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Heads up on EUPJust a heads up folks. Saw my first permanent shutoff for Excessive Use Policy today. Cus ignored 2 warning letters on bandwidth use. They were shutoff on the 3rd warning and will not be allowed back on the Qwest DSL network. Only high speed access you can get after being shut down is via Frame Relay (T1, etc.)Mucho mas money.
Be smart folks, don't abuse the system, I would hate to shut down a fellow poster. Monitoring, warnings and shutdowns have begun.
Peace. |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 1:03 pm · (locked) |
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tobyTroy Mcclure join:2001-11-13 Seattle, WA |
toby
Member
2007-Dec-13 2:13 pm
What were the transfer numbers and what DSL speed did they have? |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 2:13 pm · (locked) |
1 edit |
to Bill5309
Hardcore. They must have been seriously pushing the downloads. Frame connections are not that bad (well, other than price). Look at it this way, you get to use whatever bandwidth you want (within your SLA terms) and you get priority service from the hicap technicians. Your neighbors DSL might go out, and you'll see a Qwest tech long before he will. |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 8:55 pm · (locked) |
1 recommendation |
to Bill5309
First you tell us we aren't allowed to infringe on copyrights. Then you tell us that we can't use excessive bandwidth. What's next? Qwest will stop us from spreading worms or doing simple DOS attacks? They take away all our fun! |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 9:27 pm · (locked) |
dispatcher21911 Where is your emergency? join:2004-01-22 united state |
to Bill5309
I too am curious about the amount of bandwidth he was pushing and in what time frame. |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 11:04 pm · (locked) |
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to Bill5309
im sure this is a dumb question... but how do you use excessive bandwidth? I have never heard of this... |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 11:13 pm · (locked) |
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no_one to Bill5309
Anon
2007-Dec-13 11:29 pm
to Bill5309
[You seem real happy about cutting them off also. If I had the time I could easily use some bandwidth just watching videos on the computer. Not downloading just watching. A few linux packages, some good free software. Servers are allowed or has that also changed? So share some photos with family members. I shoot high quality. Plus if I send or put high quality on the server they can get prints if they want or not. Sounds as if you think Qwest should charge per bit. So what is extreme usage? Yes I read the EUP but what is Qwest enforcing? Or is it Qwest is to broke to upgrade the gateways or whatever they are called? My DSL connection is solid but the gateway connections seem to be overburdened at night. "Rather, here are examples of the type of usage that could be deemed excessive: 300,000-500,000 photo downloads in one month 40,000 to 80,000 typically sized MP3 music downloads in one month 15+ million unique e-mails each month Online TV video streaming of 1,000-3,000 30-minute shows each month 2-5 million Web page visits (approximately one every second, 24 hours per day)" So are these the lowest possible quality phoots ever. I tend to shoot and share RAW images. Those files can add up. I watch nowhere near that much TV. But am I supposed to watch say the lowest quality video stream and not dare stream what quality I want to watch and the connection handle? These terms are rather vague. To you a photo may be lowest quality black and white. To me highest quality my camera will shoot. My one photo may equal a thousand of what Qwest thinks is a photo. |
actions · 2007-Dec-13 11:29 pm · (locked) |
msj Premium Member join:2004-05-21 Fort Collins, CO |
to Bill5309
I too would be curious to know what kind of usage resulted in this shutoff. However, I am happy to see that at least they got two warnings. If you can't tell us the usage in this case, could you at least tell us the timeline of the warnings and shutoff?
Why is it that Qwest and Comcast can't seem to give us exact information on what our limits are? Many ISP's spell out the limits in detail and even let you go to their web portal and find out what your current usage is.
Also, I would hope that the limits are different for the different tiers of DSL service, but I suspect that is not the case. In my opinion if you are paying extra for the 7Mbit service you should also have increased bandwidth caps. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 1:13 am · (locked) |
danawhitakerSpace...The Final Frontier Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Thorndale, ON |
to Bill5309
I second...third...fourth...whatever the question on just how much usage we're talking about here, in terms of gigs per month. A rough estimate will do. I wouldn't mind knowing the geographic location of the person who got cut off (just the state will do). I also wouldn't mind knowing, as others have mentioned, the timeline between receiving warnings and the cutoff.
