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Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

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Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#151

Post by kcdenman »

Bud wrote: post #144
neonfunk wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually agree with metering; I think it's the only fair measure. Granted, the metering you describe sounds atrocious, and there'll probably be a long messy transition to the point where our internet bill is more like our electric bill. But imagine this: on mobile networks, instead of voice minutes, text messages, data caps, fees for tethering, and every other scheme the Telcos are concocting right now (with regard…

The idea that metering is or will be "fair" as applied by rapacious telecoms is beyond hilarious. You honestly think the rate will be within an order of magnitude of your guess? Pardon me while I get a hernia from laughter.

The telecoms will be as rapacious as the rules of the game allow them to be. As with all metered utilities the price needs to be regulated so that the consumer avoids abusive pricing. The question to be answered periodically will be how much does a GB cost for the telecom to provide a customer and what is a fair profit to sustain infrastructure development.

Without a meter system in place the flat rate will penalize small bandwidth users and let high bandwidth users get the bargain.

I agree that if the pricing were completely up to the telecoms they would ravage our wallets until we are eating ramen noodles 7 days a week. However, given their position of power they will have to openly defend their claims to raising unit prices in court.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#152

Post by tel »

caf wrote: post #146
gyom wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a French Canadian guy working in an English workplace and I feel a bit insulted whenever I hear this expression. I never hear anyone complain about it, but it makes me want to start saying "pardon my English" right after belching loudly (on purpose for that occasion). The only thing keeping me from doing that is that I don't think people would make the connection and understand the reference. I don't know how Jew…

It's not supposed to be a slight at the French. It's a "polite fiction" - the user of the phrase is pretending that the swear word was a (non-offensive) word in another language, and the other party is pretending to believe this (since of course they are so pure that they have never heard the word in question before). Both parties of course know exactly what is going on, but the device allows the first person to apol…

I thought it was always a part of the (possibly true, but I'm no francophone) mythos that French just has a much better swearing vocabulary. A statement like that, I'd think at least certain parts of French culture should get behind.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#153

Post by spitfire »

fyrerise wrote: post #128
sjs wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This situation really sucks, but remember that those of us with Telus or Shaw don't have anything to complain about at the moment so you aren't hearing about all of us on 10-25 mbps lines, with 50-200 GB soft caps that aren't enforced. I'm torrenting up a storm 24/7, and regularly download shows and movies on iTunes and Netflix, stream Grooveshark at home and on my phone. I don't even hear anything if I use 2x my mon…

This isn't accurate. Shaw has recently jumped on the same bandwagon and started enforcing hard caps with overage fees. Just go here if you want to check that: http://www.shaw.ca/en-ca/ProductsServices/Internet/High-Spee... ($2.00/GB for each GB used above plan’s limit) AFAIK, Telus isn't doing yet, but I've heard that this is a technical limitation rather than lack of desire to do so.

Have you actually gotten a bill from them yet? My bill is the same $47/mo it's been for a while. I don't have a tv.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#155

Post by napierzaza »

neonfunk wrote: post #96
acangiano wrote: post #24

I'll provide one data point of how this affects Canadian internet users. I currently have no caps with TekSavvy and pay $39 a month. Starting from March 1st, I will pay $31.95/mo with a 25 GB cap. Any gigabyte over the limit will cost about 2 bucks. Now, you can buy a block at discounted prices. According to TekSavvy, based on my internet usage, I will need to buy at least a 275 GB extra block. Believe it or not, I d…

I actually agree with metering; I think it's the only fair measure. Granted, the metering you describe sounds atrocious, and there'll probably be a long messy transition to the point where our internet bill is more like our electric bill. But imagine this: on mobile networks, instead of voice minutes, text messages, data caps, fees for tethering, and every other scheme the Telcos are concocting right now (with regard…

You have no idea what you're talking about. Bell hasn't upgraded its service, just the price. It's been pretending it's the users fault that things are slow but it keeps putting more users on the same network. They have no incentive to improve service, especially if the government agrees they can charge whatever they want.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#156

Post by napierzaza »

zmmmmm wrote: post #150
lsc wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metering only makes sense if the costs vary with usage. In the case of DSL, the vast majority of the cost is the cost of maintaining the copper pair to your house, and that cost largely doesn't change, regardless of usage. Now, if the line from the CO (where the DSL terminates) to the internet was a significant bit of the cost, I'd agree with you. But my understanding is that the line from the CO to the 'net is a ver…

> Metering only makes sense if the costs vary with usage ... in the case of DSL, the vast majority of the cost is the cost of maintaining the copper pair to your house, and that cost largely doesn't change, regardless of usage. That's a somewhat naive view of things. It only works if all the upstream equipment has infinite capacity. If you (and others like you) use 275GB instead of 10GB then it absolutely does cause…

