Verizon's Mobile Video Won't Count Against Data Caps -- but Netflix Will (arstechnica.com)

Earthquake Retrofit writes: Ars Technica has a story about how Verizon Wireless is testing the limits of the Federal Communications Commission's net neutrality rules; Verizon has announced that it will exempt its own video service from mobile data caps—while counting data from competitors such as YouTube and Netflix against customers' caps.

Comments

Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[NotInfinitumLabs]

Let's hope that the FCC shows that its net neutrality enforcement has teeth.

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[rmdingler]

The FCC has been dragging their feet before ruling on Zero-Rating, so hopefully they will get this one right.

If Verizon is allowed to abuse this as a loophole, others will follow, and sponsored content will reign.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Anonymous Coward]

It sucks that Verizon has the only quality LTE nertwork in the US.

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[jellomizer]

Is it?
They are not preventing Netflix or YouTube, There isn't any sign that they are slowing down their performance. It is just they are counting the data the same as any other internet download.
The only twist is that Verizon isn't charging for bandwidth for its own service.
You could say the cost of Verizon mobile is being paid from the service fee, and you are actually paying more then than the data cap fees.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[jellomizer]

AT&T and Sprint Have LTE too. Perhaps you are a hating Verizon fanboy.

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Anonymous Coward]

Zero-rating sounds fine.

Discriminating on who you provide it to to further your monopoly is not.

If VZ want's to do this for their video service, they need to do it for Netflix as well.

Unless VZ thinks they don't have a monopoly?

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Kryptonian Jor-El]

T-Mobile actually has the fastest LTE network in the US

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[ITRambo]

That may be true if you are in an area where they offer a decent signal. Where I am, T-mobile customers, usually visitors, often can't even make a call. The other 4 top providers work well. T-Mobile needs to build out their cell towers more, in sparely populated areas, to earn new customers.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Anonymous Coward]

Use a 3rd party carrier that makes use of Verizon. Use their network without being a direct customer while paying less. For example in may places Sprint uses Verizon's network, and Republic Wireless uses Sprint. Where I live I am paying 14 bucks for 4G a month with Republic Wireless while using Verizon network :-D

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[ArmoredDragon]

That was true maybe 3 years ago, however T-Mobile's coverage is rapidly approaching what Verizon has. In fact, in terms POP (point of presence, basically how many people they cover on average,) they're currently where Verizon was about a year ago:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/...

They're also quickly catching up. If you're still seeing people in your area that don't get coverage, it's likely they have an older phone whose radio doesn't receive the newer bands T-Mobile has been using. These newer bands are lower frequency, which means they have longer range, and T-Mobile has been deploying them to towers that cover rural areas more than anywhere else, specifically to fill in those gaps you're noticing.

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[duckintheface]

I don't think that word means what you think it does. Zero rating, by definition, implies discrimination between sources of data. And it doesn't help to say it's ok to do it for Netflix because then your are discriminating against non-Netflix video or non-video applications. The whole point of net neutrality is that a bit is a bit and companies that use public easements (whether telephone poles or public airwaves) are common carriers subject to limitations on pricing.... for the public good.

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hereis how you play the game:

1) You 'zero rate' all traffic for which the providers pay extra (one could call it extortion, since this is exactly a protection racket)
2) You provide limited, crappy service for those sites where the providers didn't pay the protection money.

3) Profit!

Zero rating is exactly a means of creating and enforcing this protection racket.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Chewbacon]

They're not going to do a damn thing. Net neutrality had been little more than lip service. Applications can still be discriminated against and traffic is still favored (create your own speed test and compare against the popular ones to see what I mean).

Re:Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation.

[Anonymous Coward]

It is called adverse selection, and a way to go back to the "captive portal", walled garden days. Once all the services "approved" by Verizon (where the providers pay money to Verizon) are made free, they can stop increasing the data cap or even lower it, and make users pay for bandwidth from "unapproved" services.

