Rogers Shows American Cable Users The Future With different tiers come different caps, and different per-GB fees Buried beneath the noise surrounding Bell Canada's effort to annoy independent ISPs and their customers, Canadian cable operator Rogers last week informed its customers they'd be facing new overage charges. In a several page letter sent to Rogers customers last week, the cable operator first goes out of their way to make their existing caps seem " abundant," then alerts users that starting in June, they'll be billed for going over their caps. It's insulting when an ISP's marketing department resorts to calculating their caps in page views or e-mails sent in order to make it seem like they're being reasonable (in this case 60GB equates to 6,291,456 e-mails and 1,572,864 page views, the letter kindly informs us, with pictures). Users who go over Rogers' 60GB monthly cap will now be charged up to $5 ( 36,600 seconds of third-world outsourced labor!) per gigabyte capped at $25 ( 2,500 gum drops or penny stocks!) monthly for all tiers. Of course there's the slight problem that the tools they provide customers to track their bandwidth usage have never actually worked. Rogers offers a variety of tiers with different speeds and caps U.S. users should keep an eye on, because the pricing and presentation is something many U.S. cable operators would very much like to bring to the States. These speeds range from an "Ultra-Light" tier with 2GB monthly cap (Grandma, EXTREME!) to their "Extreme Plus" 18Mbps package, with a 95 GB monthly cap. The caps and overage charges per tier:  Measuring usage this way more fairly reflects how our customers are using the service and allows us to maintain competitive monthly rates for all of our customers. -Rogers |
•Ultra Lite – 2 GB monthly cap, $5.00 per additional GB
•Lite – 1Mbps, 25GB monthly cap, $2.50 per additional GB
•Express – 7Mbps, 60 GB cap, $2.00 per additional GB
•Extreme - 10Mbps, 95 GB cap, $1.50 per additional GB
•Extreme Plus – 18Mbps, 95 GB cap, $1.25 per additional GB It's grandma and grandad who get hit hardest should they decide to "go wild" one month and use their connection to download an HD film. We'll also note that Rogers has been one of the worst North American ISPs when it comes to throttling connections, not only throttling BitTorrent traffic extensively, but throttling all encrypted and VPN traffic as users attempted to get around the measures. In an American market where ISPs are frightened of the consumer backlash to billing by the byte, the Rogers model could make its way here sooner than you think. While U.S. providers already offer different speed tiers, the idea of adding various caps to those tiers (complete with billing overages) is something that's already being considered.
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 | | marketing doublespeak quote:
in this case 60GB equates to 6,291,456 e-mails and 1,572,864 page views, the letter kindly informs us, with pictures.
...or a single HD movie  | |
|  |  en102Canadian, eh?
join:2001-01-26
Valencia, CA
1 edit | Re: marketing doublespeak Exactly... You don't see any reference to any sort of bandwidth heavy app on here. Forget HD, even streaming basic apps would blow this out of the water.
I Fedora Core 6 ISO = 3.4 GB
What I don't get, it why do I need caps on the lower end rates ? Ultra lite requiring a 2GB cap ?
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Canada = Hollywood North | |
| | |  HiVoltPremium
join:2000-12-28
Toronto, ON
kudos:12
 ·TekSavvy DSL
 ·TekSavvy Cable
| Re: marketing doublespeak said by en102:What I don't get, it why do I need caps on the lower end rates ? Ultra lite requiring a 2GB cap ? It's to make it so unattractive, that the user will upgrade to the next tier up.
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GOLF LEAFS GOLF! | |
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|  RaptorNot a Dumptruck
join:2001-10-21
London, ON
3 edits | And how many movies is that oh mighty Rogers god of mathematics???
What's this? We're allowed to use 'Bittorrents'? But howwww? You throttle the bujeezus out of them?....
Who does their marketing, clearly they think we're idiots, or I guess just ignorant.
