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An Algorithm To Facilitate Uber-Style Dynamic Phone Tariffs (thestack.com)

Posted by timothy on from the how-much-do-you-want-it? dept.

An anonymous reader writes: A new paper proposes an algorithm to help network providers furnish 'surge' pricing for mobile data and other network communications, citing a 50% shortfall between demand and capacity over the next five years as an indicator that consumers may have to be shepherded out of the congested times and areas in order for normal service to continue to be maintained. Just don't tell any of the people in charge of airport wireless networks.

5 of 75 comments (clear)

  1. Disaster "surges" by BenJeremy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Great, let's charge people 5000% of their rates when something terrible hits, like a terrorist attack or some sort of natural disaster, and penalize people for letting people know they are alright or trying to track down their loved ones to make sure they survived!

    1. Re:Disaster "surges" by Dagger2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      In theory. In practice, the result is that the provider is strongly encouraged to under-provision their network so they can charge extreme rates for normal use, citing "high" utilization as an excuse. So you end up with a poor experience at all times, rather than just during disasters.

      It'd work well if we had some kind of requirement in place that mandated capacity upgrades such that the system only approaches max capacity less than x% of the time, where x is small. But that's not going to happen.

  2. Amazon Model by Luthair · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Maybe it would be better if they followed the Amazon model where they built the infrastructure to support the surges and turned the excess into a viable business instead of mimicking a glorified bandit taxi dispatcher that has never been profitable.

  3. Reward networks for not upgrading by nitehawk214 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    They get paid more the worse their network is. Yeah, great idea, I am sure customers will love this.

    --
    I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
  4. What will the market bear? by ljhiller · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Last year Uber quadrupled their prices for people trying to leave downtown Sydney during a hostage standoff. Uber style phone tariffs means that if terrorists kill 100-1000 people in a town, it will cost $50 for people to communicate their survival to concerned family members, because after all, that's what people will pay, right? So it's all good.