You seem quite happy to be cutting people off for copyright infringement and "excessive" usage. I've always liked Qwest until now, but lately my experience both with the service itself and seeing stuff here on this forum is leading me to think otherwise. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 4:10 am · (locked) |
1 recommendation |
You have it wrong, I am never happy in any way, shape or form to loose a paying customer. I do not mind loosing someone who is actually costing my company to have instead of us making money. That is basic business. Deal with it.
In the same vein, If I loan my car to a neighbor to drive around town, and they then use it as a taxi service..well..they are not going to get my car again for any amount of money. I strongly look after my company's money, let's leave it at that.
As far as numbers, I do not have those numbers. If you get a EUP warning letter from Qwest, back off on the downloads. Simple as that. In order for you to get that warning, you are doing some SERIOUS traffic and should be on a frame circuit instead of a paltry DSL line anyways. You don't buy a Yugo and then try to drive it like a Porche.
Peace |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 10:40 am · (locked) |
danawhitakerSpace...The Final Frontier Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Thorndale, ON |
The problem is, your attitude is just as poor as Comcast's in this regard. You refuse to tell anyone what "serious" traffic is, or give people any idea of how much they should cut back. I haven't gotten a letter. If I ever do get one, I'd like to be told exactly what limits I should be staying within. Your response is akin to the police pulling people over and warning them not to speed but not having any speed limit signs posted telling them what the maximum speed is. It's rude to your customers not to provide a specific limit or guideline within which they should stay. I dislike the methods of some of Qwest's third-party ISPs in terms of bandwidth caps, but at least they explicitly state them.
Having read the EUP again as a refresher, I can say that the 1-3 GB per month Qwest states as average use is mostly BS. When I went on vacation for two months several years ago, I left my computer on the entire time, but I didn't do any downloading of any large files or patches during that duration. Just between e-mail, and mIRC, my average daily usage was in the 300-500 meg range. I still have the logs.
We aren't telling you not to have any kind of policy in regards to absue, or not to enforce it, but we'd just like to know more concrete criteria than "serious" traffic. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 11:21 am · (locked) |
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God love your passion on this issue. Unfortunately, I can't get you the figures you seem to need to satisfy your curiosity. I have yet to see any ISP set down hard numbers on this, as of yet.
As far as you and your DSL circuit go, I guess that as long as you do not get an EUP warning letter, we can assume you are ok? If you should ever get one, I guess we will be looking at it then. I wish I could do more for you ...and My attitude is just fine.
My purpose of posting this, originally, was to let the board folks know that this issue is alive and active. Whether or not I agree with a bandwidth limitation or not is moot, as I am not allowed to make these decisions. This post was to cause self-reflection on any single person's usage and make adjustments if they felt it necessary. And to NOT ignore warning letters from your ISP about bandwidth usage. It has consequences. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 11:36 am · (locked) |
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no_one to Bill5309
Anon
2007-Dec-14 11:48 am
to Bill5309
said by Bill5309:You have it wrong, I am never happy in any way, shape or form to loose a paying customer. I do not mind loosing someone who is actually costing my company to have instead of us making money. That is basic business. Deal with it. In the same vein, If I loan my car to a neighbor to drive around town, and they then use it as a taxi service..well..they are not going to get my car again for any amount of money. I strongly look after my company's money, let's leave it at that. As far as numbers, I do not have those numbers. If you get a EUP warning letter from Qwest, back off on the downloads. Simple as that. In order for you to get that warning, you are doing some SERIOUS traffic and should be on a frame circuit instead of a paltry DSL line anyways. You don't buy a Yugo and then try to drive it like a Porche. Peace So what are the limits? The part of the EUP I posted I would never hit. But like I said I shoot high quality photos as a hobby and because I have a two year old. My wife loves to exchange toddler photos with out of state friends. I do not watch that much online TV as in no time but when I do it is high quality. Should I start always picking low quality to play and shoot?? It is costing your company money. You help put out as vague a warning as the EUP. When I am home I can