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....where's my fiber? | |
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1 edit | Re: marketing doublespeak said by Raptor:And how many movies is that oh mighty Rogers god of mathematics??? What's this? We're allowed to use 'Bittorrents'? But howwww? You throttle the bujeezus out of them?.... Who does their marketing, clearly they think we're idiots, or I guess just ignorant. I love their average of 60MB for HD movie trailers from Apple, last few trailers I watched there were all over 200MB. | |
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2 edits | quote:
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in this case 60GB equates to 6,291,456 e-mails and 1,572,864 page views, the letter kindly informs us, with pictures.
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quote: bthornhill
...or a single HD movie
Touchee!!
Chew on that TED. | |
| | |  DKSDamn Kidney StonesPremium,ExMod 2002
join:2001-03-22
Owen Sound, ON
kudos:2
·Bell Sympatico
| Re: marketing doublespeak said by Riplin:quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- in this case 60GB equates to 6,291,456 e-mails and 1,572,864 page views, the letter kindly informs us, with pictures. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- quote: bthornhill ...or a single HD movie Touchee!! Chew on that TED. You forget that Ted owns Rogers Video. He wants you to go rent that movie from his Rogers Video store.
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Need-based health care not greed-based health care. | |
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| | Canadian internet is going to shit. Canadian internet is going to shit. | |
| | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. If it's any consolation, you internet in Canada is A LOT
faster than most people get here in the states  . Besides that, yeah it really sucks with all those caps. Why are there all those caps in Canada? | |
| | | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. My mistake... YOUR internet, not you internet  | |
| | |  telcolackey5The Truth? You can't handle the truth
join:2007-04-06
Death Valley, CA | Why isn't my water bill flat fee? | |
| | | | RaptorNot a Dumptruck
join:2001-10-21
London, ON | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. It is in rural Ontario (in some places anyway). | |
| | | | |  SnickerdoPremium
join:2001-02-28
Niagara Falls, ON | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. said by Raptor:It is in rural Ontario (in some places anyway). It is in a lot of places, actually. In Montreal it is part of your property taxes from what I understand. | |
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| | | | | Water and internet access are two totally different things.
One is a finite natural resource costing varying amounts of money to pump through an infrastructure. The other is data and electricity which costs minimally more no matter if 1 GB is sent or 200 GB. The power is always on and the actual costs do not match in such a way to compare to moving water.
Geesh, get a society hooked on something and then rake the through the coals! Just hilarious! | |
| | | | | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. What you say is partly true, but if an ISP is maxing out their bandwidth, they have to add extra routers that cost money and overall the ISP will consume more electricity.
Basically, ISP prices should go up at the rate of inflation, and their capacities and speeds should keep pace with the current technology. That would be fair. | |
| | | | | | d25m03pPremium
join:2007-12-26
Abbotsford, BC | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. said by orangelemon:Basically, ISP prices should go up at the rate of inflation, and their capacities and speeds should keep pace with the current technology. That would be fair. Wrong... If prices go up, they should follow the rate that my salary go up ..... Which is 0%! Every business thinks that prices can keep going up, but if salaries don't follow, then soon, no-one will be able to afford anything. The answer by businesses... Put the prices up again and again.
Who the hell runs these businesses? MBA's? No wonder North America is becoming a third world continent! | |
| | | | | | | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. Hmm. Most salaries do go up, unless you're talking about a minimum-wage or fairly low-paying job. If yours doesn't, then perhaps you should try to find a better job. | |
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| | | hurfyPremium
join:2002-08-06
Spokane, WA | Ours is certainly close
Off the top of my head:
$40 water bill is for like $4.88 worth of water used and $3 worth of sewer, etc tied to it. The rest is fixed monthly costs even for zero usage. I bet yours is not too much different.
You want internet like your water bill:
$18.50 connect fee
$2.11 enviromental impact fee
$1.44 rate equalization
$.37 paperwork for above fees
$1.12 utility tax
$1.66 sales tax (vat)
plus $1 per GB**
**plus tax (still only half the lines as our water bill but...) | |
| | | | |  dvd536as Mr. Pink as they comePremium
join:2001-04-27
Phoenix, AZ
kudos:4 | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. said by hurfy:$18.50 connect fee $2.11 enviromental impact fee $1.44 rate equalization $.37 paperwork for above fees $1.12 utility tax $1.66 sales tax (vat) plus $1 per GB** Hmmmmmm. kind of looks like the average cell phone bill!