This is like opening a restaurant where meals are $1000 a person, but saying that if you're white, then it will be $10, and pretend that is not in any way discriminatory :)

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[paiute]

If they get too heavy handed with it, people will bail.

Damn straight. If Comcast pulls this shit, I will dump them for Xfinity.

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[guises]

That's a joke, right? You're pointing out the lack of competition between ISPs in the US? Yes. You are. Ha ha. Good joke.

No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it hard to understand why this isn't ok. It costs more to communicate with the wider Internet than with your own ISP's machines. If Net Neutrality precludes this, it's essentially subsidising streaming providers that aren't also ISPs, i.e. regulation in favour of Netflix.

Since I can't stand Netflix, I choose not to buy it. I don't think the government should be overriding my choice by making it more expensive than it would be for me to choose competing service from my ISP.

Re: No transit costs.

[ByTor-2112]

You are wrong. Netflix will put servers physically next to Verizon's. The cost is that of a few feet of fiber and some ports. It's probably cheaper because your "general" incoming bandwidth isn't used.

Re: No transit costs.

[ByTor-2112]

And it's about antitrust. Since the telcos have what us basically a government approved monopoly, they have to agree to certain rules that might seem weird in a free market. Such as net neutrality.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

This may be true for huge ISPs.

In the UK, at least, there are many advantages in choosing smaller ISPs, such as the lack of de facto requirement to implement censorship, and reassurance that blanket monitoring does not occur.

Re: No transit costs.

[hackwrench]

If their customers were paying the ISPs to connect only to the ISP's servers then you might have a point. If you don't use any of the high bandwidth features then you can get a lower capacity tier. If you charge your customers for the data they want brought to them and then charge the other side to bring the data to your customer, that's double charging and hides where the costs lie from the customer.

Re: No transit costs.

[Opportunist]

The free market is a nice idea but fails at the entrance fee.

If I have an established system, I can operate at much lower cost than someone who would have to establish the system first. If I already have a factory pumping out a product (which has redeemed its cost already by me being able to set the price due to having a de facto monopoly due to a lack of competitors), I can easily squish any and all competition that may arise by lowering the price to the point where it is not feasible for someone who still has to redeem his investment. By fixing the price at a level where he cannot redeem his costs, I can ensure the continuation of my de facto monopoly. This is crucial in markets where the initial cost of doing business is magnitudes higher than the operational cost. Like, say, ISPs.

There are a few ways to crack open such a monopoly. But that first and foremost needs the will of the law makers to actually do something against it.

Re: No transit costs.

[JackieBrown]

they have to agree to certain rules that might seem weird in a free market

There's no such fucking thing as a fucking free fucking market ... a free market is a lie, because companies will always lie, cheat, steal, collude, and otherwise game the system.

There never has been, and never will be, a free fucking market.

You can pretty much replace corporations with anything run by people (including the government).

Difference is, it's easier (not easy, just easier) to get out of the way of a corporation than it is to get out of the way of government.

Example, I hated sprints customer service so I switched to t mobile. I have my city's electrical company but the cost of switching away from that is much higher (have to move, find a new job, etc.)

Re:No transit costs.

[Lunix Nutcase]

Verizon has peering agreements to cover costs the wider Internet. Secondly, the ISPs have always argued that the last mile (in fiber or spectrum) is the bottleneck and why they need data caps. So it's amusing watching you try to flip the argument now that we see that Verizon has no real bandwidth bottleneck for its wireless service if it can zero-rate streaming as long as you pay the piper.

Re:No transit costs.

[BitZtream]

Because they will use their monopoly in the local areas to make it prohibitively expensive for anyone else to compete against them. They've already been caught throttling other providers and not themselves, again trying to push customers to their service by adding additional pains and costs to other services.

They'll make it very expensive to use Netflix, far more than is in any way justifiable, in order to drive you towards their own over priced services.

They don't get the privilege of doing so because the government granted them the monopoly. For fucks sake they didn't even pay to build out their own god damn networks, we got charged and taxed extra on our bills for fucking years for that shit.