really use my connection if I ignore my two year old. Maybe I should and see what these limits are? Plus I like a the definition normal user. One to 3 gigs a month. Some email and light web browsing. Oh and yes your child should be able to get some mp3s from amazon or walmart or apple. Sure. The net has more to offer today and much more video and other fun normal none RIAA stuff. My monthly usage is up and down depending on my free time. There are older people and disabled people that have time to stay at home and use the internet as a social network. It is a balance like all things. Those hardly using the net should be able to easily subsidize a few higher users. Or like I asked earlier is the Qwest backbone even worse than say a cell provider like Verizon or Sprint. There are those that put 1-3 gigs on a cell phone even without tethering. Now I am making the presumption this is just usage related and semi abnormal. Not pushing real servers like for porn or having drastic RIAA file sharing going on. That I could understand. Other question as I have not looked in awhile but I guess Qwest did away with business class DSL. Business class DSL at a higher price to cover the usage but without the same SLA of a T1. Plus moving to another ISP may not help as reading here the new 7meg service is Qwest or MSN only. So could not even switch in some cases to another ISP. Maybe Qwest should bring back business class DSL. Some people just need DSL for business. A T1 may not be optimal for everything. Not even the price but not optimal. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 11:48 am · (locked) |
dispatcher21911 Where is your emergency? join:2004-01-22 united state |
to Bill5309
1-3GB per month is what qwest considers average? That IS BS!! If I rent one HD movie off Xbox Live a week, thats almost 5GB a week just from that, plus my game playing, game demos, streaming tv shows, web browsing and music purchases from napster. Like danawhitaker, I always had a mindset that qwest was better than the cablo cos and would always be up front with their customers, looks like that is out the window now. Why wont qwest just be upfront about usage and give us a number to stay under? Also, is this for business dsl also? Business dsl is almost twice as much as residential dsl (but still a pretty good price) and could be a vible option for the power user. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 11:50 am · (locked) |
BinkVillains... knock off all that evil join:2006-05-14 Colorado |
to Bill5309
Im totally with Bill on this one. At the end of the day, a company needs to make, at least, some profit to stay afloat. If you enjoy your Qwest service, and would like to continue doing so, you should also be against those that abuse the systemand ultimately leave you with less bandwidth and a higher monthly cost. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 11:53 am · (locked) |
roozy join:2004-09-30 Casper, WY
1 recommendation |
to Bill5309
What is considered excessive or high volume use? A very small percentage of Qwest Broadband customers fall into the excessive or high volume use category. Examples of excessive or high volume use are as follows: 300,000-500,000 photo downloads in one month 40,000 to 80,000 typically sized MP3 music downloads in one month 15+ million unique e-mails each month Online TV video streaming of 1,000-3,000 30-minute shows each month 2-5 million Web page visits (approximately one every second, 24 hours per day) » www.qwest.com/internethelp/eup/This is from Qwest website. Seems reasonable to me. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 12:09 pm · (locked) |
roozy |
roozy
Member
2007-Dec-14 12:11 pm
After scanning and posting, I realized that No_One had posted this without reference URL. Sorry for the repeat. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 12:11 pm · (locked) |
mathyou join:2002-01-03 Minneapolis, MN |
to Bill5309
Obviously if someone is consistently transferring hundreds of gigabytes of data a month, Qwest ought to do something. It is perfectly reasonable for there to be a limit. Like a lot of other people, though, I'd like a better idea where the line is drawn. If the standard is reasonable, people will want to make sure they're in compliance. That's why we want to know. I'm sure you can't give us numbers or an estimate or you would have already, but I have some other questions.
Your comment that "monitoring, warnings, and shutdowns have begun" seems to imply that this is a new development. I know the EUP has been around for a while. Is enforcement of it a new thing? Has Qwest started a crackdown on high usage?
Does this apply to people using CLECs on Qwest circuits? Does traffic get measured at the DSL circuit or somewhere down the line? I ask because my ISP peers with Qwest and other backbone providers. So aside from the last mile, most of my traffic never touches Qwest's network. Does all my traffic count against me? |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 12:12 pm · (locked) |
roozy join:2004-09-30 Casper, WY |
roozy
Member
2007-Dec-14 12:28 pm
Let's put this in perspective.