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You can never be too rich, too thin or have too much Bandwidth | |
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| | |  davoice
join:2000-08-12
Saxapahaw, NC
·Comporium
| Mine is... it's "free". All I pay is a real utility company - an electric coop no less - for the power to pull it out of ground and push it into my house.
And my electric utility company actually charges me less per kW when I use more power. Unlike these cap and surcharge ISPs who want to penalize people for actually using their product fully.
}Davoice | |
| | | | | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. Actually you (or the homeowner) had to pay for the infrastructure to get the water to you. There's the pipes in the home, and the pipes out to the well, and then the well, the pump and the cost to dig down to the water and install a pipe to that water. That can easily cost in the thousands of dollars depending on how deep they have to dig.
Now, you can consider your internet connection the same when you install your cable/fiber from your residence to the cable company and you are responsible for fixing any issues that come up with it. Of course you still need to pay the cable company a fee to use their network and send data out on to the Internet but that will be a much lower cost if you take on the costs/headache of managing the connection from the cable company to your home. | |
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| | | elwoodbluesElwood BluesPremium
join:2006-08-30
HarperLand | Mine is | |
| | | | nebular
join:2007-07-12
Peterborough, ON | because you live in death valley california, whereas I live on the trent severn waterway in ontario and enjoy a flat fee for my water | |
| | | | | telcolackey5The Truth? You can't handle the truth
join:2007-04-06
Death Valley, CA
1 edit | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. dupe | |
| | | | | telcolackey5The Truth? You can't handle the truth
join:2007-04-06
Death Valley, CA | said by nebular:because you live in death valley california, whereas I live on the trent severn waterway in ontario and enjoy a flat fee for my water I want to live closer to the Internet
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"Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear." - Dinah Craik | |
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| | | | Not really. Fios and Cablevision and cox are way ahead of us. Comcast is about even tho. | |
| | | | SnickerdoPremium
join:2001-02-28
Niagara Falls, ON | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. said by jessegr:Not really. Fios and Cablevision and cox are way ahead of us. Comcast is about even tho. FIOS sure, but the amount of money they're spending will come to bite them - and their customers - in the ass in a few years. Cablevision isn't any much better than what we have North of the border, as we've already got cable ISPs here with 30 and 50Mbit/s tiers, just like Cablevision.
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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. | |
| | | | | EPS
join:2008-02-13
Hingham, MA | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. I think this is a case where being a megacorporation helps- Verizon has so many other businesses (a majority stake in the most profitable wireless carrier in the US, a global data network inherited from the former MCI, a still substantially profitable copper landline network) that they can handle the hit from FiOS and still keep up their dividends enough to keep the stockholders from rioting... a smaller company couldn't do that. | |
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| | | You mean Central Canadian ISPs. When I moved to Alberta from Ontario I was surprised to find that they have 25Mbit no throttled connections here. And I always had the perception that things were behind here, but not so. For example if you walk into a mall a map of the place is automatically uploaded onto your PDA. Pretty tech savvy. I'm assuming it's something to spend oil money on. | |
| | | | | Re: Canadian internet is going to shit. Who is your ISP in Alberta? And, 1 being the worst and 10 being the best, what would you rate them? Finally, how much does it cost in USD? If it's a good price and the service is also good the I might just have to move to Canada  . | |
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Reviews:
·Comcast
| Capping isn't the future... What the future is is fiber optic connections straight to the house that replace HFC completely and the user gets a fixed bandwidth that incrementally drops down towards 100kbit as they go over set cap limits say they hit 50GB they drop to half their speed... 100GB 1/3rd 200GB 1/6th and so on until they hit a "overuse tier" where they have enough to surf but that is about it... until the next month where they reset... cap's right now are common because the technology is not where it should be, cramming QAM channels using up every single one not channel bonding not using the new DOCSIS 3 (yes i know its not really out yet) not laying fiber to the premisis... all kinda ways they can fix the problem with out doing per gb billing and abuse terminate capping... | |
|  gatorkramKaBOOM BabyPremium
join:2002-07-22
Winterville, NC
kudos:2
·Suddenlink
| Up? Down? Up and Down? Did I miss it, or did they not say if this is for downloading and uploading, or just downloading?
