Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

readwriteweb.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 31 posts

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#21

Post by pyre »

jcr wrote: post #14
kyleslattery wrote: post #5

Talking to a co-worker, who used to work in customer service at a different US wireless carrier, this is common practice. His example was customers who use terabytes of data a month would get throttled for the remainder of the period, similar to what Verizon's proposing. It'd be interesting to know how much data the top 5% of users use.

Your post is overly optimistic, but your oversight of "terabytes" is entirely due to Verizon refusing to elaborate on the details of their data plans or how they work in practice. On plans sold as "unlimited" there is actually a usage cap. When the cap is exceeded, bandwidth throttling is employed through the end of the monthly billing cycle. For the newer $50/mo data plans, the cap is 5GByte/mo. For the newer $80/mo…

I think that the post you're replying to may have confused the target of the throttling. The comment would make sense in the context of Verizon FIOS rather than Verizon Wireless.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#22

Post by kinofcain »

modeless wrote: post #4

I think the worse news is the transcoding proxies they are announcing, not-so-transparently lowering the quality of any JPEG and MPEG files you download. This is why the Internet needs end-to-end encryption on by default.

Agreed, SSL should be the default.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#23

Post by ars »

eli wrote: post #12
modeless wrote: post #4

I think the worse news is the transcoding proxies they are announcing, not-so-transparently lowering the quality of any JPEG and MPEG files you download. This is why the Internet needs end-to-end encryption on by default.

I've always been curious with these transcoders and copyright law. Why are they allowed to alter and redistribute content without the permission of the author? Could I set up proxy that strips flash ads out of other people's content and replaces them with my own tasteful text ads? How is that different from scraping their content and reposting it on my server?

For copyright to take effect the work must be "fixed" in a tangible form.

See here: http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/obtaining.html#fixation

That leads to a question of whether storing it in RAM counts as "fixed". I can't find a reference right now, but I remember reading that congress recently clarified the issue that storing in RAM does not count as fixed (and prior to that it was either an open question, or it did count).

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#24

Post by jcr »

mdasen wrote: post #16
kyleslattery wrote: post #5

Talking to a co-worker, who used to work in customer service at a different US wireless carrier, this is common practice. His example was customers who use terabytes of data a month would get throttled for the remainder of the period, similar to what Verizon's proposing. It'd be interesting to know how much data the top 5% of users use.

It's impossible for a user over a 3G connection to pull terabytes a month. Assuming 1Mbps, you would be able to transfer 8.6GB per day or 259GB per month if it was always on. Even if you hit the 3.1Mbps theoretical max of EV-DO every second of every day for a month, you'd be shy of a terrabyte. I've had friends who have worked on a network and it isn't unusual that the top 5% of users use 50% of the capacity, but 3G…

If you sit down and thing about it from the perspective of a service provider building and maintaining a network with limited wireless spectrum, you'd see how a limiting the "Top X%" of users would work very poorly. Overall usage continually increases, and typically increases faster than network capacity can be added.

In the specific case of Verizon Wireless "broadband" data plans (e.g. the plans based on EVDO rather than 1xRTT), back in 2004-6 Verizon (mistakenly) sold the plans as "unlimited" only to start terminating customers who actually used it as unlimited and creating new cap-limited plus paid-overage plans. This resulted in a lawsuit where the old "unlimited" customers were allowed to keep their "unlimited" contracts (without being terminated or paying overages), but if excessive use was detected, the connection would be throttled back until the end of the current monthly billing cycle.

This arrangement with old customers actually worked out surprisingly well for both Verizon and its customers. The customers don't need to worry about surprise bills for "overages" and Verizon can still manage their network resources and investments reasonably.

The new Verizon iPhone4 "unlimited" plans are essentially the same deal offered to the old "granfathered-in" customers. If you exceed the 5GB cap, the bandwidth is throttled down to 200Kbit/s for the remainder of the monthly billing cycle (and potentially the next billing cycle). Assuming full-time/full-capacity usage, the 200Kbit/s throttle means you're reduced to roughly 1GByte/mo.

The problem is, many people mistakenly believe a cellular-based wireless data network is only used with phones. This isn't true. It's understandably tough to imagine someone using a phone to transfer many GB of data each month, but since the wireless network is used for a lot more than phones, particularly backhauls and personal computers, bandwidth varies a great deal between customers depending on their needs/situation. The result is, the "Top X%" metric is entirely misleading due to the variance in use-cases.

Pulling "X%" numbers out of thin air is misleading at best. Worse yet, LET has a theoretical maximum speed 1Gbit/s, so 5.4 TERABYTES is possible per month. Of course, neither Verizon nor any other commercial LTE network is currently running near theoretical max, but that's beside the point.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#25

Post by jcr »

pyre wrote: post #21
jcr wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your post is overly optimistic, but your oversight of "terabytes" is entirely due to Verizon refusing to elaborate on the details of their data plans or how they work in practice. On plans sold as "unlimited" there is actually a usage cap. When the cap is exceeded, bandwidth throttling is employed through the end of the monthly billing cycle. For the newer $50/mo data plans, the cap is 5GByte/mo. For the newer $80/mo…

I think that the post you're replying to may have confused the target of the throttling. The comment would make sense in the context of Verizon FIOS rather than Verizon Wireless.