416 photos per hour, 24/7 or 55 mp3s per hour 24/7 or 20,833 emails per hour 24/7 or 16 hours tv per day 24/7 or 2777 webpages per hour 24/7 or as stated 1 per second
Is this kind of usage even possible and still eat, sleep and shower? |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 12:28 pm · (locked) |
BinkVillains... knock off all that evil join:2006-05-14 Colorado |
to roozy
Quickly based on this, if we assume 60000 MP3 files, at 5.5MB a piece, we have 330000 MBor about 320GB a monthand if youre downloading 320GB a month, you should be cut off.
Give Bill a break.
Cheers. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 1:16 pm · (locked) |
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Barnaby to Bill5309
Anon
2007-Dec-14 1:16 pm
to Bill5309
Bill, the ban for excessive use is permanent? Many of the cable co's let banned customers back after six months or a year. (for excessive use, not alleged copyright violations)
On the other hand, I suppose that this is one way to get out of a contract with Qwest. I wonder if Qwest considers bundled customers more valuable? I have pots, wireless, directv, and broadband bundled through Qwest. If Qwest pulled the plug on any one, I think the customer would have some legal standing to void the contract as a whole.
Anyway, I probably use 4-5GB per month. I may try to shift some of those transfers to my work machine, or one of the dozens of open wireless networks around. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 1:16 pm · (locked) |
danawhitakerSpace...The Final Frontier Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Thorndale, ON |
to Bill5309
"I have yet to see any ISP set down hard numbers on this, as of yet."
Rogers, Bell Sympatico, Shaw, and I believe several other Canadian ISPs have specific bandwidth caps that they inform users of. Cox sets down a specific amount too, although they rarely enforce their policy. I have several friends on Belgian ISPs that have specific caps enforced by their ISPs. Xmission, which is a 3rd party Qwest ISP, has a specific cap.
I don't have time at the moment to dig up the specific caps for these ISPs (I know that several are around 100 gigs) but I will try to find the time later. I know that Bell in Canada has an overage policy where users can go over basically as much as they want as long as they pay more, and the overage fee is capped. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 2:00 pm · (locked) |
dispatcher21911 Where is your emergency? join:2004-01-22 united state |
to Bill5309
My question is, how can you monitor your total network usage? I know there are programs for your computers but what about other items such as Xbox, DVD players, web enabled tv and the such? Is there any hub or switch I can put between my items and router that monitors bandwidth? |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 2:29 pm · (locked) |
BinkVillains... knock off all that evil join:2006-05-14 Colorado |
Bink
Member
2007-Dec-14 2:48 pm
You got me curiousand while Im certain I could easily setup something to handle this, quickly looking at a few statistics of my UNIX-like router reveals the following:
$ uptime 12:40PM up 23 days, 4:16, 1 user, load averages: 0.14, 0.12, 0.09
$ netstat -bI pppoe0 Name Mtu Network Address Ibytes Obytes pppoe0 1492 Link 1520808661 4282831193
So
((1520808661/1024)/1024)/1024 gives me 1.4GB in 23 days. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 2:48 pm · (locked) |
woodwardXMission Internet join:2000-12-28 Salt Lake City, UT 1 edit |
to danawhitaker
said by danawhitaker: Xmission, which is a 3rd party Qwest ISP, has a specific cap. Actually, we quietly removed the cap on DSL traffic about a year ago. It used to be a 100 GB limit that was only monitored during business hours (nights and weekends were free sailing). We still have a cap on our basic FTTH service on UTOPIA, though. That is a bidirectional 50MBps/50 Mbps line that includes 500 GB/mo, with a 1 TB tier upgrade available. We have to limit that because on fiber a single user can rack up thousands of dollars in overages on our 95th percentile upstream costs. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 2:51 pm · (locked) |
danawhitakerSpace...The Final Frontier Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Thorndale, ON |
Thanks for clearing that up, woodward. It's been a while since I've taken a close look at you guys. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 3:25 pm · (locked) |
cfossy join:2007-04-05 Ottumwa, IA
1 recommendation |
to Bill5309
Seriously guys, leave Bill alone. He was just trying to protect you guys from having your service shut off. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 4:23 pm · (locked) |
danawhitakerSpace...The Final Frontier Premium Member join:2002-03-02 Thorndale, ON |
"Seriously guys, leave Bill alone. He was just trying to protect you guys from having your service shut off."
