all the other providers will have come on-stream (they're rolling out 6 months from now).
  The downer for me in this announcement was that I'd hoped to have enough data on 4G to ditch wired home broadband (limited to 3Mbps until FTTC comes along) and just tether my phone, but if these caps are indicative of what all the providers will be allowing, then that's a dead end.
4. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Phrogman · 2012-10-23 03:24 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Here in my part of Canada, there is no competition. Oh there are companies that are theoretically competing with each other, but they seem to have agreed that charging outrageous prices is working for all of them so why fuck with it. No one is offering cheap, efficient service to the masses. Competition does not work when the service or item in question is more or less essential, and the barriers to entry are significant.
  The CRTC here in Canada just seems to rubberstamp what the industry tells them to do.
  
  --
  "The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
5. Re:Mobile bandwidth by h4rr4r · 2012-10-23 03:25 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Do we have any evidence that competition in such fields works as it normally does?
  Judging from the US mobile market I have to say it does not look likely.
  Real competition would have to be regulated into existence. Force compatibility of technology and radios, force cross network compatibility and legislate costs for using other networks. We would probably also have to set a maximum subscriber count or region limits. Might even be easier to just make the actual gear owned by a non-profit and let the profit seeking enterprises act only as MVNOs.
6. Re:Mobile bandwidth by h4rr4r · 2012-10-23 03:28 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  In this case, UK English, tariff is not referring to a tax. The "tariff" is what americans would likely call a cell phone "plan".
7. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Anonymous Coward · 2012-10-23 03:30 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Competition is fundamentally limited by the combination of very high start up costs (infrastructure becomes a sunk cost) and very low marginal cost (once the towers are all built, running them is cheap). Railroads, power lines, and wire/fibre based telecommunication share these traits and historically demonstrate a tendency towards monopoly/duopoly structure.
8. Re:Mobile bandwidth by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · 2012-10-23 03:30 · Score: 2
  
  So, guys... how's that whole "Let the market decide" argument working out for you? Capitalism works great for non-critical, non-infrastructure goods and services... but when it gets its hands on something everybody needs, it's gonna take you to the cleaners. Every single time.
  It's not so much the criticality(or lack thereof) that gets you or saves you; but the barriers to entry and costs of duplicate entrants.
  Plenty of user-critical-without-which-modern-civilization-would-come-to-a-screeching-halt goods get produced just fine under market conditions, so long as the barriers to entry aren't too high and competition between suppliers of identical or reasonably substitutable goods is fairly robust.
  Infrastructure, of course, is sort of a classic case of high barriers to entry coupled with high costs of duplicate entrants. You've got a finite amount of desirable spectrum to work with, and every market entrant needs to put a net-connected box of RF gear on a pole in every chunk of land they want to provide service for. The spectrum and buildout hassles tend to leave you with an oligopoly, at best, among people who actually provide wireless bandwidth, and possibly some MVOs who provide specialized customer support/billing/advertising offerings to sell bandwidth to subscriber groups that the primary telcos don't want to deal with.
  In addition to having strong 'natural monopoly' characteristics, Infrastructure goods and services bite you twice: Not only are they natural monopolies/oligopolies, and thus tend to fall into ugly pricing, they are infrastructure, something over which other goods and services and interactions take place, so they are extremely well placed to allow holders of market power in the infrastructure market to exert it in any of the markets (or socially valuable nonmarket activities like 'communication') that occur on top of that infrastructure. Wacky fun!
9. Re:Mobile bandwidth by MBGMorden · 2012-10-23 03:31 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  While that works, part of the problem in modern society is the cost involved in starting up a competitive business. Most of the tenants of capitalism were thought up when the largest companies around would qualify as a small business by modern standards. The industrial revolution saw the rise of megacorps and the problem has continued to rise into the digital age. It costs a fortune to start a telecom company to compete with an existing one - not quite the same as wholesaling your apples for less than the competing cart next door.
  What the solution is I'm not sure, but I think it will eventually have to involve government ownership of some of the very core services or at a minimum some rather strict regulation. We already have that with some things - where I live the power generation is handled by a government entity (Santee Cooper - a SC state agency), as is water and sewer services. Ambulance/911, law enforcement, and military are already handled by the government. Its just a matter of deeming telecommunications a critical public service.
  
