urbanriot
join:2004-10-18
St Catharines, ON | reply to neko
Re: [Niagara] Cogeco Bitcaps
Of course! Downloading TV shows / movies = no cable or satellite TV. There's a definite bias here. |
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MadAtCogeco
@cgocable.net
| reply to nydwarf1
So what can we do about this greedy policy?
Can we call anyone? Some people don't have the option of switching, are those people just screwed?
Anyone that gets a ps3 or xbox and downloads 6 demos or more is over the bit cap for the month...
That is just ridiculous. |
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brorjace
join:2007-12-09
Hamilton, ON
| reply to nydwarf1
Well I'm going to be honest, my roommate and I watch a lot of streaming video (one could call us YouTube junkies at times).
I'm constently runnnig my Xbox 360 online (download trailers, demos and the like), we BOTH used to play World of Warcraft, we're running on the Standard package and to be honest, I've gone to like 64 GB in a month...so it's possible to use the internet within our limits.
If you find that 60 just isn't enough for you, then I would suggest upgrading to the Pro package. Don't forget, with us not charging for an overage that does give you as a consumer the leg up over other providers (Rogers, Bell, I think Execulink, and other DSL providers charge for Bandwidth Overages...and it's clearly outlined in the fine print on the website, not just in their TOS).
I'm a fan of fair use, so I'm a fan of increased caps, is it planned? Probably, is it being implemented right now? No. So for now I think everyone should just review their internet usage and curve it just a bit so that don't see these warnings (I've never had a warning except a spam warning...heh forgot to re-enable my CSS!) |
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urbanriot
join:2004-10-18
St Catharines, ON
 ·Cogeco Cable
1 edit | reply to MadAtCogeco
said by MadAtCogeco :
So what can we do about this greedy policy? Well, I'm not so annoyed with Cogeco as I was when they originally initiated this bitcap. They did it without warning, in an ill-thought-out manner... basically proving that someone at the very top doesn't give a shit for customers, and cares only about the bottom line. I'm assuming there's some new idea people at Cogeco who don't realize how much they've destroyed their ISP loyalty. However, since profits are up, I guess loyalty doesn't mean jack.
That being said, I've switched over to the $100 Business account and I'm decently happy, since the quality of service is good, and the support is great... but at the same time, I'm being raped for a service that's costing considerably more than it does in other first world countries.
There isn't much you can do... complaints have been voiced, some people have left, many long time Cogeco users are disenfranchised, and Cogeco's turning a profit. Either switch to the business account or jump ship. |
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Shalimar
join:2007-09-26
Hamilton, ON
| More like get the hell off of the sinking ship that is Cogeco.
Treating your customers whom have been loyal for years as they recently have is simply unacceptable.
I already have as well as many others and I took over 200 of my clients in the Hamilton area with me already with more to come. If $ is all they care about (which is quite obvious) then I have taken away a good chunk of such from them. |
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brorjace
join:2007-12-09
Hamilton, ON
| reply to nydwarf1
Money wasn't the reason to enforce our Bitcaps though. If that were the case then we would charge everyone for their overage (just as other providers do and our AUP says we can do).
We're just making sure everyone can get the speeds we are advertising with some overhead for new sub divisions to come online. Don't forget, if EVERYONE in the area downloaded 4 and 5 times their Cap then you'd all have slow speeds because the area would get congested.
My suggestion to this all is compare your options. If you wish to leave us for another service then do your research first as some other companies are a little more strict with their Bandwidth then we are  |
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ExCogeco
@cgocable.net
| said by brorjace  :If you wish to leave us for another service then do your research first as some other companies are a little more strict with their Bandwidth then we are It's good that Cogeco's proud of not being the worst. |
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A Lurker
Premium
join:2007-10-27
Burlington, ON
·Cogeco Cable
| reply to brorjace
said by brorjace :Money wasn't the reason to enforce our Bitcaps though. If that were the case then we would charge everyone for their overage (just as other providers do and our AUP says we can do). We're just making sure everyone can get the speeds we are advertising with some overhead for new sub divisions to come online. Don't forget, if EVERYONE in the area downloaded 4 and 5 times their Cap then you'd all have slow speeds because the area would get congested. Yes, except I don't think that we, as consumers, are really buying that explanation. I was a high bandwith user, and have no objection to paying more (which I do). If you were really concerned about my neighbours you wouldn't have sold me a business package with a higher download limit. Oh, and my old modem never hit the fancy new higher speeds that my newer modem does (more than twice as fast). Now, I'm a reasonably good user, as I queue and download at night. But I could use all that bandwith during peak hours... so do you really care about my neighbours?