If they want to start charging this way, they need to crank up the modems wide open, and let dog eat dog.
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Give me bandwidth or give me death!
»/testhistory/661871/4f240 | |
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1 edit | Re: Up? Down? Up and Down? Basically rogers cable is so bad most every port is blocked everything is throttled the price goes up about every month the email rarely works there are no newsgroups. Almost forgot they block content and only let you surf what they allow you to surf. Basically it's like dial-up but web pages come up faster. Soon it'll be about a thousand dollars a month because the rates go up every month or so. | |
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zincPremium
join:2004-02-17
Kitchener, ON | 85 hour days? 2040 hours / month
= ~ 2040 hours / 30 days
= ~ 85 hours / day
WOW! Superhuman! | |
| |  Luker3
join:2004-10-09
Blacksburg, VA | Re: 85 hour days? 1,500,000 pages
Lets say you look at a page every second
30 days * 24 hours * 60 minutes * 60 seconds = 2,592,000 seconds in a month.
So, over half of the month you are doing nothing, but opening web pages every second. | |
| |  pokesphIt Is Almost FastPremium
join:2001-06-25
Sacramento, CA
kudos:1 | said by zinc:2040 hours / month = ~ 2040 hours / 30 days = ~ 85 hours / day WOW! Superhuman! WOW! Superhuman! ---- WoW exactly. | |
|
 DogfatherPremium
join:2007-12-26
Laguna Hills, CA
1 edit | Am I reading this right? Unlimited use for extra $25? So for $25 in penalties you get unlimited use?
That's the way I read it, that the per GB penalty caps out at $25. Or do they cut your service off at $25 in overage? | |
| |  Romney2012Defeat Obama 2012-Chg we can believe inPremium
join:2002-03-03
USA
kudos:4 | Re: Am I reading this right? Unlimited use for extra $25? said by Dogfather:So for $25 in penalties you get unlimited use? That's the way I read it, that the per GB penalty caps out at $25. Or do they cut your service off at $25 in overage? That isn't the way I read it. It doesn't spell it out in the Q&A section, but my take is that once you reach that $25 overage fee, you will get cut off. And why I think that is that the different tiers get different amounts of bytes transferred for that $25 overage fee. Those in the higher more expensive tiers get more bytes. If they weren't going to cut you off, why bother with the distinction because everyone could just buy the lowest tier and then file transfer like crazy at the lowest tier price and never pay more than $25 extra.
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My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page | |
| | | SnickerdoPremium
join:2001-02-28
Niagara Falls, ON | Re: Am I reading this right? Unlimited use for extra $25? said by Romney2012:That isn't the way I read it. It doesn't spell it out in the Q&A section, but my take is that once you reach that $25 overage fee, you will get cut off. Bzzt. That is the maximum charge for overage, your service will not get cut off once you hit the magic $25 number. Rogers still reserves the right to cut you off just like any ISP anywhere does, but this setup is identical to what Bell had, though Bell is abandoning it as of June and going the way of Videotron and causing people to re-mortgage their house to pay for overage fees.
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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. | |
|
| | Ultra lite has no limit on overuse fees They advertise ultra lite on television for this very reason. To suck you into thousands of dollars of overuse charges every month. Dsl reports get your facts straight before you post. This June 1st 2008 sympatico will have no limit on overuse fees for new customers. If it wasn't for their speed throttling nearly 24/7 new users could see charges in the thousands every month. | |
| | Host:
Road Runner
PC gaming GAMES
PC gaming Tech
1 edit | Re: Ultra lite has no limit on overuse fees Dsl reports get your facts straight before you post. Ultra lite has no limit on overuse fees Not according to the Rogers website:Will I be charged if I go beyond my monthly usage allowance?