  --
  "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
10. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Brannoncyll · 2012-10-23 03:35 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  "The tariffs have been announced for Britain's first 4G network and they include a data cap"
  I tend to agree that human life and welfare and critical infrastructure shouldn't be left to the ravages of greed but tariffs are normally levied by government not free market.
  In the UK a 'tariff' in this context means what you guys would call a 'plan'. From Wikipedia: The word comes from the Italian word tariffa "list of prices, book of rates," which is derived from the Arabic ta'rif "to notify or announce."
11. Re:Mobile bandwidth by girlintraining · 2012-10-23 03:35 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Introduce competition.
  When a capitalist says this, it's a hand wave. They're dismissing cost of entry into the market. And let me explain to you why cost of entry matters in telecommunications (or for that matter, any infrastructure industry)... First, limited resources. You need access to land to run cables. If you're wireless, you need to negotiate for spectrum. Both are controlled by someone else. And the law says they don't have to sell to you at a competitive price -- or any price, for that matter. They choose whether you get in the door or not... and they may just choose to charge you an arm and a leg. Municipalities sign exclusive contracts saying only your competitor can run cables in that area for a period of 5, 10, 20, even 50 years. Why, you ask? Because those companies tell the municipality if they don't agree, they won't do business with them. "Too risky. Need to protect our investment," they say.
  And then there's spectrum. It's not all equal -- and how well your network does wirelessly still depends on finding land to put your towers up. Again, exclusive contracts -- they'll fuck you every time. You can't just ask J. Random home owner to host your tower.. he'd probably love the income, but the government has zoning regulations... oh, and exclusive contracts.
  In fact, in every case where capitalism has failed in an infrastructure capacity, it's for that reason: Exclusive contracts. Exclusive rights. Exclusive. Not inclusive. Inclusive means competition, and we don't want that. Exclusive means "protected investment"... and "protected investment" means... you, the consumer, are gonna pay a premium. Not them, not the guys who forced you down this road. You. Because their money is more special than other people's money. Their money has a government stamp of approval.
  So the next time you hear a capitalist say "induce competition," remind them that they're the ones that asked for the exclusive contracts. Afterall, it's good business, right? And for them... it is.
  
  --
  #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
12. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Coisiche · 2012-10-23 03:35 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  You're jumping to conclusions about a language you don't speak. In British English a tariff is a list or schedule of prices for such things as rail service, bus routes, and electrical usage (electrical tariff, etc.). I was unfamiliar with other uses of the word until seeing your comment and doing a 2 second google search to find that it also means a fee, not a tax, on imports or exports (trade tariff) in and out of a country, which I assume must be the main American English use of the word.
13. Re:Mobile bandwidth by ColdWetDog · 2012-10-23 03:37 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  High speed mobile internet could be the definition of "non critical". It's not a need. It's a luxury.
  What are you about? Of course it's critical. You might miss out on a tweet on a slower network. Someone else might see that advertisement for the limited edition, genuine zirconium ear studs that you've always coveted.
  Damn it man, Lindsey Lohan might get arrested again and you wouldn't know about it for minutes.
  
  --
  Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
14. Re:Mobile bandwidth by firex726 · 2012-10-23 03:37 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Also considering the initial startup costs, just to break in would be very difficult.
  Cell towers are not cheap, nor the network wot support them.
15. Re:Mobile bandwidth by drunkennewfiemidget · 2012-10-23 03:38 · Score: 2
  
  That's all of Canada.
  Robelus can eat my ass and the CRTC is a joke.
  Example: Rogers' best Internet plan is $130/mo. 250G of data. You will exceed that in less than 5h at full speed.
  Fucking assholes.
16. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Dunbal · 2012-10-23 03:50 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Government/oligopoly partnerships working as designed. I see no problem here. If you keep complaining we'll just have to give you a little more indoctrination about how great "free markets" are. Of course you have never seen a real free market in your life, but that's besides the point.
  
  --
  Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
17. Re:Mobile bandwidth by shaitand · 2012-10-23 03:52 · Score: 2
  
  4G in and of itself might not be an essential class of service but it is fair to put it under the umbrella of "internet" and internet is essential.
18. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Fuzzums · 2012-10-23 03:59 · Score: 2
  
  Nobody NEEDS 12Mbits/sec on a phone.
  
