AT&T Caps Are A Giant Con And An Attack On Cord-Cutters (dslreports.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Following a report from DSLReports that ATT would be imposing usage caps on the company's U-Verse broadband customers, ATT has announced it would now be following Comcast's lead by "allowing" users to pay $30 more a month if they wanted to avoid usage caps entirely. However, ATT has taken it to a new level by "allowing" users to graciously avoid the $30 fee -- if they subscribe to DirecTV or U-Verse TV service. These data caps allow ISPs like ATT and Comcast to cash in on internet video and make cord-cutting less viable by making streaming more expensive. And now, ATT is using caps to force users to subscribe to traditional TV if they want their broadband connection to work like it used to.

Comments

FIOS

[friedmud]

This is all definitely making me happy I'm on Verizon FIOS. It is expensive... but I get full bi-directional 75 Mbps that is rock solid and with zero caps. I've had it for almost 2 years now and I can't list even one complaint (ok, it is pricey... but you get what you pay for!)

What "should" unlimited Internet cost?

[swb]

Assume 50 Mbit/sec, symmetric bandwidth, dynamic IP address, no caps on upload/download?

What would it take to actually operate this network?

If you had 100,000 customers in a given metro area, what would you need for uplink capacity at the head end? My probably-has-an-error calculation at 5% average utilization is 250 Gbit/sec, 50 Gbit/sec at 1% (my 1 day average over 3 months is .55 Mbit).

What would 50 or 250 Gbit/sec of Internet uplink capacity cost if you had to go out and source it commercially?

I hate all these caps but I'm kind of curious what exactly it would cost to operate the kind of Internet connectivity everybody really wants.

Re:What "should" unlimited Internet cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Out in the sticks" isn't too far from the truth of the situation actually.

We had to pay around $10k in construction costs to get that fiber pulled the 12 miles between the closest access junction and our location.
Before that, the only connectivity option was AT&T POTs lines that were of such poor quality they couldn't even provide PRI service for voice calls, and the lines shorted out and went down every time it rained.

Prior to me switching us to fiber, we had a wireless cisco canopy radio link at 5Mbit/sec for $600/mo.
Worse, we didn't even have a direct line of site to the ISP, so our link pointed to a setup mounted to a farmers silo 7-8 miles down the road to relay back to the ISP.
(Apparently the ISP offered the farmer free internet service and compensation for electricity for this silo radio dish space)

While I admit I was shocked how stable and resistant to interference that wireless link was, it definitely topped out at 5Mbit and the RTT was pretty horrible. Even on third shift when our bandwidth usage was below 2% you could feel how slow to respond websites were.

So yes, our options are about as limited as those in the sticks, despite being in a respectively sized city (nothing compared to LA or NY of course)

Either POTs dialup at far under 56k, wireless, or the rates I stated for fiber service that is actually capable.
I'm certainly not complaining about the price given the situation.

Given that the parent wanted numbers on bandwidth that is literally 1:1, you realistically still need to factor in other costs related to "this is just for you and all on you, there is no one else to split the cost with"

PS Fuck you Slashdot for making me use IE just to reply
"It's been 1 hour, 10 minutes since you last successfully posted a comment"

Re:Three words

[PCM2]

True story: I used to get DSL service in San Francisco from a CLEC, Earthlink, because I already hated AT&T back then.

One day, my service goes down. Modem lights blinking. I put in a repair request, and the service person tells me that she can verify there is indeed a problem with my line, and someone will take care of it. I go to work. I come home from work and there's a message on my voicemail telling me the problem has been successfully resolved. The lights on my modem are still blinking. Still no service.

I call back and say I still have no service. They say according to their systems, I do. I say I don't. They say the problem must be with my interior wiring. I say, how is there going to be a problem with the interior wiring when nothing has even moved? One day, service; the next day, none. It has to be Earthlink's problem, so could they please send someone out to take a look?

They said no. I said, what? "No. We will not roll a truck, sorry. But if you like, I could quote you a price on our satellite internet service."

It went back and forth like this over a couple more calls, them not budging, until finally I get someone at second-tier tech support. He goes, "You wouldn't happen to have a pair of alligator clips?" Flabbergasted, I said, "Um. You mean a length of phone cable with the ends stripped and a pair of alligator clips attached to the ends? Uh, yes. Yes, I do." He advised me that if I had a power outlet available, I could take my DSL modem out to the phone box on the side of the house and use the alligator clips to find my line. Depending on whether the modem loops up from the box or not, I'd know where the problem is.

So I did. I went out to the box, and sure enough, the modem looped up. And that's how I discovered where the problem was. Because the lines inside the box -- my nice little pair of wires with the Earthlink tag attached to them -- had been cut. Clearly snipped in half with wire cutters.

And that's when I remembered. A few days before my DSL went out, a new neighbor moved in upstairs. What do you do when you move into a new place? You order phone service. They had probably called AT&T to have a new line set up -- maybe even DSL -- and when the AT&T tech came out to the house, he saw my non-AT&T DSL line and he cut it, likely knowing Earthlink wouldn't do a damn thing about it and I'd be forced to switch back to AT&T. (Later, someone explained to me that AT&T's field techs are union and Earthlink's were not. I can't vouch for that but it's another theory.)

So that was my situation. Either I could go with AT&T, which I had already got fed up from dealing with for both home service and business networking. Or I could go with Earthlink, who were obviously competing in a totally hostile market and clearly didn't give a flying fuck about my business, so much so that when they told me they wouldn't repair my line, they helpfully added, "And because you've been a customer for nearly two years now, you won't have to pay any fees for early cancellation."

So I went with Comcast. Fuck DSL, fuck 'em all. And you know what? I know they suck and I've heard all the stories, but for the most part, Comcast hasn't given me any trouble ever since. It's been 10 years now, too.