Pull your head out of your ass, its not their network its fucking ours. Its our money that paid for it via government taxes and fees. Its our land that their lines lay in and travel over. Verizon/TWC/Comcast and the other major providers should just be dissolved and the networks become public utility. Even the fucking government wouldn't make it worse for us in this case.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix doesn't have physical servers anymore. They're 100% in Amazon AWS, so no, this will not work.

Re:No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not okay because it's against the Law. It doesn't matter what your opinion is. The Law says this is illegal.

Re: No transit costs.

[zoober]

The last mile for towers and cell sites are very restricted technically. The bottle neck is NOT the backhaul. it is the number of people that can connect to a sector. It is something like 40 concurrent connections.. and they all have to share the bandwidth for that sector. Wireless just doesn't scale for high bandwidth usage.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix doesn't have physical servers anymore. They're 100% in Amazon AWS, so no, this will not work.

Netflix has physical servers all over the place. I'd be willing to bet a majority of of their traffic gets served by their OpenConnect appliances.

https://openconnect.itp.netflix.com/hardware/

Re: No transit costs.

[mark-t]

Even if they are physically adjacent, Netflix is still part of a network that isn't owned by Verizon. How is Verizon supposed to tell if treating those machines the same as it treats its own does not also allow that server to perform attacks on its network?

Re: No transit costs.

[Junta]

They have a control plane in AWS, but the bulk of the bandwidth comes from distinct CDN strategy. Notably they have appliances for ISPs to incorporate, precisely to enable ISPs to deliver better netflix performance.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Netflix servers may not be physical anymore, but they give ISPs an appliance (https://openconnect.netflix.com/request/) they can host themselves to cache poular shit (captcha: watery)

Re: No transit costs.

[Rakarra]

They have a control plane in AWS, but the bulk of the bandwidth comes from distinct CDN strategy. Notably they have appliances for ISPs to incorporate, precisely to enable ISPs to deliver better netflix performance.

Assuming that the ISPs play ball. Some of the bigger ones have said "no" because Netflix competes against them and they want their customers to pay extra for Netflix.

Re: No transit costs.

[Rakarra]

Oh yes, every company is just EVIL EVIL EVIL.
They're all totally EVIIIIIL. Because money is EVIL.

Companies are just terrible and EVIL.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

So, should the government regulate pricing schemes for auto manufacturers, Apple, LCD screens? All have a high entry cost and few suppliers.

Re:No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

For fucks sake they didn't even pay to build out their own god damn networks, we got charged and taxed extra on our bills for fucking years for that shit.

The government long ago got out of the business of building publicly available networks. At least 99% of the network that your public internet traffic goes over is privately owned or leased. Utilities even pay property tax for every pole they own in some jurisdictions. Providers often lease space on poles or underground ducts from utilities which own the "space" to run their cable. It's 2016, not 1976.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you say the free market is a good idea? If you could get economists to agree on one thing, it's that the free market is not a good idea. A competitive market is a good idea, but free market and competitive market is about as far as you can get from each other when it comes to ISPs.

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yes, every company is just EVIL EVIL EVIL.
They're all totally EVIIIIIL. Because money is EVIL.

Companies are just terrible and EVIL.

Whew! I hope you feel better now that you got that out of your system. Do you have any interesting insight you would like to add to the conversation?

Re: No transit costs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix has non-physical appliances? That's pretty impressive, is it from the 6th dimension or something?

Re: No transit costs.

[Junta]

Yes, but that was the whole point in the thread was that Verizon *could* play ball, and the response was 'no, because AWS'. Which is inaccurate because netflix *has* hardware to locate at the edge for willing ISPs, and also inaccurate because even ignoring that, their video comes over non-AWS CDNs (cheaper bandwidth, AWS is not as cheap as traditional CDNs for high bandwidth tasks).

Re: No transit costs.

[corychristison]

Well, there is always generating your own electricity... though that may depend on your local laws.

Re: No transit costs.