Yes. If you exceed your monthly usage allowance, you will be charged as follows:
Ultra Lite – $5.00/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Lite – $2.50/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Express – $2.00/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Extreme – $1.50/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Extreme Plus – $1.25/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Please note: the grandfathered Ultra Lite over-allowance fee is $5.00/GB with no maximum, and the grandfathered Lite over-allowance fee is $3.00/GB with no maximum. | |
| | | | | Re: Ultra lite has no limit on overuse fees Directly from your link...
Will I be charged if I go beyond my monthly usage allowance?
Yes. If you exceed your monthly usage allowance, you will be charged as follows:
Ultra Lite – $5.00/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Lite – $2.50/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Express – $2.00/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Extreme – $1.50/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Extreme Plus – $1.25/GB to a maximum of $25.00
Please note: the grandfathered Ultra Lite over-allowance fee is $5.00/GB with no maximum, and the grandfathered Lite over-allowance fee is $3.00/GB with no maximum.
Read the part at the end that says "with no maximum".
See dsl reports got the thing wrong and i was right. | |
| | | | | | Re: Ultra lite has no limit on overuse fees Sort of: said by you :
This June 1st 2008 sympatico will have no limit on overuse fees for new customers.
Grandfathered customers have no limit, which is something. New customers do. | |
|
 Smith6612Premium,MVM
join:2008-02-01
North Tonawanda, NY
kudos:21
·Frontier Communi..
·Verizon Online DSL
1 edit | Caps suck It's a good thing Verizon isn't capping their DSL service, as I consume around 100GB at the most a month if I am lucky. I do everything from downloading games from Steam, hosting games here (and large ones as well), downloading HD movies I've bought, along with a lot of 1080p HD video files I upload, YouTube, game demos, ESPN360, etc. If I were to get charged by the byte by a company like Rogers, I'd pretty much end up with a bill probably over $100 a month. The only thing I'd do is switch to a different provider if I was a Canadian.
As for those images, I never knew e-mails, web pages and games all used a fixed amount of bandwidth. For games, I know of some games that are total bandwidth hogs, and some of us like to host servers  | |
|  LaZ3RPremium
join:2003-01-17 |  And Guess What?!
The throttling is complete bullshit and I hate it with passion. I really wish this site was popular enough to make a news story on TV about it so Rogers would get a little scared but nope, that'll never happen. Only thing we can do is accept it since 1-100 people here might now like it including myself, but the millions of other subscribers have no freaking clue how to use a computer and thus see no problems.
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Life is a game of blackjack. You keep playing until you bust. | |
| | | | Re: And Guess What?! So I take it Rogers is Canada's version of Comcast except worse . So then Bell Canada must be Canada's at&t except worse as well. I'm glad(as far as internet and telecom goes) I don't live in Canada. | |
| | amungusPremium
join:2004-11-26
America Reviews:
·AT&T DSL Service
| Sadly, you have a good point about the many many users who can barely figure out how to use their computers... such users likely won't care and will continue bumbling through the internets.
Others might bump into the caps and be forced to subscribe to a pricier level of service, even if they don't need the speed - but they'll be forced into it because of a lesser restriction on usage - only to find that they now have faster service, and with that, wish to use it more, thus going back to bumping into the next cap and having to get an even faster level, only to continue this vicious cycle of lunacy.
Such a cycle will eventually push enough people into their most expensive level(s) at which point it might register in the brains of some people that they feel ripped off enough to complain about it. At this stage, there might be a slim chance of such occurrences to lead to a larger realization that the truth of the matter is that everyone has been scammed.
If I were you, I'd write/call/fax/email every media outlet in your area.