  --
  Privacy is terrorism.
19. Re:Mobile bandwidth by aicrules · 2012-10-23 04:03 · Score: 2
  
  There is nothing artificial about a price that enough people will pay to make it worthwhile to the company providing the services/goods for sale. A free market doesn't work on the principle of one person or even a few people whining about the price of a service setting the price lower. Yes, if you don't like a price point and also cannot afford it, but enough other people can afford it and pay it, your poor little plight will not directly impact free market. Heck, even when there are NOT enough people who want to buy a service or good to make it profitable for a company that doesn't mean it will IMMEDIATELY be reduced in price. Free market doesnt' mean instant gratification, even for a super majority. It still beats ACTUALLY artificial prices being set by "societal needs" and other such B.S.
20. Re:Mobile bandwidth by alexgieg · 2012-10-23 04:05 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  So the next time you hear a capitalist say "induce competition," remind them that they're the ones that asked for the exclusive contracts. Afterall, it's good business, right? And for them... it is.
  Which is why capitalists neither vote nor support libertarian candidates, preferring to go with some of the big government parties, not caring much whether it's right or left-leaning. Libertarianism, with all that talk of deregulating markets, undoing legislation, removing trade barriers, eliminating subsidies etc. is quite scary for them. It's way, WAY easier to "make a deal" with a handful of high level bureaucrats and a few very friendly mega-corp CEOs, all working together to lock down the market into a de facto monopoly, than to deal directly with hundreds of millions of customers and thousands upon thousands of competitors.
  
  --
  Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
21. Re:Mobile bandwidth by vux984 · 2012-10-23 04:11 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Rogers' best Internet plan is $130/mo. 250G of data.
  I doubt you need 250GB of data on your phone per month, or even per year. I'm not saying you couldn't use it. I'm saying you don't need it.
  You will exceed that in less than 5h at full speed.
  7.5 hrs by my calcs, but even that is unlikely. I doubt the average user would be able to exceed that cap in under 24hrs even if they tried as getting maximum theoretical peak speed for a sustained 250GB burst is just not going to happen.
  But that's beside the point. Mobile data caps on the top end plans is like those "free gas for a year" prizes. Its far more than enough gas for the average commuter in the average car.
  But some slashdotter will cry foul because in a Veyron at 250mph driving 24hrs a day he'll be out of his "free gas for a year" in under a week.
  Think of it as the networks are selling you 250GB/mo for $130, at the maximum speed they can deliver it, because that's the real deal on the table.
  If you don't find that to be good value then don't buy it, but I'm curious how you rationalize that you should somehow be entitled to "all you can possibly consume", especially seeing as they haven't promised you 'unlimited' anything.
22. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Phreakiture · 2012-10-23 04:12 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Reminds me of an amusing story.
  In one area in rural upstate New York, just a few dozen miles outside of Albany, there was a small town where they wanted cell coverage, but nobody wanted to allow the tower to go up on their property.
  Eventually, one local celebrity stepped forward and said enough was enough. He didn't need the income, and didn't (at the time) have a cell phone. He just was sick and tired of hearing about it. He had done well enough for himself and had plent of land in a good, high location and let them build a tower on it.
  His name was Andy Rooney. Yes, that Andy Rooney
  
  --
  www.wavefront-av.com
23. Re:Mobile bandwidth by RMingin · 2012-10-23 04:12 · Score: 2
  
  Tenets of capitalism. Capitalism does not have renters, but it does have core concepts.
  Your sig quote is particularly amusing in this context. I'll go put on my grammatical fascist armband and sit quietly in the corner now.
  
  --
  The preceding comment is my own, and in no way construes an opinon of the Emperor of Mankind.
24. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Cederic · 2012-10-23 04:17 · Score: 2
  
  How else would you constrain demand for a limited resource?
  If they offered everybody unlimited bandwidth at Â£20/month then everyone would switch off their DSL subscriptions and tether.
  Even without that happening, population density means that there just wont be enough bandwidth to go around.
  The price is ludicrous, but if everybody needs this then they're fucked, because there are some pretty strict upper limits involved.
25. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Jesse_vd · 2012-10-23 04:24 · Score: 2
  
  I'm almost positive drunkennewfiemidget was talking about home (cable) internet. Rogers dominates most telecommunications here
26. Re:Mobile bandwidth by eth1 · 2012-10-23 04:42 · Score: 2
  
