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314 Comments
- MHunt, on 01/07/2009, -0/+279I'm still waiting for FIOS. You hear me, Verizon? Come to my neighborhood and I'll sign up immediately. I have comcast!
- fuckingusername, on 01/07/2009, -5/+250***** comcast !
- shitton, on 01/07/2009, -2/+175So you pay for internet service and then get penalized for actually using it?
- inactive, on 01/06/2009, -3/+156***** A. All the news I get about my internet on Digg is bad news.
- Spor, on 01/07/2009, -3/+136I really love Comcast. I also love how I am forced to bend over and take their ***** because of a lack of competition. ***** you Utah, you pile of ***** state with zerp options for "high-speed" internet.
- vtnerd, on 01/07/2009, -2/+107I can't wait for the bandwidth tool.
I probably use less than 20GB a month currently, but out of spite and my loathing for their dishonest advertising I will be using 240+ GB of bandwidth every month in a legal manner as soon as that tool becomes available. - inactive, on 01/07/2009, -1/+106Yep, been with Verizon on their FiOS for over a year now and when they came to my neighborhood everyone switched from Comcast to them. Haven't seen a Comcast van since......except for the one guy that works for them down the street. ...I think he has FiOS too though. ;-)
- spokenrope, on 01/07/2009, -0/+76Coincidentally, I just got a flier yesterday saying that AT&T's U-Verse is available in my area now. I'm calling up Comcast today to tell them that they can go fornicate themselves with an iron pole.
- hagiaso, on 01/07/2009, -1/+71Dear Comcast,
I hate you. I've never, ever been pleasantly surprised by your service. You do everything in as piss poor way as possible. Every installation request I've ever done has been screwed up. I've wasted too many days waiting for your people to come and they never did. I've wasted far too much time on the phone trying to get the credits that you promised me to make up for making me sit at home all day. Oh, and yes, my time is worth more than a $50 credit for a whole day.
You are my only choice though. So I suck it up and say I love you. But we both know how the true feelings run. - inactive, on 01/07/2009, -1/+51How long before someone kicks craptastic out of the isp market?
- o0joshua0o, on 01/07/2009, -2/+49This is like a restaurant with an all-you-can-eat buffet stopping you after the second plate and saying "Sorry, you're eating too much".
Comcast can go to hell. - kevbryant, on 01/07/2009, -0/+47All i can say is, you're doing SOMETHING wrong when nearly ALL of your informed customers are waiting for your competition to become available.
- AndrewMoyer, on 01/07/2009, -0/+42As soon as the government regulators remember they work for The People.
- Shogi, on 01/07/2009, -13/+54As much as I hate Cocmast (yes that was intentional because they love to ***** people over), this seems like a fair system.
On the other hand I would not be the least bit surprised if they are still ***** with torrents. - Vektuz, on 01/07/2009, -1/+41So in other words if you use the amount of bandwidth you purchased from them, they'll lower it.
Why not lower the bandwidth by 70%. Oh wait, because the truth is they've done the equivalent of booking 100 people the same airline seat and hoping that only one shows up. - godzilla8nj, on 01/07/2009, -1/+36So I signed a contract for one level of service, but in actuality I'm only entitled to 70% of it. Hmm. Wonder what would happen if I try paying only 70% of my bill...
- Dragular, on 01/07/2009, -3/+34the ***** up part is that it has nothing to do with how MUCH you're downloading, only how FAST you're downloading. If you decide to download your monthly 20gb, but all at once, even though you're just downloading 8 percent of your "allowed" 250gb, you'll get throttled. C'mon, don't use the speed they tell you you're guaranteed, guy.
- MHunt, on 01/07/2009, -1/+32Great, rub it in! :(
- AndrewMoyer, on 01/07/2009, -1/+31"We never stop making fast slow down faster."
- SleepParalysis, on 01/07/2009, -0/+29This is what your neighbors wireless network is for.
- duniyadnd, on 01/07/2009, -2/+31Monopoly in our building for one..
- Vektuz, on 01/07/2009, -2/+30It is not a fair system at all. Its basically saying "if you use the service you payed for, the quality of service will be lowered". Its also anti-competitive behavior, because comcast is a cable tv / entertaintment provider and this move directly impacts videocasts and youtube and things like this.
