ISP Trying Free (But Limited) Home Broadband Plan

adeelarshad82 writes "Earlier today FreedomPop, a telecom company headquartered in Los Angeles, announced its plans to launch a very low cost home broadband plan for extremely low-intensity users, with 1GB monthly for free. Clearly this is much lower than an average U.S. home broadband usage, which is between 24 and 28 gigs per month. The 1GB of free Internet is basically a teaser; the company aims to disrupt the cable and DSL business with its 10GB for $10 plan which is extendable by paying $5 for each additional GB beyond 10."

Comments

Model cycling

[nycsubway]

Hopefully the home ISP market won't follow the cyclic model of the cell phone industry. With cell phone data, first you paid by the kB, then they introduced unlimited data plans, then they capped the limits and you paid by the GB, now they're going back to unlimited data plans. I'd prefer the home ISPs to not do that. They've always been unlimited (within reason) so I'd wouldn't like to see some small company changing the model for the industry.

Re:Attacks on bandwidth caps are shortsighted

[PhxBlue]

Highly disruptive. Sure. Whatever.

Given my bandwidth usage, I'd have to pay about $1,000 a month to get what I have now for about $70. I'm not seeing what's "highly disruptive" about that.

Re:Attacks on bandwidth caps are shortsighted

[Sez Zero]

I'm not seeing what's "highly disruptive" about that.

Well, it would be highly disruptive to your wallet.

Re:Attacks on bandwidth caps are shortsighted

[alen]

yeah, but lots of people like my inlaws who don't use too much will jump on this if it costs them $20 or $30 a month

if i use less than 1GB per month on my iphone i'm sure there are lots of people who use the same on their home internet

Re:Attacks on bandwidth caps are shortsighted

[dmatos]

RTFA - median internet usage numbers in the US are 5.8GB/mo. This plan is cheaper for those users than _any_ other plan out there right now.

If they can steal 50% of all internet customers from other service providers, to the benefit of those customers, it will be disruptive.

Re:Could Work for Some

[Rogue Haggis Landing]

Interesting to see the average usage at 24Gb to 28Gb. When our local cable company was trying to bring in a 30Gb monthly cap, their argument was that 95% of their users went through 2Gb a month or less, effectively subsidizing heavier users. Total bollocks argument of course, but that's another story.

The summary is a little misleading. The 24-28 gb is the average use, but the mean is a lot lower. Here's the full quote:

"While average [U.S. home broadband usage] is 24-28 gigs per month, the average is skewed heavily by the whales. The median is actually 5.8 gigs, which is basically your non-streaming user," Stokols said.

So half of all users are using 5.8 gb or less. Still makes the 2 gb limit ridiculously low, but the 24-28 gb average is skewed by some heavy users.

Re:Attacks on bandwidth caps are shortsighted

[dyingtolive]

I think he ran out of bandwidth.