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![For FCC Chair, Obama Should Look Outside the Beltway [GigaOM]](http://images.dailyradar.com/media/uploads/tech/story_story/2008/11/11/for_fcc_chair_obama_should_look_outside_the_beltwa.jpg)
Consumers Aren’t Gonna Pay a Lot for Telco TV [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... provided by their cable companies — suggesting that undercutting cable companies while providing better service is the key to gaining their business. That being said, many of the consumers in the September survey said they’d be happy to switch to telco TV if the price was right. It looks like that for all the technical innovation, the promise of the triple-play bundle isn’t about service, but about the bargain. Carriers will have to find other ways to boost their ...
Official iPhone Tethering Rumored to Cost $30/month
TheAppleBlog —
... don’t use a significant amount of data on their iPhone’s alone (looking over my previous months data usage, I averaged at about 200MB/month), it would be easy to see how once tethered to a laptop that would no longer be the case, especially for mobile professionals and frequent travelers who are constantly on the go. As more and more is done online, AT&T is looking to profit from that. Just last week, they announced that they would join several other U.S. broadband providers in testing tiered pricing for home internet users. Charging an additional fee for iPhone tethering ...
A Quick Peek at the Internet Growth Charts [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... on what users can and cannot do on their data plans in a bid to both control access and boost revenue. And even though wired web growth is slowing, don’t expect carriers to suddenly abandon their efforts to squeeze more out of subscribers with tales of video clogging the network. ...
Tiered Broadband Trials Torment Beaumont [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... Perhaps, but it’s also a classic example of why we need competition in the broadband arena. Beaumont is a small market and as such, doesn’t offer a lot of choice when it comes to broadband providers — making it easy for the dominant players to implement anti-consumer initiatives such as overage fees and tiered plans. ...
Five Festivus Grievances for Online Video [NewTeeVee]
GigaOM Network —
... issues. Ugh. I can understand licensing windows (barely). Studios still want people to watch TV shows on a TV first. OK, fine. But once a show airs, there is no reason why it shouldn’t live online forever. Quit yanking shows off Hulu and littering the web with dead embeds. 5. Bandwidth caps and metered access. They stink, they’ll stifle innovation and the only “winners” will be the greedy cable and telcos. ...
Verizon Branches Out With Expensive Online Storage [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... I’ll applaud Verizon for trying to get more revenue from broadband subscribers (even other companies’) by offering a service rather than capping bandwidth or ...
The Inauguration Got Your (Broadband) Meter Running [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... in favor of newteevee, but few will actually do this if they have to essentially pay by the byte or hour to participate in such an event online. And that’s a damn shame, because the kind of community and transparency the web enables is exactly what we need to get people excited about public service again. Metered broadband ...
Zeugma’s SmartMeter and the End of Unlimited Broadband [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... These types of plans exist in the UK, and I’ve warned that they’re a likely next step in the U.S., but it will still hurt to give up on all-you-can-eat broadband in exchange for tailored packages. Such plans offer more flexibility than a rigid cap and could cost less than paying overage fees, but will still raise the total price paid by consumers for web-based services like streaming video. Maybe I’m feeling defeated, but I have to ask myself, did I really think I could get away with paying $45 a month for broadband, voice (using ...
Welcome to Consumption-based Broadband [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... The all-you-can-eat broadband buffet appears to be at an end as ISPs implement caps and metered pricing for broadband services. The stated goal is network management, but the real reason is to cash in on the increasing value of the web despite being a dumb pipe. Today, ...
DPI Doesn’t Kill The Open Internet, Carriers Do [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... However, the report comes across as almost hysterical by blaming of the DPI technology rather than the carriers and how they are using it. Carriers are investing in their networks, although slowly, and are pricing new offerings with an eye toward increasing their margins. The real villian behind this creeping trend isn’t DPI. It’s a broadband policy that hasn’t encouraged competition — without which, a user that’s upset with a carrier trying to gouge them can’t easily switch to an equivalent provider. ...
Time Warner Expands Metered Broadband Rollout [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... out of the tiny town of Beaumont, Texas. According to BusinessWeek, Time Warner is expanding its trials to San Antonio, Austin, Texas and Rochester, N.Y. and Greensboro, N.C. Data collection in Austin, San Antonio and Rochester will begin in April with metered billing to begin this summer, the business weekly reports. Greensboro apparently will get its wallet raided a bit sooner.
Time Warner is joining other ISPs in trying to squeeze more money from their broadband pipes, generally in the name of needing to upgrade the ...
Time Warner Expands Metered Broadband Rollout [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... yet decided how much it will cost. Also, Time Warner will monitor downloads starting in April but the actual metered billing in San Antonio and Austin, Texas, will begin in September. Three months before they plan to charge folks under the tiered plans, they will notify customers, offer them a meter and let them see how the metered billing will affect them. Read the official statement.
Time Warner is joining other ISPs in trying to squeeze more money from their broadband pipes, generally in the name of needing to upgrade ...
DPI: It’s Going to Be About More Than Ads [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... in January 2008, talked to me last year about the likelihood of using DPI to provide a form of consumption-based broadband. Instead of a flat-out metering program, such packages might offer subscribers an emphasis on voice or gaming services and prioritize packets accordingly. Kevin Walsh, vice president of marketing at Zeugma Systems, has a similar vision. Zeugma, which provides equipment to telecoms, doesn’t do DPI but can track ...
How ISPs Can Survive Becoming Dumb Pipes [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... , PlusNet in the UK and most other UK broadband providers are experimenting or have implemented caps or consumption-based plans as a way to boost their revenue from providing the pipe. The pipe is still dumb, but different pricing plans mean that carriers can make more money off of them. Benefits of this to the ISP are higher revenues (and presumably profits). The downside is that in a competitive market, carriers will get stuck with the low-end user as a customer base, and as those consumers die off or discover high-end services, ...
Metered Broadband Is the Future: Verizon CTO [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... Verizon Chief Technology Officer Dick Lynch said today that in the coming years, wired broadband will likely be sold in packages based on the amount of data a person wants to consume, much like wireless broadband is sold today. In comments made to press at the 2009 Fiber to the Home Conference Expo in Houston, Lynch stressed that he wasn’t announcing a shift in pricing for Verizon, but that: “We’re going to have to consider pricing structures that allow us to sell packages of bytes, and at the end of the day the concept of a ...
It’s Captastic! Cable One Embraces Congestion Pricing [GigaOM]
GigaOM Network —
... . Overall, these pricing changes and caps are both a way to manage traffic and increase revenue for ISPs. Last year, I talked about the use of different tiers, caps and usage policies in determining pricing with Kurt Dobbins, the chief technology officer of IP services at Arbor Networks, and he said: ...
