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Sprint Will Start Throttling Customers Who Exceed 23GB Monthly (sprint.com)
CNET reports (and CTO John Saw explains on the company's blog) that Sprint has decided to taper access to a slice of its "unlimited" wireless data customers, by throttling access (not curtailing it, at least) to those who slurp down more than 23 gigabytes per month -- the same cap that T-Mobile has imposed. If you think "throttled" and "unlimited" don't quite jibe to describe the same service, you're not the only one to quibble: CNET notes that regulators have "begun scrutinizing the carriers' practice [of slowing access past a cap]. In June, the Federal Communications Commission threatened to fine AT&T $100 million for deceiving its customers by mislabeling its service as unlimited. The FCC also challenged Verizon when the company planned to expand its data throttling policy to its 4G customers. The company retracted that policy last fall. In June, Verizon also stopped slowing unlimited-data traffic for 3G customers."
When I had Sprint it was so f'ing slow that there's no way I could ever approach 23GB. I always figure that's how they could get away with "unlimited" data plans.
Sprint said customers will still be able to use unlimited amounts of data without overage charges, but for moments when the network is congested, traffic from heavy-data customers will move more slowly. Sprint said the policy operates in real time and only applies if a cell site is constrained. Performance for an affected customer returns to normal as soon as the local traffic returns to normal.
Doesn't seem all that diabolical. The alternative is the end of unlimited plans (which is probably coming anyway).
How are they going to throttle their service any more that Sprint already does? I have Sprint and 3G is glacially slow (unusable for anything but email) and LTE only somewhat faster. I'm not even sure I COULD download 23GB in a month!
Seriously, why 23GB? Why not 20GB? Or 25GB? What's with that random number that makes it so special?
Let's all be assholes! (seriously the fact that any of the telcoms got away with advertising anything "unlimited" is amazing. Lobbying power and Bullshit make wonderful bed partners.
Yipes...bad fingers. Bad.
You can't have unlimited even with no throttling you will always be limited by the speed. I find it kind of weird how they tie data caps to speeds but not speeds to data caps. My home internet is 75 Mbs but does that mean I can use 75 Mbs 24/7? No. Do these wireless providers hard cap you? No. If anything I think this throttling is much more fair and truthful than advertising speeds with caps.
And you pointed out the ridiculousness of their position.
Getting to sound like a dated service, as 4K movies via them from Netflix are that size (or only a few HD movies).
Couldn't they just lower the bandwidth, rather than choking customers?
Corporations are only people when it comes to political donations, otherwise they are entities unbound by law.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
As harsh as it may seem to you and I, Sprint seems to have a choking fetish and totally gets off when throttling their customers. I find it quite disgusting.
On a more serious note, Sprint can eat a bag of dicks! UNLIMITED doesn't mean limited to 23GB.
Misleading headline, if what I hear is true. It's reactive throttling, not active. And to hit 23GB you're probably an upper member of the millions of streaming drones that have taken over the tubes. Literally. The statistics put streamers at more tube than everything else combined. So don't expect me to play a violin for your reduced speed, which it turns out is a minor impact unless you're (lol) streaming.
Have those faggots not developed buffer solutions yet? Johnny the Pirate can not only queue up his Lord of the Rings the night before during soft hours, but also watch it locally forever. Without stutter or overcompression.
But if he's watching as much video as the 23 giggers, they both need better ways to fill their day. I'd say "Get a job." but that's turning into a poor joke as the paycheck club gets more and more exclusive.
I have to question how anyone can use 23GB of data per month on a cellphone. Seriously, what are you doing with your life if you're using the Internet on your phone that much? It's excessive and I really can't blame Sprint for making the decision they're making, and anyone who is using anywhere near that much on their phone in a month on a regular basis, in my opinion, needs to take a hard look at what they're doing and why, and make some lifestyle changes.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
Sell it as Unlimited.
(then after you jerk your pole and set the hook on paper... reel suckers in. There are bunch of companies jacking consumers like this now. Being hoes for the money is trending.)
Policy Change.
Unlimited for 5 minutes so yes, it's Unlimited as fuck.
After 5 minutes... throttled. Sorry, we didn't mean unlimited as in the actual definition of the word. Our company doesn't actually mean what we say.
Takes your mind off this though.
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
just maybe, they are in those lovely parts of the US of A where they can't get decent broadband. You know, where the big pipe providers skipped because it wouldn't be profitable or promised a fiber rollout for everyone and didn't deliver.
With this in mind, perhaps tethering is their only access to the net. Or, they're running a cellular enabled router ( Like say a Cisco 819 ) to provide a household with net access.
So while it's possible someone is watching Netflix via their phone, or streaming music 25 hours a day, 8 days a week, don't rule out the possibility that, due to the carriers greed, their phone may be one of the few options they have.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Most of the people I've heard of using large amounts of data are truckers. Watch Netflix while on required stops, or have your phone do some torrenting while you drive. Sometimes streaming radio, but there's sat radio for that. The gigs rack up when there's never any wifi.
If I'm grandfathered into a discontinued unlimited plan, keep letting me use the highest speeds that were available when you stopped offering the plan to new customers.
In 2020 I'll either be content with "slow" 2015-era speeds or I'll switch plans (or carriers).
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
of dead master baiters.
** Hands around customer's throat **
You're using too much bandwidth! Stop it!
There are two types of people in the world; those who believe there are two types of people, and those who don't.
at&t charged me at the end of last year almost $800 for data on my unlimited plan.
do i have any chance of suing them? if you want to work pro-bono for 100% of the proceeds at the end, let me know.
Yeah, and 640k ought to be enough for anybody.
I think it's important to note that per the original article this isn't about a hard cap, as much as prioritization.
From the actual article:
"This QoS practice is intended to protect against a small minority of unlimited customers who use high volumes of data and unreasonably take-up network resources during times when the network is constrained. It’s important to note that this QoS technique operates in real-time and only applies if a cell site is constrained. Prioritization is applied or removed every 20 milliseconds. And performance for the affected customer returns to normal as soon as traffic on the cell site also returns to normal, or the customer moves to a non-constrained site."
So they are only throttling customers that go over 23GB, AND are on a over burdened cell site. It's not a simple case of go over 23GB and immediately we slow your connection down as the article summary indicates.
Secondly, to those that say 23GB is reasonable for people who might be using their cell phone for tethering as their only internet access.. keep in mind that tethering is not allowed on Sprint unlimited plans (though you can probably get away with it in small amounts using a 3rd party program), you have to purchase a tethering package separately which has specific bandwidth caps.
So much for the so called Net Neutrality.
Anonymous predicted this would happen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7WHoqsRuxU