Bandwidth is sold in bulk, pennies by the gigabyte. Not dollars. It's not just covering their costs, it's obscene.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#157

Post by barrkel »

neonfunk wrote: post #96
acangiano wrote: post #24

I'll provide one data point of how this affects Canadian internet users. I currently have no caps with TekSavvy and pay $39 a month. Starting from March 1st, I will pay $31.95/mo with a 25 GB cap. Any gigabyte over the limit will cost about 2 bucks. Now, you can buy a block at discounted prices. According to TekSavvy, based on my internet usage, I will need to buy at least a 275 GB extra block. Believe it or not, I d…

I actually agree with metering; I think it's the only fair measure. Granted, the metering you describe sounds atrocious, and there'll probably be a long messy transition to the point where our internet bill is more like our electric bill. But imagine this: on mobile networks, instead of voice minutes, text messages, data caps, fees for tethering, and every other scheme the Telcos are concocting right now (with regard…

Fixed prices for fixed sizes of data isn't efficient, economically speaking, because marginal costs are not proportional to marginal data transit; either the price is too low to prevent congestion at peak times, or it's too high and leaves pipes underutilized at off-peak times - and the times don't lend themselves to simplistic on-off peak analysis.

What you want is spot prices dependent on congestion, but that creates a different problem, opacity in pricing, where people will be fearful to use owing to uncertainty in how much it will cost.

I think the fairest mechanism is probably some kind of QoS by inverse usage: where congestion occurs, drop packets belonging to users who transfer the most. Unfortunately, I'd expect that to be computationally infeasible, as it would require fairly complex dynamic and stateful logic in routers to process the accounting and make decisions on a packet by packed basis fast enough.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#158

Post by napierzaza »

gyom wrote: post #111
neonfunk wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually agree with metering; I think it's the only fair measure. Granted, the metering you describe sounds atrocious, and there'll probably be a long messy transition to the point where our internet bill is more like our electric bill. But imagine this: on mobile networks, instead of voice minutes, text messages, data caps, fees for tethering, and every other scheme the Telcos are concocting right now (with regard…

I also agree with metering if we're charged prices that we consider reasonable (defined by the prices that most people are paying elsewhere in the world). I'd like to pay for internet like I pay for electricity. We pay by the kW*h and that's it. I think it'd be nice to pay a higher rate for electricity / internet during the day if it meant that we'd pay a lower rate during the night. I keep hearing about how european…

Costa Rica, not as poor as Africa, gets 5$ a month for cell with infinite data.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#159

Post by patrickgzill »

zmmmmm wrote: post #150
lsc wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Metering only makes sense if the costs vary with usage. In the case of DSL, the vast majority of the cost is the cost of maintaining the copper pair to your house, and that cost largely doesn't change, regardless of usage. Now, if the line from the CO (where the DSL terminates) to the internet was a significant bit of the cost, I'd agree with you. But my understanding is that the line from the CO to the 'net is a ver…

> Metering only makes sense if the costs vary with usage ... in the case of DSL, the vast majority of the cost is the cost of maintaining the copper pair to your house, and that cost largely doesn't change, regardless of usage. That's a somewhat naive view of things. It only works if all the upstream equipment has infinite capacity. If you (and others like you) use 275GB instead of 10GB then it absolutely does cause…

It is not at all naive, it is very accurate.

After the connection hits the DSLAM it goes onto fiber, which starts at 1 Gbps capacity and goes up to either 40Gbps or 100Gbps per port. Only in the smallest markets would they use a T3/DS3 connection.

Actual bandwidth costs for 200GB (which is about 1Mbps) over the course of a month are about $1 USD in almost any major US city.

Even assuming 4x the cost for Canada's smaller market size, we are talking about a ($4 into $55 upcharge) 13 times markup once the cost of the basic connection, tech support, marketing, etc. is covered by the initial $31.95.

Re: Canadians Just Became World's Biggest Internet Losers.

#160

Post by napierzaza »

waterside81 wrote: post #97
cal5k wrote: post #69

Here's another reason why this is bullshit... this is an excerpt from an article I'm working on: The biggest problem with these caps is that they are, plain and simply, anticompetitive. Probably illegally so. Let’s take Bell’s internet service as an example. Bell recently rolled out their “Fibe” offerings, both for internet and IPTV. Their most accommodating plan, Fibe 25, has a ludicrously low cap of 75GB. It would…

Rogers’ suspiciously well-timed lowering of caps on their most popular plans when Netflix entered the Canadian market I have intimate knowledge of this issue and it really was just bad timing on Rogers' part. They had been planning on rolling this out well before Netflix's announcement, at least 8 months, but they just chose to pick the absolute worst time to make their announcement.

I'm so glad to hear they they planned on pulling that crappy manoeuvre before Netflix. Thanks for the info
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