[kwbauer]

isn't a bar in a college town pretty much a market to get free fucks? Or is that not what you were meant by a free fucking market.

Re: No transit costs.

[Opportunist]

Actually we used to have a curious form of economy for the longest time in many parts of Europe where key infrastructure was in the hands of the state while the rest of the economy worked out in a market economy. The net result was that there was a lot more competition for the consumer market because the playing field for the competitors was a lot more level.

In this example it would mean that the cables would be owned by a state controlled monopoly while the ISPs compete on equal footing by renting cable from the state monopoly and providing the ISP service to the customers. Much lower entrance cost into the market meant that a lot of small ISPs competed, allowing the price to drop. Then in their unending wisdom our regulators decided to "liberate" the market because that bad, bad state government made everything so terribly expensive due to all the red tape and bureaucracy that state monopolies entail.

Now, about 15 years after the monopoly fell, we have two major ISPs left, zero competition between the two (who curiously seem to divine whenever the competitor raises the price and matches it immediately), prices are up at the ceiling, bandwidths have been stagnant for a few years now, cables are congested because nobody invests in new infrastructure and the whole shit is going down the drain.

Thanks, free market!

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[EzInKy]

I guess that would depend on who funded their network, no? Who gave up the land that they needed to cable? If it was the "People" then it is the "People" who get to dictate the terms. Quid Pro Quo.

Other countries

[SumDog]

In Australia, Optus has offered unlimited Facebook/Twitter for years. I think even Wikipedia has a zero cost with many African providers.

The US really needs to make a stand. We're behind in so many other areas, we can at least have real network neutrality. It's something the industry won't do itself, and they sell it to customers by saying, "Hey, free Facebook and YouTube..."

Re: Other countries

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel sorry for you Americans. In Finland I get 250/100Mbps for 29.90 EUR/m. And if there was a case of carriers favoring their own products over direct competitors like Verizon they'd find themselves in court pretty damn soon. Heck, even if they taunt their competitors using names or other similarly identifiable information they'd go to court.

Re: Other countries

[I'm New Around Here]

Can you get that if your connection is in Croatia?

Re: Other countries

[Anonymous Coward]

Ask your EU representatives.

Re: Other countries

[schnell]

In Finland I get 250/100Mbps for 29.90 EUR/m.

What wireless technology is your phone using that it gets 100 Mbps download?

I understand the bandwidth argument

[Anonymous Coward]

But why can't they just locally host the Netflix data the same as their own.

That proves it's not technical design so it's monopolistic.

Can we just make it legal to shoot executives?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please? It really would solve so many problems...

Re:Can we just make it legal to shoot executives?

[Opportunist]

Because of the golden rule. He with the gold makes the rule.

Re:Can we just make it legal to shoot executives?

[Rakarra]

That's why they call it a "golden parachute" after all. He put in the procedures to make it incredibly expensive just to fire him.

Re:Can we just make it legal to shoot executives?

[Opportunist]

I really say one should test that literally. How well does a golden parachute really work if you toss said manager out of the 50th floor? Inquisitive minds want to know! And let's be honest here, it sure ain't no loss if a CEO or two die in the process, we have far more than we need anyway.

FYI: Bell Did this in Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe they lost in court, heres the main story but couldn't find conclusion easily.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technol...

isn't this only a free weekend?

[known_coward_69]

in the FAQ's it says the app is free but you will use data unless on wifi and the free data is only this weekend

Just a Few Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't this prove by example that there is no last mile scarcity on Verizon's wireless network? The reason for limits on wireless has always been this bottleneck, transit costs over fibre are small, if not free for a tier 1 provider. These costs are easily covered by a cellphone agreement. What is the IP transit cost for a 95% average line that does 2GB a month to Verizon $.05?

With this move, Verizon is demonstrating that caps are unnecessary. With this evidence, one might even argue that caps are an arbitrary and capricious with the sole purpose of extorting money from customers and content providers.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[rsmith-mac]

Doesn't this prove by example that there is no last mile scarcity on Verizon's wireless network?