  Introduce competition.
  When a capitalist says this, it's a hand wave. They're dismissing cost of entry into the market. And let me explain to you why cost of entry matters in telecommunications (or for that matter, any infrastructure industry)... First, limited resources. You need access to land to run cables. If you're wireless, you need to negotiate for spectrum. Both are controlled by someone else. And the law says they don't have to sell to you at a competitive price -- or any price, for that matter. They choose whether you get in the door or not... and they may just choose to charge you an arm and a leg. Municipalities sign exclusive contracts saying only your competitor can run cables in that area for a period of 5, 10, 20, even 50 years. Why, you ask? Because those companies tell the municipality if they don't agree, they won't do business with them. "Too risky. Need to protect our investment," they say.
  Which is why we just need a simple law that forbids the same company from providing any two or more of content, transport, or physical/wireless media.
  Company A (preferably a co-op, HOA or municipality) owns the line to your house, but any ISP can connect to the other end.
  Or you have one company that does nothing but provide and maintain standardized cell towers, through which any telco can provide service.
27. Re:Mobile bandwidth by vux984 · 2012-10-23 05:04 · Score: 2
  
  Ah, I'm on Shaw in Canada for home internet. I pay $75 for 400GB bandwidth at 50mbps/3mbps.
  The top tier shaw plan is $190 for unlimited bandwidth at 250Mbps/15Mbps.
  That's pretty freaking impressive if you ask me.
  As to the rogers plan, I see that it is their home internet, $130, 250GB bandwidth, at 150Mbps/10Mbps.
  Looking at the fine print, however, it appears the data overage rate for the ultimate plan is 0.50 cents a GB up to $100 maximum. So the plan can be restated as:
  $230, 450GB (unlimited?), 150Mbps/10Mbps
  $230 buys you 450GB, and its potentially "unlimited" as its not quite clear what happens when you hit the $100 maximum for 200GB of overage; possibly you can just keep consuming. Given that restatement looks a lot like the top shaw plan, I'd say there are good odds that its effectively unlimited for $230/mo, once you hit the $100 overage cap.
28. Re:Mobile bandwidth by Ichijo · 2012-10-23 06:04 · Score: 2
  
  Municipalities sign exclusive contracts saying only your competitor can run cables in that area for a period of 5, 10, 20, even 50 years. Why, you ask? Because those companies tell the municipality if they don't agree, they won't do business with them. "Too risky. Need to protect our investment," they say.
  
  That's strange because when the municipality decides to build its own network, the economics suddenly make sense even without the exclusive contract.
  
  --
  Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
29. Re:Mobile bandwidth by jepaton · 2012-10-23 06:04 · Score: 2
  
  I'm British. I understand "tariff" to mean a system of charges. I think that the most commonly encountered use here of the word "tariff" will be in relation to mobile phones. I had never thought of "tariff" as being a government related word until now. But perhaps, the language of government has persisted from when the government owned everything. From what I understand of the word, the modern British usage is correct although unfamilar to an American. The American usage seems rather alien to me. Isn't that fair?
30. Re:Mobile bandwidth by neokushan · 2012-10-23 06:27 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  There is nothing artificial about a price that enough people will pay to make it worthwhile to the company providing the services/goods for sale.
  Well that's utter crap for a start. I guess you're either not from the UK or simply haven't followed this whole debacle. The prices are high when compared to comparative 3G services - I pay £15 per month for an unlimited 3G service, but for £6 more (nearly a 50% markup) I can get a 4G service with a paltry 500mb of data. The only difference is 3G and 4G and guess what - there's several 3G providers and currently only one 4G provider. What a shock, their prices are over-inflated. It's not a case of "people paying what they're willing to", it's a case of people not having much choice - if you want faster data, you WILL have to pay just one provider and you will not have a choice about it. That might sound like a stupid thing to say, but there are plenty of people who don't have access to a decent fixed-line broadband service that would make good use of LTE.
  The reason this all happened was because OFCOM allowed two huge mobile networks to combine and then allowed them to use "spare" spectrum for 4G - meanwhile, the rest of the mobile operators don't have spare capacity (and aren't allowed to use it for 4G anyway as it has already been allocated for 3G services) and have to wait and fight it out for a spectrum auction that has been delayed for years now (admittedly, this was somewhat self-inflicted but all the same - they shouldn't have greenlit EE to launch 4G this soon). EE will be the only 4G provider for about a year now and low and behold - inflated prices.
  Why on earth would they charge less, anyway? No competition so no need. If you want 4G, you're stuck with them.
  