Explain that this is a scam because it will force unsuspecting customers to pay for levels of service which they may not need, AND that the provider probably can't even deliver the highest levels to all locations... If one picks it up and reports it halfway right, others might follow suit. | |
|
Romney2012Defeat Obama 2012-Chg we can believe inPremium
join:2002-03-03
USA
kudos:4 |  Change of heart on user caps
U.S. users should keep an eye on, because the pricing and presentation is something many U.S. cable operators would very much like to bring to the States. Karl,
I thought your stance on this was that it would never happen in the U.S. In fact, I have been told in many posts that my thoughts that this was coming to the U.S. were flat out wrong.
Has their been a change in heart? Is this now very possible as I have said all along?
--
My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page | |
| |
See 7 replies to this post | |
| | | | Re: If the tools don't work, how can anyone be sure? Stop using logic. It confuses the company shills. | |
| |  MashikiBalking The Enemy's Plans
join:2002-02-04
Woodstock, ON | Don't ask me but the fancy page I got in the mail listed 6/10/11GB for Nov/Dec/Jan and I downloaded around 40GB for each month.
I guess it's tech-voodoo. | |
|
| | by the byte ... and run by retired Oil company executives | |
| amungusPremium
join:2004-11-26
America Reviews:
·AT&T DSL Service
| frak that Seriously stupid move.
I would not be able to tolerate such a system. I'm not even that heavy of a user, but screw this nonsense. With Rhapsody, Netflix, gaming, surfing, random downloading, windows + other updates (antivirus, other software, etc...), it would add up rather quickly.
Oh, and I have more than one computer... So... again, screw that noise.
Even IF I was within the limits, I'd still be upset. What about when I feel like going and downloading a Linux to try out? A game demo or 5?
This is not how the internet is supposed to work. This is completely counterintuitive, completely wrong on so many levels.
The internet should not be sold on such a basis. People are too used to having it be as unlimited as they can get.
I realize it's a packet switched network, but this is outrageous. People are used to using such services in ways much like a circuit switched, or analog network.
You can leave your tv on all year if you want. You can talk on your phone (and now even cell phones...) all day and all night if you want. You can leave your water running all the time if you want (and are able, and if it won't run your area out of water... ).
Going back to dialup days, you could leave your dialup running all the time...
With DSL, you can also have that running full time, and the phone companies usually have no problem with this because their network(s) were designed to handle such a thing...
The more people start using their internet connection, the more need there will be for it to be a truly available system, not unlike so many other things.
I find this idea repulsive and ingorant, stagnant and foul smelling, narrow minded and insolent, and utterly disgusting in every way; especially the little pictures showing what you could get out of their service. Makes me sick.
The internet is not meant to be (neutered) this way. | |
| |  ARGONAUTgot ping?Premium
join:2006-01-24
New Albany, IN | :( Looks like cell phone service now. | |
| | | We don't have much choice... Rogers is pretty well the sole cable choice in many area. And in areas not served by DSL, they are the ONLY broadband choice. They face few government regulations about what they can and can't do. No wonder they are able to stick it to us pretty well any time they want to. I was one of the lucky ones - I'm an Ultra Lite subscriber who is in on the 60Gb grandfathered tier, rather than being reduced to 2Gb. I've always stayed within that 60Gb cap with no problems, as I'm usually somewhere around 30Gb per month. If they had attempted to reduce my cap, I was prepared to go back to dial up rather than paying them $20.00 extra per month to upgrade to Express. I would like to see a lot more regulation in the Canadian broadband industry. It is my opinion that Rogers is in a conflict of interest position regarding their throttling and caps. In addition to being a broadband ISP, they provide cable television, and own a chain of video stores, among other things. I think their throttling and capping is less about controlling bandwidth use than it is about preventing the use of downloading technologies which may hurt their other financial interests. | |
| | | | Re: We don't have much choice... I think you've pretty much hit the nail on the head. | |
|
| | Extortion Overall it's not going too good in Otario anyways, Bell and Rogers are just manipulating and extorting their subscribers.