Eh, yes and no. If Go90 can truly clog up Verizon's bandwidth, they'll be making so much money that network expansion costs are little to be concerned about.

The physical issues with congestion are real, and while Verizon can solve them, they want to be paid more (i.e. profit more) if they're going to have to spend more.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[MightyYar]

No question. The issue is that - under the current Verizon scheme at issue - only Verizon can pursue this business model. Anti-net-neutrality proponents would argue that Netflix should be able to pay Verizon more money for access, and Verizon could then use that money to upgrade. Net neutrality proponents would argue that Verizon should just directly charge their customers to use more bandwidth, and then use that money to upgrade.

Verizon wants a little of both to give themselves something of a monopoly (1). That doesn't benefit anyone except Verizon.

(1) Not really a monopoly, as cell phone service is fairly competitive. Verizon does have the best rural network, though, and they have something of a monopoly outside of metro areas.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[nine-times]

Still, it's an indication that carriers and ISPs are not being completely honest. They basically keep claiming that they need special protections, they need the ability to throttle and limit service, and that services like Netflix can't perform because it's simply not possible to deliver the bandwidth people are demanding. They imply (I'm not sure they've said it outright) that it's not a problem of their unwillingness to upgrade their network, but that people's expectations are just out of whack-- that people using more than a few gigabytes per month are bad actors, using up all the bandwidth, and that there is not any possible way for them to fulfill the demands on their network.

But now they're saying that everything is fine, so long as they can cut Netflix out of the market and take those profits for themselves. If they're allowed to have a monopoly, then suddenly all the technical problems go away.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

It does, but to be fair anybody with any technical knowledge knew this already.

Data caps are entirely about extortion and generally they're aimed at people who don't know better, because the people who implement them have no morals.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[radarskiy]

Alternative theory: Verizon's home growth mobile video is crap that no one wants, thus the usage is so low that they can afford to give the bandwidth away from free.

Re:Just a Few Thoughts

[KGIII]

Yeah, I'd not say that it's a monopoly so much as there are alternatives but not many of them are very good. My home is in a *very* rural area. My choices are pretty much limited to those who have a peering agreement or resell VZW or I'm booted off in short order. I use US Cellular and they have their own towers and whatnot. However, they also have a peering agreement with VZW. T-Mobile seems to not have such an agreement and simply does not work in my area. AT&T works but they boot you off if it turns out you live there or spend most of your call time there. Neither has towers in the area.

Actually, only US Cellular has towers but VZW works fine. They've got some sort of peering agreement that allows one to not roam when you're using the others towers. AT&T will activate me, they've done so twice, but the phones indicate that they're roaming and they boot me off after just a couple of months with a letter saying that they're declining to provide service. I believe the inexpensive pay-by-month phones work but I have no details or knowledge. I've pretty much just accepted that I've limited choices and I don't even bother doing any searching any more nor do I even deal with billing or customer service or the likes - if I can help it.

This proves there's plenty of bandwidth to go arou

[caseih]

Service providers continue to maintain that caps are about congestion and infrastructure. This move proves that the network has plenty of bandwidth and is plenty robust. So when the FCC comes calling they can't use this as an excuse for why they have caps on their "unlimited" plans. This type of thing is very hard to defend logically, but I'm sure they'll find a way to make up something that sounds reasonable.

And actually caps of any kind can't be justified by network infrastructure since if there's bandwidth to let everyone download up to, say, 300 GB a month, all at the same time and at full speed, there's bandwidth for everyone to download as much as they want at full speed.

To the new slashdot owners, when you finally get around to supporting utf-8, how about lengthening the subject line to at least another dozen characters!

Shomi, CraveTV is the same in Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

In Canada it costs bandwidth if you use CraveTV from Shaw/Rogers, or Shomi from Bell/Telus. However if you use Shomi from Shaw/Rogers or CraveTV from Telus/Bell's own TV boxes it doesn't use your bandwidth. Netflix costs data on all of them, however only Telus actually has the Netflix app in it's TV box as well.