Do you think that's not what we're trying to do as well by asking for more specific details? I'm trying to take proactive measures to make sure that I never get one of those letters by finding out what the limits are, approximately. If and when more specific limits are given, then I will either go on my merry way or modify my usage accordingly. I don't like the idea that one random day I may get a letter in the mail saying "Oh, you used too much, cut back." and have no idea how much I would need to cut back by.
Would you like to live in a city where there were no speed limit signs, and the cops just pulled people over at random and told them they were going "too fast" and that they should "slow down" and that if it happened three times their drivers license would be taken away permanently? All we're asking from Qwest (and not specifically from Bill even, though he's taken the brunt of this because he created this thread and posted the warning) is to have a SPECIFIC policy in place. If we, as consumers, refuse to demand this from the companies we do business with, we're just asking for trouble in the future. Maybe if my connection were actually working properly, and Qwest's only solution to my speed not running at what it should be wasn't to downgrade me to 256/256, I might not be so disgruntled and outspoken right now. Now I'm starting to wonder if there's a correlation between Qwest's apathy at fixing connections that are only getting half the speed they're supposed to and their enforcement of their EUP.
Yes, I am passionate about this issue. I have been passionate about this issue when it wasn't even my ISP doing this - I railed about Comcast and Rogers and even tangled with woodward over Xmission's former policy a few times. Now that it's my own ISP, I definitely will stand up and take notice, unlike the majority of consumers who get blindsided by this stuff, or who take an apathetic stance. I apologize if I did lash out personally at Bill, because I know it's not his fault, but it's difficult and frustrating when you're asking questions and someone offers half-answers in return. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 5:07 pm · (locked) |
damox Premium Member join:2002-01-07 Olympia, WA |
to dispatcher21
Not sure where you came up with 1-3 Gigabytes per month, but given the examples by Qwest as to what constitutes excessive usage, I'm thinking this is more like about 300 gigabytes or more per month. That's quite a bit, don't you think? If people can't live with that, they are probably using their connection for commercial purposes. Personally I think Qwest, and Comcast, who does the same thing, before cutting a user off, should first offer a business tier connection. I'm sure some folks would take that in lieu of being cut off. |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 8:40 pm · (locked) |
Stankus join:2007-11-02 Ridgefield, WA 1 edit |
to Bill5309
I asked this very question a couple of months back when I was considering using DirecTV's "on demand" feature. I was wondering what was considered abusive by Qwest. I realize that there is cost associated with heavy bandwidth usage, and I personally wouldn't object to an additional (reasonable) charge if I went over a well published and agreed upon monthly usage maximum (just my opinion). It seems now that if you run over their somewhat fuzzy usage maximum, you may be terminated (after some warnings). I would prefer the following: 1) Give me a reasonable, well published maximum usage that my particular DSL tier can have. Give it to me in gigabytes, not number of email messages, number of photo downloads, etc. 2) Give me a way to monitor my current monthly usage (maybe through my qwest.com account?). This should at least be accurate to within the last 24 hour if not "real time". I can alter my usage pattern appropriately if need be based on this information. 3) If I go over my maximum, tell me how much per gig the additional usage will be. Maybe give a user the option to "temporarily suspend service for the month" that would kick in if they bumped against the maximum (so that they would never get a surcharge surprise). For everyone else going over the limit, expect the well published surcharge for overage per gigabyte. These are just ideas from the peanut gallery (me); there are probably better ideas out there . Right now I'm afraid to use my on demand or xbox movie rentals because I don't want to be branded a bandwidth hog (since this is my only affordable broadband option, and I need it for work). |
actions · 2007-Dec-14 10:13 pm · (locked) |