But honestly, its their history coming back to bite them in the ass. They've done the equivalent of hooking entire neighborhoods up to a single little water pipe meant for one household, then started complaining when everyone was unable to take a shower at once.
Its not the customers. Its the infrastructure and the ridiculous amount of overbookedness they have allowed. But its easier to just put more customers on the same network and sell them the same bandwidth over and over. Even though you've already sold that bandwidth to 100 other people, you sell it over and over again, with the hope that no 2 people will use it at the same time. - fireismyflag, on 01/07/2009, -0/+27"Comcast says that sustained use of 70% of your up or downstream throughput triggers the [throttling] state"
it is simply a matter of setting a bandwidth cap on your torrent app. - SleepParalysis, on 01/07/2009, -0/+26Your world delivered, to the NSA.
- trer, on 01/07/2009, -0/+24Actually, Comcast can't violate the 4th amendment. The 4th amendment only protects you from the federal goverment (and also the State through the 14th amendment). It doesn't guarantee a right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures conducted by private citizens or organizations. Comcast is a private organization.
Also, the 4th amendment only applies to criminal law, not civil law. The situation you are describing most likely would be a civil matter. - ModernTenshi, on 01/07/2009, -0/+23Comcast = Bag of Dicks.
- OrangeCrush, on 01/07/2009, -0/+23In other words, never.
- Dragular, on 01/07/2009, -0/+23Royally screwed. it's false advertising. If you sell something and advertise speeds up to a certain amount, you should make sure your network can handle that many people going at or near those speeds. What they're saying is that if you going at a certain speed is going to slow down someone else, even though it's still within the speeds that they've advertised to you, you're going to get capped. The fact that they've spent so much money researching how they could do this without violating the law, instead of using the money to enhance their network, should shock me. Yet it doesn't, because the Comcast board of directors, as has previously been noted in so many pleasant phrases, all suck big donkey balls.
- Jektal, on 01/07/2009, -0/+21Why? So you connect those million extra PCs you have sitting around?
- bjwest, on 01/07/2009, -0/+21When was the last time your power company throttled your usage? As long as you pay your bill, they'll give you all the power your meter can handle.
- Mockylock, on 01/07/2009, -0/+16Thanks for this post, it was the first I'd heard of U-Verse.
- PopcornDave, on 01/07/2009, -0/+16Make sure you tell them to warm it to a glowing red first.
- Zomgondo, on 01/07/2009, -1/+16I thought it was for appeasing Pedobear.
- angryfirelord, on 01/07/2009, -0/+15As soon as the local governments stop creating the monopolies in the first place.
- o0joshua0o, on 01/07/2009, -2/+17Probably because they don't do it.
- Vektuz, on 01/07/2009, -0/+15But that's the thing. That's not how the internet actually works. It's not like water, where you can pour it into a container and measure it.
The essential difference is that bandwidth is wasted if not used. For example, If your ISP has a 100mbit pipe and they let you use 10mbit of it and not the other 90mbit, leaving the 90mbit unused, then every second, 90mbit of bandwidth is wasted. It doesn't get 'saved up'. It doesn't lower THEIR costs. They'd still be paying for the 100mbit pipe whether 1 or 99 of it was being used. It doesn't actually matter how many bytes you use up. They pay for the bandWIDTH not the band...uh... amount. Size of pipe.
It's every ISPs dream to be able to charge you for your downloads as if they were like water pipes, because its literally inventing scarcity when they actually have an infinite resource. The real problem is that they want to sell the same bandwidth to more people than it can actually afford.
What the ISPs are doing right now is more like selling a water pipe that is only wide enough to serve a single household at a time, to entire neighborhoods. Its not that there's not enough water (bytes), its that the pipe isn't wide enough to actually convey the water when everyone wakes up to shower.