Prior to Shomi and CraveTV, the TV providers would let you view the entire season on the VOD. But since Shomi and CraveTV came out, the VOD has been neutered to "just the last episode"

I'm surprised, honestly, that there hasn't been more outcry here in Canada, but then again, a significant amount of people here just use US Netflix with a VPN and probably don't even care if Shomi or CraveTV exist.

Re:Sounds Balandced! Sounds Neutral!

[Opportunist]

What now, vote Trump or criminalize criminals. Make up your fuckin' mind!

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy crap are you a fucking idiot. But you just had to let everyone know that, right?

Re:This proves there's plenty of bandwidth to go a

[I'm New Around Here]

To the new slashdot owners, when you finally get around to supporting utf-8, how about lengthening the subject line to at least another dozen characters!

A few months ago, we played around with using the Ampersand character in the subject line. It gets expanded out to 5 or 6 characters in the internal buffer, but still is shown as "&" in the line. It was noticed because someone's post had the maximum length for the subject line, but an & in the middle made it too long in the buffer, so the end of the final word was truncated before being printed.

Cash versus Credit

[Anonymous Coward]

This sounds like the differing prices between cash and credit that the credit card companies killed-off a bunch of years ago. Now everyone offers a "cash discount" which evidently does not violate that price-equity law.

Verizon will find a way to get around it. For example, all they have to do is change their data policy to charge only for data leaving their network, instead of charging for data traversing their wireless networks.

CAPTCHA: Legalize

Re:Cash versus Credit

[sims 2]

Don't people realise that if a business accepts a credit card the card company gets somewhere around 2% this is a cost to the business itself unlike sales tax. So say an item costs $100
that the business would only receive $98 after fees.

Here it would go
charge to customer
item $100
tax 10% $10
total $110

Received by business
paid in Cash $100
paid with cc 2% $98

Now tell me again how it's fair to pay people for their money? It really is a convenience charge shouldn't the customer be paying for use of the card?

Well if on network usage was free id just set up a point to point connection with 2 aircards to the business line at work as paying for a second line would still be way cheaper than the overages.

Re:Cash versus Credit

[Rockoon]

charge only for data leaving their network, instead of charging for data traversing their wireless networks.

This is exactly how the backbone is organized and settled. When people mention "settlement free" peering agreements, these are normally just when the data going both ways is about balanced. Every once in awhile one of these agreements gets stressed due to a growing imbalance, several times now due specifically to netflix's at-the-time provider (first when they were with Cogent, second when they were with Level 3, and interestingly that first time the dispute was between Cogent and Level 3) discovering that one of their settlement-free agreements isnt going to be settlement-free in the future.

In any event, ultimately its the sender of the packets that must secure its delivery. In some cases this requires paying someone else to complete the task.

Re:Cash versus Credit

[candude43]

Of course, when a business accepts a credit card, the funds automatically appear in a bank account. When a customer pays cash, the business must reconcile the receipts to the cash drawer, prepare deposit slips and have someone take the cash to the bank. Or have a armoured car come around to pick up the money. It can be pocketed by a dishonest employee, or taken in a hold-up. All of this costs money too.

Re:Cash versus Credit

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, companies who agree to pay their ~2% are able to accept customers who do not carry cash, or who are making large purchases. No merchant is technically forced to accept credit cards... but if they do not, the nearby competitors who do accept them will eat their lunch.

The fee the merchant pays to the credit card company is the cost of getting their slice of those customers. Merchants also pay to advertise, to get new customers, so 2% for a large bump in potential customers is a pretty good deal, for many businesses.

No, I have no particular love for credit card companies, but I completely disagree with the notion that "oh, boo-hoo, businesses only get $98 instead of $100," nor do I expect that prices would fall by 2% if that fee were eliminated. Businesses charge the price that they CAN charge, because to charge less leaves money on the table, and to charge more causes too many customers to pick a competitor, which means less sales, and less profits than they would have if they charged less. Without that 2% fee, the business would make more profit per sale, but if they don't accept credit cards, they simply make less sales.