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Snickerdo
Premium
join:2001-02-28
Niagara Falls, ON
| reply to nydwarf1
said by nydwarf1 :
Does Bell Sympatico currently have a hard bit cap on their service? I'd like to know if their are some alternatives to Cogeco since they clearly might not want my business in the near future. They'll charge you a max of $30 for going over the hard limit, then they'll throttle you down to 512/512 once you get into the 250GB/month range. If Cogeco did something similar, it would be more than fair. 60GB is pathetically low. 100GB is on the low end. 200GB for a premium package is sufficient for 99.9% of all users out there without making the heavier users look like criminals.
And yeah, node-level bandwidth has absolutely nothing to do with this, otherwise there would be moratoriums on business connections in high congested areas, or QoS setups or stuff like that. This is profit taking, pure and simple. brorjace is just a loyal employee trying to defend the company they work for. Unfortunately, we here have all been through this for a while, and we know that the suits at Cogeco don't give a flying fuck how we feel.
--
I swear that I will faithfully and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Canada, Her Heirs and Successors, and that I will faithfully observe the laws of Canada and fulfil my duties as a Canadian citizen. |
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Sulako
@cgocable.net
| reply to brorjace
said by brorjace :Money wasn't the reason to enforce our Bitcaps though. If that were the case then we would charge everyone for their overage (just as other providers do and our AUP says we can do). We're just making sure everyone can get the speeds we are advertising with some overhead for new sub divisions to come online. Don't forget, if EVERYONE in the area downloaded 4 and 5 times their Cap then you'd all have slow speeds because the area would get congested. Wow, you have really been drinking the Kool-aid, haven't you. It tastes too much like dishonesty to me, so I'll have a scotch and soda while I write this.
I download a lot. I make no apologies for it; I use newsgroups and if I incrementally update my newsgroups, it will take a gig of bandwidth on it's own. So I figured I'd buy the uber-expensive-grab-your-ankles-and-squeal 120 gig/ month plan. Because I download a lot.
That was fine for a couple of years, until last September, when Cogeco started getting anal about bandwidth caps.
It was funny how when I was on the 120gb plan and I first ran up against the new bitcap, I got the automated email saying I was ruining teh interwebs for my neighbors.
Clearly I was hogging the internet, and because of my actions, the poor people who live in my neighborhood weren't able to fully enjoy their highspeed. I must have been leeching all the bits and bytes, and I guess when my neighbors opened up IE they would see a blank page, because all their 1's and 0's were being directed to my computer instead of theirs. I'm a neighborly guy, so I called up Cogeco and ask what I could possibly do in order to make things better for my neighbors.
Startlingly enough, Cogeco's solution was that I purchase a more expensive plan, the $100/month 200-gig plan.
"So if I give you more money each month, that will improve the surfing experience for my neighbors?"
"Umm...well....err..if you purchase the Soho business plan, you will get 200 gigs a month"
"Am I allowed to download that all at once? Should I restrict my days or the time of day I download?"
"No sir, you can download at whatever time of day you choose"
So lemme get this straight. I'm ruining the internet for my neighbors, but you'll get over it if I pay you more?
I don't get picked up for work in a short bus, so I expect honest answers from businesses I give money to, especially ones who suck more than $1,200/year from my bank account.
Last month I downloaded 180 gigs but was entitled to 200. If Cogeco gave a shit about the quality of my neighbor's internet experience, wouldn't they give me a pro-rated rebate for the bandwidth I'm entitled to and don't use each month. Wouldn't that free up the cloud a little more for my neighbors, presumably also loyal sheep in the Cogeco flock?
But it ain't about that at all.
So how about some honesty? Just come clean and admit that it's about milking your loyal customers for every penny you can. You'll feel better for telling the truth, I'll respect you a little more for it too. Hell, I might even let you cook me breakfast the next morning.
Cogeco gets an epic fail for even bringing up the pretense that our interaction somehow wrecks the web for our fellow Cogeco customers. If it was about the quality of the service for those around us, how about increasing Cogeco's network capacity, so that you can actually deliver on your promised speeds, rather than hoping that only a fraction of the paid users will be using the service at any one time?
