Time Warner to begin internet billing based on usage in SA (updated title) (San Antonio: stats, relocate to)

[Spock's Beard]

Originally Posted by cwh

The information superhighway has never been free.

It is not all that bad. You get to pay based on what you use. I think the caps that TW is proposing are rather low and may come back to bite them. The folks that are consuming excessive amounts need to pay their share, rather than be subsidized by those that use much less.

You just don't get it. No limits to bandwidth is what made the internet what it is. So some use more than others? So what. At least it's there, and you should be able to do with it as you please without a restriction from a greedy fascist company that somehow eludes antitrust laws.

[scuba steve]

Originally Posted by cwh

The information superhighway has never been free.

It is not all that bad. You get to pay based on what you use. I think the caps that TW is proposing are rather low and may come back to bite them. The folks that are consuming excessive amounts need to pay their share, rather than be subsidized by those that use much less.

Likewise, we should charge more towards those who watch more TV than others. That's more bandwidth too.

I think it's a horrible idea - hope it gets a lot of attention online. I haven't seen it make too many headlines yet... I'm still giving it time.

[rd2007]

I have another good analogy for this.. it's like buying a Corvette, but demanding to pay the Malibu price because you never plan on taking it over 60 MPH. That's your own fault and there's no need to punish everyone else just because you don't get the full value out of something.
Life is what you make it You don't need to bring everyone else down to your level just because you choose to sit in the La-Z-Boy all day..

[Drzy]

I too think paying for the service you use is terrible. Completely un-American!

Can you believe McDonald's charges me for what I eat, rather than charging everyone the same flat rate? Not fair!!

And those banks that charge fees to people who withdraw from their ATMs that aren't a part of that bank? How dare they charge for a service they provide! We should be able to withdraw from the ATMs that they service and stiock with cash for free! Unfair!

Here's a little-known fact. Did you know that some car washes are charging EXTRA when you get extra services done to your car?? I went to the one on Huebner last weekend, and they wanted me to hand over more of my hard-earned money to do some extra cleaning on my tires. Totally unfair!!

This notion of paying for what we use is completely beyond me. I can't believe Time Warner is introducing this ridiculous concept that I've never seen anywhere else.

Paying for what I use. Pffft. Hogwash!

[Dementius88]

I agree, this is America, a company should have the right to choose how they run thier buisness and what services they deliver to thier customers. What bothers me is that I signed into a 2 year price lock with TW. Now if they stay true and offer me the same or better service with the price locked, which is what I was sold, then I will stay happily thru my contract and move to another company once the contract expires. After all, I as a consumer, have every right to shake my fist in the air and then choose another company to use. I have tried calling TW yesterday (waited about 30 minutes) and then today (waited about 20 minutes) to get an answer on if my service and rate will stay the same. If anybody has heard of whether or not the 2 year price lock contract would be unaffected by this pricing please tell!

[rd2007]

of course they can charge what they want and in the end the consumers rule. I too am waiting to see what they are going to do to the price-lock customers. If they decrease BW or increase price, I'm going to have a real problem. Knee jerk reaction will be to drop them, but I absolutely hate at&t. Hopefully TWC will do the right thing.
and comparing additional services for extra costs is not the same as whining about not finishing your meal but still being charged the same price. Unlimited BW was what they sold me and that's what I expect to get. If it would've been like a cell phone plan and I agreed to it's terms, I wouldn't say a word, but it obviously wasn't.

[Spock's Beard]

Originally Posted by rd2007

of course they can charge what they want and in the end the consumers rule. I too am waiting to see what they are going to do to the price-lock customers. If they decrease BW or increase price, I'm going to have a real problem. Knee jerk reaction will be to drop them, but I absolutely hate at&t. Hopefully TWC will do the right thing.
and comparing additional services for extra costs is not the same as whining about not finishing your meal but still being charged the same price. Unlimited BW was what they sold me and that's what I expect to get. If it would've been like a cell phone plan and I agreed to it's terms, I wouldn't say a word, but it obviously wasn't.

The customers don't rule at all. Where did you get that? With large companies, they do what they want because they can do it. Anti-trust laws are dead, and if you need proof of that, just look at how so few companies took down our economy when we had the unenforced laws to protect us from that.



TW won't do the right thing. Why do online movie rental competitors like Netflix a favor when TW is selling VOD (For example)? This screws a lot of people in a lot of industries, and it'll pretty much kill online gaming (which is a major blow because more and more games are sold with some sort of online content and downloadables). It'll also slow down growth of the internet too because unlimited bandwidth is why we have streaming TV like Hulu and news sites that stream the news.

[cwh]

Originally Posted by scuba steve

Likewise, we should charge more towards those who watch more TV than others. That's more bandwidth too.

I think it's a horrible idea - hope it gets a lot of attention online. I haven't seen it make too many headlines yet... I'm still giving it time.

Not quite the same. Tv is multicast, so everyone is getting tv even if you are not watching it.

[cwh]

Originally Posted by rd2007

I have another good analogy for this.. it's like buying a Corvette, but demanding to pay the Malibu price because you never plan on taking it over 60 MPH. That's your own fault and there's no need to punish everyone else just because you don't get the full value out of something.
Life is what you make it You don't need to bring everyone else down to your level just because you choose to sit in the La-Z-Boy all day..

The more accurate analogy would be be having the many Malibu owners subsidize the few corvette owners.

There is quickly becoming a problem with unlimited internet usage and capacity. That being said, I dont really have a problem with caps, but they should be reasonable. I dont think the TW caps are reasonable.

[the_dimwit]

Originally Posted by cwh

Not quite the same. Tv is multicast, so everyone is getting tv even if you are not watching it.

The same could be said for any utility, though. All houses (built, that is) are connected with power, water, and sometimes gas. Each house has the same levels of access as the other, but bills will vary based upon usage. So, if we pushed Internet access into the same model, things make sense. We are using the Internet for a lot more than just checking e-mail these days, just like electricity powers a lot more than a home's lighting.

I think this is the way things are heading for Internet access, whether we like it or not. As we grow to utilize the Internet for more and more purposes, companies responsible for providing such access will have to go to a use-based billing solution.

Full disclosure: I'm not an employee of any ISP, but I used to work for UUNET and can tell you all about business-level Internet usage based on traffic statistics (up or down), burst rates, billing, etc.

--Dim