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AT&T Introduces "Sponsored Data" Allowing Services to Bypass 4G Data Caps

Posted by Unknown on from the pay-for-play dept.

sirhan writes with news that AT&T has announced a program that allows companies to pay for their services to bypass mobile data caps. "With the new Sponsored Data service, data charges resulting from eligible uses will be billed directly to the sponsoring company ... Customers will see the service offered as AT&T Sponsored Data, and the usage will appear on their monthly invoice as Sponsored Data. Sponsored Data will be delivered at the same speed and performance as any non-Sponsored Data content." The Verge comments: "If YouTube doesn't hit your data cap but Vimeo does, most people are going to watch YouTube. If Facebook feels threatened by Snapchat and launches Poke with free data, maybe it doesn't get completely ignored and fail. If Apple Maps launched with free data for navigation, maybe we'd all be driving off bridges instead of downloading Google Maps for iOS." Or, think of distributed services: Mediagoblin vs Flickr, pump.io vs twitter, ownCloud vs Google Apps. This is probably a sign that data caps are here to stay, at least for AT&T subscribers (and if it's successful...).

7 of 229 comments (clear)

  1. Clever? by Vermonter · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This is a clever idea. After all, now they are potentially getting money from deep corporate pockets, while at the same time giving their customers a bit more. Seems like it might be a win-win for AT&T.

    1. Re:Clever? by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Interesting

      No, I work in the industry, there actually ISNT enough bandwidth. If this becomes popular, wait for the data caps to get lowered.

      The only legitimate argument I've heard for this is that the content providers have been irresponsible with their delivery because it costs them nothing. For example, not allowing users to download off-hours, even encouraging them to all download at peak times, and not using proper compression. If using more bandwidth cost them more money then they'd be more inclined to work with the ISP to reduce the load on the consumers end.

    2. Re:Clever? by Sarten-X · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Yet AT&T profited by $7.3 billion last year, which is enough to replace 2.3% of their assets (including buildings and wires). They've had sustained profits for many years, but yet there's still not enough bandwidth.

      --
      You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
    3. Re:Clever? by houstonbofh · · Score: 5, Interesting

      This is anti-net neutrality under a different name. The throttle mechanism is supra-data cap charges instead of literal throttling.

      No it isn't. Since bandwidth is now a metered product, this is noting more than a network 800 number. The speeds are the same, it is just a question of who pays.

  2. We are coming full circle by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There is nothing new under the sun:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CompuServe

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL#History

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_cable

    --
    Palm trees and 8
  3. Inversion of Control by Warbothong · · Score: 3, Interesting

    What makes this interesting is the inversion of control. For years, net neutrality has basically hinged on the fact that users are paying their ISP for bandwidth, so it's up to the user what they do with it. This idea completely inverts that, so the user has absolutely no control anymore.

    We were worried that walled gardens like Facebook were turning the Web into a consumer service, well this will do the same for the Internet itself.

  4. My caps off to yah. by VortexCortex · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I thought they already admitted the caps have nothing to do with congestion?

    I wonder how much it would cost a quasi-turn based action RPG dev like me to get no data caps for trickling in world-battle-map updates so you don't have to wait to get your game on. I mean, in the middle of the night streaming in a bunch of data isn't costing them congestion issues. The hardware has to be there whether anyone's using it or not. I bet it'll be too pricey for me. Guess folks will just have to play it on their wired connections. So much for "progress".

    If we had a few more competitors this wouldn't happen.