I wrote this because today I went over 200 gigs (I'm at 208 gigs right now), and got an email saying that those 8 extra gigs were ruining the internet for my neighbors. I wonder if those 8 gigs were somehow sucked out of the harddrives of the people in the apartment building next to me.
I have a fair idea what Cogeco's recommended solution might be; I'm guessing that they have talked to my web-surfing neighbors and they have all agreed that if I pay Cogeco $200/month for the unlimited bandwidth plan, Cogeco will split the proceeds with my neighbors, who will then walk up to me and pat me on the back, maybe even give me a hug.
Am I right, Mr. Cogeco, sir? |
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wowproducts
join:2007-08-13
Kingston, ON
·Cogeco Cable
| reply to nydwarf1
Re: [Kingston] Cogeco Bitcaps
I have the Pro with Cogeco never had a problem with the limits and personally I download alot and send alot of stuff to me friends never once have i got the suspention notice you guys are talking about....but i do keep and eye on the bandwidth since I play games onling too also run my own server for half life and still no going over my bandwidth. |
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Sulako
@cgocable.net
| reply to nydwarf1
Re: [Niagara] Cogeco Bitcaps
I got my first suspension today, oh boy. I'm at 227 gigs on the 200 gig plan. The friendly tech support person said I'm allowed an entire gig til midnight tomorrow night.
I do 90% of my downloading from Cogeco newsgroups, and I know that the transfer from the newsgroup server to my modem is free to Cogeco. That is completely ridiculous.
Time to get another ISP, one who will happily take my $100/month and not treat me like a child. |
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hse
High Speed Edition
Premium
join:2003-10-25
ON, Canada | Hey Sulako, that nick looks familiar.  |
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ItalCanadese
Premium
join:2007-07-25
Stoney Creek, ON | reply to Sulako
said by Sulako :
the transfer from the newsgroup server to my modem is free to Cogeco Any traffic going in and out of your modem is counted as bandwidth; regardless of where its coming from. |
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kassi
@cgocable.net | reply to Sulako
I do 90% of my downloading from Cogeco newsgroups, and I know that the transfer from the newsgroup server to my modem is free to Cogeco. That is completely ridiculous. That's pretty much my biggest complaint as well. |
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urbanriot
join:2004-10-18
St Catharines, ON
·Cogeco Cable
| Cogeco's doing a great thing by offering a decent quality newsgroup server, which is more than a lot of ISP's do, however if their usenet server was in a 'bandwidth free' zone, I'd utilize it for newer items and have giganews setup as a fill server. However, since it equally counts on my bandwidth tally at the end of the month, I'm not about to do Cogeco any favours. |
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Snickerdo
Premium
join:2001-02-28
Niagara Falls, ON
| said by urbanriot :Cogeco's doing a great thing by offering a decent quality newsgroup server, which is more than a lot of ISP's do, however if their usenet server was in a 'bandwidth free' zone, I'd utilize it for newer items and have giganews setup as a fill server. However, since it equally counts on my bandwidth tally at the end of the month, I'm not about to do Cogeco any favours. Exactly. If my node wasn't broken I would queue up all my downloads from an off-site server in the middle of the day just to try and cost them as much as possible. If I'm only going to get ~130GB of usable bandwidth a month, I'm going to ensure that the 130GB costs Cogeco as much as possible to provide. This is what they get for treating loyal customers like criminals.
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I swear that I will faithfully and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Canada, Her Heirs and Successors, and that I will faithfully observe the laws of Canada and fulfil my duties as a Canadian citizen. |
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klondikebars
join:2001-02-16
Pickering, ON | reply to nydwarf1
My daughter called tonight because she got the page about exceeding their bandwidth limit. When does the service get restored, and do they have to do anything to get it back?
Thanks! |
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okoolo
join:2007-09-21
Windsor, ON | reply to nydwarf1
I'm curious .. would they disconnect somebody on the 31st .. that would mean no internet on the 1st .. which is a new month ..
and you're lucky .. I got my 1st warning on 207 gigs .. |
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Last Parade
One of the Brightest Stars
join:2002-10-07
Port Colborne, ON | reply to nydwarf1
I would imagine the network traffic on the last day of the month is pretty light from all the criminals not being able to surf. |
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