Yes. Though he specifically mentioned "wireless" he probably confused land-line broadband services with wireless services. In the case of "Verizon" (parent company), "Verizon Wireless" is an entirely separate company from their other broadband and landline holdings. I actually have both "Verizon Wireless" service and a "Verizon" landline phone, but there's no way to get just one bill for both.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#26

Post by eli »

ars wrote: post #23
eli wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been curious with these transcoders and copyright law. Why are they allowed to alter and redistribute content without the permission of the author? Could I set up proxy that strips flash ads out of other people's content and replaces them with my own tasteful text ads? How is that different from scraping their content and reposting it on my server?

For copyright to take effect the work must be "fixed" in a tangible form. See here: http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/obtaining.html#fixation That leads to a question of whether storing it in RAM counts as "fixed". I can't find a reference right now, but I remember reading that congress recently clarified the issue that storing in RAM does not count as fixed (and prior to that it was either an open question, or it did…

Seems like it's got to be a lot fuzzier than that.

So if Verizon replaced all banner ads on all sites you visit while using their network with their own ads, that would be legal?

And I could create a website that appears to republish all the content from NY Times without ads so long as in the background I'm proxying requests back to their server and storing the results in RAM?

Edit: I found a piece on the legality of web scraping in general http://www.galvanilegal.com/is-web-scraping-legal/

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#27

Post by eli »

patrickgzill wrote: post #19
eli wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always been curious with these transcoders and copyright law. Why are they allowed to alter and redistribute content without the permission of the author? Could I set up proxy that strips flash ads out of other people's content and replaces them with my own tasteful text ads? How is that different from scraping their content and reposting it on my server?

If it is just transcoding then a) they are not storing it permanently, it is just in a "buffer" b) they are not changing the content any more than converting 16bit PCM audio to 8Khz voice quality (for instance for a music on hold application) is. That is, it is not "alteration" in that the song or image is still recognizably the same - they are not changing the rhythm of the song or the height of the buildings in the…

If copyright only protects content that is stored permanently, doesn't that mean I can stream whatever I want without paying for it?

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#28

Post by ars »

eli wrote: post #26
ars wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For copyright to take effect the work must be "fixed" in a tangible form. See here: http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/obtaining.html#fixation That leads to a question of whether storing it in RAM counts as "fixed". I can't find a reference right now, but I remember reading that congress recently clarified the issue that storing in RAM does not count as fixed (and prior to that it was either an open question, or it did…

Seems like it's got to be a lot fuzzier than that. So if Verizon replaced all banner ads on all sites you visit while using their network with their own ads, that would be legal? And I could create a website that appears to republish all the content from NY Times without ads so long as in the background I'm proxying requests back to their server and storing the results in RAM? Edit: I found a piece on the legality of…

Computer programmers are used to exact rules, but copyright law has a large subjective component, and it depends on what you do with it.

So the exact same technical action can have varied legality depending on what the end user does with it and the intent of the person doing it.

So striping ads in order to save bandwidth may be legal while stripping ads because you protest the concept of ads may not be.

Or stripping ads (in order to save bandwidth) may be legal for your ISP but illegal for a 3rd party.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#29

Post by tyhjnmyh »

eli wrote: post #26
ars wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For copyright to take effect the work must be "fixed" in a tangible form. See here: http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/obtaining.html#fixation That leads to a question of whether storing it in RAM counts as "fixed". I can't find a reference right now, but I remember reading that congress recently clarified the issue that storing in RAM does not count as fixed (and prior to that it was either an open question, or it did…

Seems like it's got to be a lot fuzzier than that. So if Verizon replaced all banner ads on all sites you visit while using their network with their own ads, that would be legal? And I could create a website that appears to republish all the content from NY Times without ads so long as in the background I'm proxying requests back to their server and storing the results in RAM? Edit: I found a piece on the legality of…

In the UK British Telecom set up an ad service called Phorn that monitored your browsing and replaced ads with targeted ones from it's own suppliers.

A huge public backlash when it replaced charity "save the children" ads with ones inviting you to buy interesting videos of schoolgirls, caused it reconsider what had only been 'a trial concept'

The courts decided it had broken just about all the privacy/wiretapping laws but nothing to do with copyright. Naturally it got off with a warning under the 'laws don't really apply to big telecoms companies" amendment.

Re: Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

#30

Post by jcr »

jcr wrote: post #24
mdasen wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's impossible for a user over a 3G connection to pull terabytes a month. Assuming 1Mbps, you would be able to transfer 8.6GB per day or 259GB per month if it was always on. Even if you hit the 3.1Mbps theoretical max of EV-DO every second of every day for a month, you'd be shy of a terrabyte. I've had friends who have worked on a network and it isn't unusual that the top 5% of users use 50% of the capacity, but 3G…

If you sit down and thing about it from the perspective of a service provider building and maintaining a network with limited wireless spectrum, you'd see how a limiting the "Top X%" of users would work very poorly. Overall usage continually increases, and typically increases faster than network capacity can be added. In the specific case of Verizon Wireless "broadband" data plans (e.g. the plans based on EVDO rather…

Seems I failed to proof read...

s/Worse yet, LET has/Worse yet, LTE has/

and a few other mistakes.

Post reply on HN