Re: Cash versus Credit

[phorm]

Agreed

There were some places I just didn't patronize because they were cash only, and frankly (especially given some of their neighbourhoods) it wasn't always a good plan to walk around carrying a lot of cash.

There's are benefits to both.

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[Lunix Nutcase]

Because AT&T is better, right?

Cox does the same thing over cable allocation

[Anonymous Coward]

Cox Communication also has a data cap on their broadband service, but their own video on demand service does not count while Netflix and Amazon do.
They have been doing it for years and to the best I can tell, nothing has happened.

Use the unlimited service til it hurts

[wendyo]

So it sounds like everyone should start streaming Verizon video whenever possible. They don't have to watch it, just do unlimited streaming.

100 Megabits Per Second - Just Not Every Second

[Yew2]

When are we going to get bans on data caps? Does the Obama Administration and FCC realize that the very idea of a cap belies the nature of a service which indicates how much data per second they are selling you? Shouldnt my 100 megabits per second be capped at no less than 2,592,000,000,000 bits, a hundred for every second in a 30 day month?

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation

[Anonymous Coward]

Tmobiles network is an oversubscribed joke. I have accounts with both the evil Verizon and the retarded T-Mobile.

  Verizon rapes my wallet but their service works about as good as my home cable internet. T-Mobile is so oversubscribed I can barely check my email at any given second. Both have complete coverage for miles around me area, its a major metro.

Sadly Data rape > tmobile incompetence.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation

[Anonymous Coward]

T mobile is great in many areas, but outside those areas... It's easily the worst. I really like them in most large cities, but in between or in smaller areas, they aren't so good. Unfortunately.

Word Game

[skywire]

There is no objective difference between, on the one hand, counting towards a cap (beyond which one must pay a surcharge) only data not received from certain stated parties, and on the other, counting towards a cap only data received from certain stated parties. To claim otherwise it to play a transparently absurd word game. It's like claiming that giving a discount on cash purchases of petrol is different to assessing a surcharge on credit purchases.

Re:Word Game

[jader3rd]

For me the difference comes down to if certain stated parties are limited to properties owned by the ISP. But once extended to properties beyond the control of the ISP, then it's word playing.

They're not testing the limits

[Anonymous Coward]

They're rolling over them in tanks..

And yet, your hero, the corporately funded Hilary

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not a free-market failure; that's a human failure. And history has demonstrated that government directed economies are much, much worse at any scale relevant to modern society.

Dont need smart phone

[Anonymous Coward]

I can actually find my way without gps.
Only actually useful app they got.

"Does the Obama Administration..."

[tlambert]

"Does the Obama Administration..."

Yes, they understand that.

President Obama is invested in the Vanguard 500 Index Fund as one of his largest holdings, apart from bonds and T-bills -- Source: http://www.davemanuel.com/pols... -- which in turn is invested in:

Telecoms: AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc., Comcast Corp. Class A
Oil companies: Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp.
Pharma companies: Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer Inc., Merck & Co. Inc., Gilead Sciences Inc., Allergan plc, Amgen Inc.,
Banks: Wells Fargo & Co., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Visa Inc. Class A
Healthcare problem companies: Philip Morris International Inc., Altria Group Inc., McDonald's Corp., Coca-Cola Co., PepsiCo Inc.
Healthcare solution companies: UnitedHealth Group Inc., CVS Health Corp., Medtronic plc

Among others -- Source: https://personal.vanguard.com/...

So perhaps this explains the issues he's interested in, and the things he votes and advocates for and against.

Re:"Does the Obama Administration..."

[Anonymous Coward]

"President Obama is invested in the Vanguard 500 Index Fund"

Lol, so am I, because that's the lowest cost index fund which tracks the average market growth.

Re:"Does the Obama Administration..."