Their solution in this world? To leave the inadequate pipes as they are, but charge more for the "water". To encourage people to take less showers. Even though they pay for the service as advertised. Their infrastructure has not grown at the same rate as customer number, because its EASIER to add customers than it is to lay new lines. And cheaper. So when they were supposed to be laying more pipes instead they were doing other stuff. - Cerialthriller, on 01/07/2009, -0/+15im already paying $70.. how much more could they possibly want from me..
- inactive, on 01/07/2009, -0/+14Same. I'll be Comcast free if Verizon comes here.
- davidconnell, on 01/07/2009, -0/+14Dugg because it's a good thoughtful and informative blog post.
Also, ***** Comcast, Verizon rules. ;-) I roll with the Fios. - Cerialthriller, on 01/07/2009, -1/+15wtf are we supposed to do now? I have no broadband alternative to comcast.
- robertmstanley, on 01/07/2009, -0/+14What about video streams and online gaming? I have often visited the idea of dropping cable TV to go 100% with internet entertainment. Additionally, after reading the article, you are essentially receiving 50% of your maximum capacity. So, the advertised 10Mbps is only 5Mpbs. I see this as an opportunity for competitors to come out and attack this weakness directly.
- tattertech, on 01/07/2009, -0/+14I had FiOS for a while until we moved into Baltimore City where Verizon hasn't been able to get a deal struck. Baltimore wants to overcharge Verizon a ridiculous amount to lay the fiber apparently. I really miss my FiOS :(
- normalkid0615, on 01/07/2009, -3/+16not fair, they brag about them having the largest network in the world, but they have to throttle its users. ***** THAT!!! Its like saying "you can only watch 500 Hours of On Demand Video in a month". *****. They overextended themselves. Maybe if they sold that giant new building, they can increase the cap to 300GB.
- cromulent742, on 01/07/2009, -0/+13Amen to that. I can get raped by Comcast or swtich to 256Kbps Qwest DSL.
- AndrewMoyer, on 01/07/2009, -1/+14At least you've got a broadband connection to Heaven...
- solarsavior, on 01/07/2009, -2/+14Finally a voice of reason.
As a network engineer, I know that commercial circuits are 10x+ the cost of residential ones like the ones from Comcast. Yes, Comcast sucks for being greedy bitches and picking profit over service, but there is a real need to handle bandwidth utilization in a fair manner. I'm on AT&T U-verse now and am much happier. (at least for the moment) I'm hopeful that good competition from AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Wi-Max companies will create competition and keep costs in line and customer service up.
It seems to me that all of the people bitching so much about bandwidth are NOT network engineers, are clueless about bandwidth, and are the most greedy downloaders out there. You can't tell me that you need to download 200 copies of Linux each month via a torrent and that's why you're having a bandwidth problem. Most likely you're downloading a ton of movies, most likely bootleg. (mp3s aren't that big)
Networks cost money. Miles and miles of cabling. Very high end network gear that costs real money (from Cisco and Juniper usually, not some cheap-ass crappy Linksys or D-Link consumer-grade stuff that fails easily). This doesn't even take into account the high-end gear the telcos use to terminate fiber optic runs and such.
An army of skilled people that make the "magic" work that costs money. Verizon gets it right in their "It's the network." ads.
Get a clue. Just because it is a buffet doesn't mean that you can eat continuously for the buffet price.
(beyond that, as bandwidth increases, the impact of latency becomes the inhibiting factor to throughput, start paying more attention to the latency an ISP has) - Jektal, on 01/07/2009, -1/+13Did you RTFA? That's not how it works.
You'll get cut off if you exceed 250GB in 1 month.
If you download 20GB as fast as possible, you -might- get throttled, if there's enough strain on the total neighborhood network. If none of your neighbors are putting demands on the network, your download will go through just as fast as normal.
That said, I hate Comcast and would love to switch to a better option if there was anything other than Dial-Up available. Help me Verizon, FIOS is my only hope. - CCB0x45, on 01/07/2009, -0/+12Actually you can store internets and use them later, I have some internets from the 90's bottled up in my cupboard that I am waiting for a special occasion to open. Hamster dance is gonna be awesome!
- mujahideenryder, on 01/07/2009, -0/+11FIOS ftw!
- Nauree, on 01/07/2009, -0/+11Thats like a days worth of internet for Digg users.
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