  --
  +1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
31. Re:Mobile bandwidth by shaitand · 2012-10-23 06:36 · Score: 2
  
  If you hope to remain competitive with people who have an always on internet connection it is pretty essential whether that be people who are competing for jobs or companies competing for business. Heck, even if you want to be competitive in terms of general knowledge and skills.
  If you go more than a couple waking hours without searching for a piece of information on the Internet those missing bits of information are going to add up to you knowing a lot less about just about everything. It might take the form of mental bitrot over a course of years but that is ultimately going to lead to you being far more ignorant as a human being.
  Essentials isn't just food, water, and shelter you know. In a modern society we include the things needed for proper mental development like education. Especially since your ability to find and obtain those physical essentials is related to your level of mental development.
  During the course of composing this message I googled a piece information related to socket programming, details on the most effective nutrient composition for cultivating a mushroom I will be inoculating a bed in the backyard with in about 10 days, and found effective and interactive Morse code learning software.
Re:ridiculous data caps by Synerg1y · 2012-10-23 03:28 · Score: 4, Insightful

netflix
Its simple... by AdmV0rl0n · 2012-10-23 03:30 · Score: 2

Don't sign up. When they see the lack of custom - they will rethink the idea/deals.
In many cases people are their own worst enemy by signing up to things that are not in their favour. Apply an evolutionary curve to problems, let bad ideas/products die/ let the good ones survive.
In some ways, I'm surprised that no mobile vendors have realised that they could decimate the old school ISP model with an aggressive take on this. All you can eat for £25 a month. They would unhinge the old bandwidth supply models too - as business realises that its mobile workers benefit greatly from an always on/always available model over the old 'on this WAN/LAN/WWAN model. A £60 all you can eat business tariff. Yum Yum.

--
We`re all equal .. Just some of us are less equal than others.
1. Re:Its simple... by girlintraining · 2012-10-23 03:44 · Score: 2
  
  Yeah, because it's easy for people to form collective buyer and seller pacts as individuals. Just walk over to your neighbor, and convince him to join your cause! Capitalism works because it depends on individual actors (you, your neighbor...) to make decisions about what would best benefit them. And usually, it does work. Sometimes it doesn't -- and when there's a market imbalance, it's usually the government's fault. And it is in this case -- exclusive contracts on spectrum use and land use keep competition out.
  Getting together and collectively saying no doesn't change the terms of the contract... and even if you bankrupt them, someone else will come in, buy up the cables and towers they put up, and you'll be right back where you started. Yes, the price may come down because the new guy's getting the infrastructure at a fraction of the cost to build it. But who's going to lay new wire and towers after that? Eventually... you'll be out of date, and paying just as much (if not more) than the guys who didn't arrange a collective bargaining agreement.
  The problem here is the exclusive contract as a financial instrument. If you want low prices... destroy them without delay.
  
  --
  #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Capitalism, or an un-critical consumer base? by concealment · 2012-10-23 03:41 · Score: 4, Insightful

Capitalism works great for non-critical, non-infrastructure goods and services... but when it gets its hands on something everybody needs, it's gonna take you to the cleaners.
While I'd love to blame an economic system for this, I feel the truth is more mundane: consumers are oblivious to what they are purchasing and are content to pay high prices for bad service.
Imagine if even 25% of the new phone buyers took a look at these plans and said, "Wow, that's a terrible option. I'm going to roll back to my old Nokia flip-phone and wait for industry to get its act together."
Yeah, well... they don't do that. They keep buying overpriced cable, ridiculous cell phone plans, Nickelback, lies by politicians, McRibs, etc.
The problem is that the consumers will deny themselves nothing, and if it's a bad deal, they just pass the buck along to someone else.
1. Re:Capitalism, or an un-critical consumer base? by Uberbah · 2012-10-23 06:21 · Score: 2
  
  Failo. The entire point of capitalism is to make the most amount of money possible for the smallest investment possible. Which, in the absence of competition, frequently makes for shitty choices for the consumer.
  Which is kinda the point of the story.
Re:Did anyone look at the cost of the plans? by Cederic · 2012-10-23 04:14 · Score: 4, Informative

Considering I'm already a customer of EE paying less than that for unlimited data (constrained only by the 3G bandwidth), yes, I think the price is unreasonable.
Â£40 for unlimited and they'd have got me upgrading.
Â£30 for unlimited would be reasonable.
Â£36 for 500MB is laughable.
I think Wolfram Alpha can. by kevkingofthesea · 2012-10-23 04:16 · Score: 2

And it calculates around 330 seconds (5.5 minutes)
As for where you got 4GB...