[tlambert]

"President Obama is invested in the Vanguard 500 Index Fund"

Lol, so am I, because that's the lowest cost index fund which tracks the average market growth.

It's one of the lowest yield S&P index funds out there. You have to buy into their investment strategy for it to be worthwhile for you.

It's their service; what's the problem?

[Etcetera]

Perhaps this was written by someone too young to remember 3G video services.

Strangely enough, Verizon also doesn't charge me for receiving texts from their own customer support center, or "Fortune of the Day" service, or those chintzy CNNgo mobile .3gpp clips back in 2006, or NFL video, or any of the other benefits of cobranded services that carriers have offered. I fail to see how this is any different.

In fact, this is argueably LESS of an issue than T-Mobile's deal with the video services, simple as a result of it not being co-branded. If "Netflix by T-Mobile" was an actual thing, there'd be absolutely no room to complain at all.

Re:This proves there's plenty of bandwidth to go a

[I'm New Around Here]

Found it: http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

From almost one year ago.

It's a cap on Internet data, not all data

[qzzpjs]

Anything originating from inside their network should not be counted against the data cap or they would be charging you for something you didn't get. That being Internet data.

Now, I would be completely against them not applying the data cap to something that actually comes from Internet like Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, etc.

Re:It's a cap on Internet data, not all data

[Anonymous Coward]

You're one of three things
1) A shill
2) A troll
3) A moron.

They're not producing the content. They're distributing it. Just like Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, etc.
So, it is exactly the same, except that they're using their control over the network to screw everyone else.

Re: Well, that's pretty much a textbook violation

[Anonymous Coward]

So, wait, my phone will only talk to the towers of my provider?

I have a lot of trouble believing that- there's no way there are five separate towers out in the sticks. Nor that there are 20 towers at my local college football stadium.

I'm Okay with this

[jader3rd]

As someone who supports net neutrality, I'm okay with this. If the agreement is "Pay to have access to our network, plus some internet" that's fine. But the second it would be something like "Pay to have access to our network plus Facebook (or whatever else)" that's not fine. That's against net neutrality.

Re:This proves there's plenty of bandwidth to go a

[jader3rd]

Perhaps they have only a little bit more room, and since their video service is used a little bit, that extra usage will fill in the gap.

internet data a lot cheaper than cell phone data

[Anonymous Coward]

Going from the pricing on my sister's cell phone bills, sending data over the cell phone network is at least 10 times more expensive than sending it over the internet backbone and DSL line (assuming it is spread out). It might be more than 100 times as expensive.

Having said that, those 'unlimited video' service providers over cell phone deserve to lose money. Make it happen folks.

Re:It's their network, they should be able to

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy crap are you a fucking idiot. But you just had to let everyone know that, right?

And you just had to add a little more nastiness to the web for no benefit whatsoever. I like being an AC here, but I can see why your behavior gives ACs a bad name on /.

<aside>
FWIW, I had to google Xfinity to see the relationship to Comcast. This doesn't mean I'm a "fucking idiot", it just means that I'm fortunate enough to have zero dealings with Comcast. So the GP post was actually useful to me. Just because everyone doesn't share your perspective doesn't make them an idiot.
</aside>

Non-physical

[phorm]

I'm guessing you're just being a sarcastic jackass, but non-physical=VM image, meaning they can just pop it into existing VM infrastructure without needing to dedicate space or support to additional physical hardware.
It still takes compute/storage resources, but there's no need to worry about stuff like cabling, hardware replacement, etc etc (beyond what they're presumably already doing for their own VMs in the farm)

Wifi technology

[phorm]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...

LTE and LTE Advanced actuality have some pretty high max speeds

Isn't this a bit monopolistic?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if the Verizon Video service has the same subscription price of say Hulu or Netflix, It feels a little like, well because we own the railroad we won't charge you for using our railroad cars, just for shipping. I'd have to wonder if there's an anti-trust issue here.

Sherman Anti Trust Violation?

[LifesABeach]

Has FIOS crossed a line?