AT&T
is considering a move to usage-based pricing which would allow the company to continue to let BitTorrents thrive on the site but at a price to the people who are taking up all of the network’s capacity. The company says that it views BitTorrent users as a positive thing and wants to keep those customers but that it hasn’t been financially beneficial to build out a network that will support the small number of customers that are using the bulk of the network.
"One percent of the company's customers account for 20 percent of the network usage; the top five percent account for 40 percent of the usage. Because the network must be able to accommodate peak traffic loads, AT&T -- like other network providers -- finds itself building far more capacity than most users need, just to support the most prolific users."
The idea is that those people can better support the company’s growth by paying for the amount of bandwidth that they are using. It is believed that this new pricing model will begin in the fall.
