ISP's Consider Bandwidth Caps
Internet Providers Play with the Idea of Metering Internet Usage
Internet use has gained massive strength, and as broadband becomes more available and inexpensive, the demand for data among consumers has grown steadily. Much of this is a result of downloadable music, games, streaming movies, and other web-based content. ISP companies worried about meeting this demand have considered limiting the amount of bandwidth per customer.
This type of metering for Internet use is similar to that of America On-Line during its early years; however the key difference is that ISP's will be monitoring bandwidth in gigabytes instead of hours. Data limits may not have an effect on most subscribers, but for those who use the Internet for multiple tasks, it could have crippling results.
ISP Metering Services
Time Warner and Comcast are 2 major ISP's that have already implemented, or are planning to implement, levels of service for their customers that offer high or low amounts of data. Time Warner, for example, is testing two service plans: $29.95 per month with a 768 kbps speed and a 5GB cap and $54.90 a month for a 15 Mbps speed and a 40GB cap. This data flow includes all uploads and downloads for each subscriber. Comcast's plan, while it does not specify speed levels, would allow users up to 250GB of bandwidth, with penalties of $15 per 10GB of overage.
There is no word on how bandwidth will be measured or any alternative plans to choose from as data consumption grows. Whether or not DSL will remain meter-free from bandwidth remains to be seen, and though DSL is structured differently than cable, providers may follow through with metering if it becomes profitable.
Where Data Consumption Occurs
Assuming metered Internet were to be implemented, the immediate problem that arises is how someone knows when they are using a large amount of data. Since people are not used to limiting their Internet consumption, it would quickly lead to many going over their bandwidth cap. Customers have to be aware of how much bandwidth is being used for individual tasks.
Most Internet surfing will not put anyone at risk for high data use, though customers will likely frown over the idea of putting their limited bandwidth towards advertisements. Most only take up about a few kilobytes of information, but customers would essentially be paying for ads to appear.
Downloading music and video is the next high area of consumption. With each song or video clip taking several megabytes of information combined the popularity of sites like YouTube, bandwidth consumption increases heavily. It is primarily this area that the majority of Internet users would have to limit if restrictions were to ensue.
Capping bandwidth is most likely to hurt the heavy downloader, specifically P2P users, who are targeted as one of the reasons bandwidth use is so high. Heavy bandwidth use not only includes music and movie downloads, but online gaming as well. MMORPG players and Xbox Live users will have to consider limiting their time playing with or against players over the world under bandwidth limits.
Buck per Byte?
Bandwidth caps contain the potential for future metering services to progress even further into service plans that monitor people's data use. This could spell disaster for the consumer if ISP's began to put a price on a measured unit of data, leading to the decision of who decides how much bandwidth costs, much like putting the price per barrel of oil. History has shown that paying per hour flops with customers, but if all ISP's use bandwidth meters, people may not have a choice.