But we have to take it like we like it, we have no other choice. They can do whatever they want unfortunately. | |
| | | | Re: Extortion said by TI POIL:But we have to take it like we like it, we have no other choice. They can do whatever they want unfortunately. Not true. If you're going to be limited by ridiculously low caps, then you may as well just go back to dial up. Same difference. With the caps in place, you're paying for what...faster email? I bet if enough users voted with their wallets and returned to dial up, Rogers would change its tune pretty damn quick. | |
| | | | | Re: Extortion Bittorrent throttling is one good reason to go back to dial up. I ran tests on Bittorrent downloading using my Rogers Ultra Lite account. I then unplugged the cable modem, and connected using my free dial up account with NetZero. Download speeds pretty well exactly the same. If Rogers ever starts throttling certain sites, like Rapidshare or MegaUpload, rather than certain protocols, then I'd definitely go back to dial up. Dial up can handle my e-mail just fine, and surfing is reasonable, although slower. Download speeds is why most people subscribe to broadband, and downloading is what they are now trying to prevent us using it for. I'm quite certain NetZero would be happy to see an old customer returning. I'd had their Platinum service for years until switching to cable. | |
|
 RARPSL
join:1999-12-08
Suffern, NY | Fair Caps and Roll-Over Usage If the ISP claims that I am entitled to xGB a month and must pay if I exceed this level, I claim I am entitled to a refund of that fine if my average monthly usage is under the limit. IOW: If my limit is 40Gb/Month and in Month 1 I do 45Gb, and in Month 2 I do only 30Gb, my Month 2 bill should have a refund of the fine that was on the Month 1 bill since I did only 75Gb not 80Gb in Months 1 and 2. In fact a Month 1 usage of 30Gb should allow me to do 50Gb in month 2 BEFORE I am subject to an Over-Usage Fine.
IOW: Any under usage should roll-over to the next month. I am willing to allow the roll-over to expire or get depreciated after a certain period of time but I think the fairest method is to FIRST burn-off the roll-over before using that month's allocated usage. Since I am paying for 40Gb a month I should be allowed to use it no matter how long it takes me (I am not asking for free months when my roll-over gets to 40Gb but only the waving of overage fees so long as my roll-over is greater than my overage). | |
|  HappyBunnyHi. Cram It.Premium
join:2001-06-23
Long Beach, CA
kudos:1 | What about web and graphic designers? I never watch movies. But I am a graphic designer and I upload files to printers via ftp. One file might be 30MB, some are 80 MB, some are more. I dont do it every day, or even every week, so a business package is overkill. So where does this leave people like myself? Do I tack on a per MB charge to my client? | |
| | | | Re: What about web and graphic designers? Rogers and sympatico both speed throttle ftp. | |
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Reviews:
 ·net2phone
| Odd Sizing 60GB equated to 1,572,864 page views is absurd and that should be obvious to any ISP. Their claim is less than 40K per "page". They may have forgotten common elements like imbedded images, scripts, style sheets, flash, etc.
Their Roger's own "Abundant" link gets 80K from their server, twice the supposed claimed average.
Viewing the root of this site gets 140K
www.cnn.com gets 560K
www.yahoo.com gets 185K
www.myspace.com gets 135K
www.microsoft.com gets 205K
www.disney.com gets 1.6M | |
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If the tools don't work, how can anyone be sure?
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That's the problem with a oligopoly. It is the old problem when the service is provided by an effective monopoly. The broadband providers constantly represent that they are going to reduce service cost when they actually increase service cost. Years ago when most customers accessed the Internet via a dial up connection, service providers were forced to change the rate structure because of competition. Most customers were charged for hours connected like the old AOL pricing plan. Eventually when one service provider provided unlimited service in an area, all service providers were forced to provide unlimited service or lose customers. Remember in the early days of Internet access there were many ISP's after years of consolidation there are now few. What we need is regulation of broadband rates and service packages or more broadband providers. Another solution would be to setup a government subsidized transport company, Municipal Fiber. It would be a utility service that would offer transport only, to any company wanting to sell digital services. The rates would be regulated. The oligopoly would be forced to compete with the alternate transport utility. This arrangement is not impossible, in most municipalities a government agency provides water and sewer services. Without such an arrangement prices will continue to rise and the Broadband Oligopoly will continue to cherry pick the areas where they want to provide service.