The Secretly Horrifying Implications of AT&Ts Bandwidth Caps

[qubit]

Mine is unlimited currently. I sure hope it stays that way. Out of curiosity is there anyway I can currently track my own download rate on a monthly basis?

There's various ways. You could run the excellent freebie NetMeter app which has a totalling function. However, this is obviously limited to just your main machine. A better way is to get your firewall to do it. Roll-your-own Linux firewall Astaro does this and totals the results per month.

Best of all, would be to have your ISP supply an online control panel that does all this for you. Mine does and it's really useful.

 

[Bengie]

Im unable to access the source at the moment. So what basically is happening, is this company is capping DL amounts or speed for their customers???

I'm from Australia and never heard of them. So enlighten me if I say something wrong.

If they cap DL amounts/speeds people will just move to a different provider?

The internet block from my College comes up as this:

Access to this web site which is categorized as >>Humor/Jokes<<, is currently restricted due to the *Name hidden* Internet Communications Policy.

Or is AT&T like Australias Telstra which owns the majority of internet cabling through-out the country and other providers buy a loan of these cables for their services?

Your college sucks. My when I was in college 4 years ago, the computer lab rules were "you can browse any legal content you want, but if someone can see your screen and they are offended, you have to move or stop browsing that content"

You could hang in the computer labs browsing porn for all they cared. Although, if the lab is full and you're piss'n around on Facebook/etc and someone needs to get work done, you gotta give up your computer.

 

[theonedub]

You think 150GB was bad, Frontier had actually tried to cap landline DSL @ 5GB/month. Then they attempted a cap @ 100GB/month years later. Both times the great work by http://stopthecap.com/ helped to get it squashed. That site is pretty good on following usage cap/overcharging schemes and getting them publicized enough to, in some cases, get them removed.

 

[zithe]

I have time warner internet. If I remember correctly, they planned to do the same thing but changed their minds when there was a massive public outrage.

 

[mastrdrver]

If anyone has any hopes for Google to change anything as far as internet bandwidth is concerned needs to do some research from ~10 years ago when ATT was going to do fiber to the home. The Cable providers cried foul to the FCC. So the FCC did this awesome thing and stepped in and said that ATT could only go to the last ~10 ft. Do I need to mention that ATT decided it wasn't worth it?

Also when the government broke up Bell "the first time" the separated the manufacturing/long distance from the service end and divided up the service end in to many pieces. If the broke up Bell again they would only be breaking up the service end again. The manufacturing part became Lucent when ATT divided in the 90s.

all internet - and i mean literally all, is fed through one provider here, telstra. their leverage lets people get 15GB a month for the same price others pay for unlimited... and they're a few ISP's down the foodchain

Just to point out real quick.....

I'm quite amazed by some sites (and people who comment on them) to the lack of knowledge of most (if not close to all) about how much of the "internet" in the US really boils down to about two companies: Bell and ATT

I'll have to double check but I'm pretty sure that covers cable too. I'm not talking about the "local" providers of the internet but the ones who either own or built (at one point all) the overwhelming majority of the internet infrastructure in the US.

 

[Over_Lord]

You think 150GB was bad, Frontier had actually tried to cap landline DSL @ 5GB/month. Then they attempted a cap @ 100GB/month years later. Both times the great work by http://stopthecap.com/ helped to get it squashed. That site is pretty good on following usage cap/overcharging schemes and getting them publicized enough to, in some cases, get them removed.

thats what we have here, 14$ Internet DSL India gives you 5GB and 512kbps only...

 

[Mussels]

thats what we have here, 14$ Internet DSL India gives you 5GB and 512kbps only...

that'd be $40 here, and they'd make you bundle a phone line with it as well.

Oh and then we'd get indian guys as tech support as well, so we're even on that count.

 

[Aceman.au]

that'd be $40 here, and they'd make you bundle a phone line with it as well.

Oh and then we'd get indian guys as tech support as well, so we're even on that count.

I can back that up as my parents had to do that too. $79 AUD a month for 400kbytes of DL and 100kbytes of upload with a 100GB of total download+upload limit. Bundled with a phone and mobile plan setup. And the 79 dollars is the internet alone, I don't know the total bill amount.

Mussels Ive heard if u threaten to change provider they give you a better deal

 

[Mussels]

best bet is not to threaten, but to actually just leave. some people get really stubborn about losing their phone numbers and their 'discounts' tho.