I filed a complaint with the BBB. I pay for the higher speeds. How does even offering higher speeds make sense if they cap the bandwidth consumption limit? I would expect that since they now offer less service my bill would go down. They took away newsgroups too, and guess what? My bill stayed the same. Cable television needs to be deregulated so we have competition in the marketplace.

Comcast is pathetic. They throttle packets anyways with their Sandvine deep-packet inspection. Yeah offer all the bandwidth but do all they can to keep you from using it.

As a Comcast customer who has been using a bandwidth monitor since the new cap went into place in October, I have to mention I do not have cable... just phone and internet service. Most of the TV programming I watch is on the internet, and I've yet to pass 100 GB with all the downloads I do for game demos and tv streaming and so on. If I'm doing web work for clients and have to download or upload large zip files of images, I still have a hard time reaching 150 GB. 250 GB compared to what a lot of other services offer in terms of monthly usage is a steal.

True.. you should not reach these numbers.
But it's going to be a industry change. I'm already being told from our business internet provider that our T1's are going to be taking on this model also.

While I like the addition of a tool to monitor bandwidth, the cynical part of me wonders if the cap is partially aimed at helping Comcast maintain its cable TV customers. If I wanted to stifle the growth of online TV and movies, this is a major component of the strategy I'd use. Cap bandwidth, slow down streaming video from certain sites, and raise the rates for us internet-only subscribers who aren't willing to buy their phone and TV services. Then make the charges on the bill so confusing that no one can quite figure them out.

Is this really so complex????????????

They have a finite amount of bandwidth.
And newsflash, Internet access is NOT their primary business.
So, they can either allow a few to effectively freeze out /impact more casual users, or limit those who think that basic access entitles them to unlimited bandwidth.

You want unlimited or greater access, subscribe to one of the tiers designed for that - typically referred to as 'business' plans.

If you need the increased volume/speed, subscribe to the appropriate plan! Duh!

As high speed and large volume feed ssuch as HD video become more common, the ubiquitous use of the Internet for high volume transfers will become more common - thus resulting in the potential for greater use over finite resource plant. I expect ALL carriers to eventually institute greater tiers service plans to meet the usage requirements of individual users.

Like it or not, what is amazing is to listen to so many apparently so shocked over the concept.

Damn, just like the idea that music is not an entitlement, so many have problems understanding that access to the Internet is not free either.

It might not be free, but it's certainly not worth what we're paying.

Japan as far as bandwidth speeds go kills us by comparison and these clowns want to cap use?

I'm glad I jumped ship long ago.

Japan, Europe, etc all have higher speeds at a lower cost because their customers are all clumped up together. In the US we are extremely spread out and the cost of running fiber all over the place is very expensive. If the foreign companies offering these very fast, low cost internet connections tried to do it on the scale someone like Comcast does, I doubt they could offer the same speed/price they do now. In fact, they probably would be on older technology due to the increased cost of updating much larger infrastructures.

Some very valid points...

Geesh...and not to mention the much higher federal corporate tax rates (as well as all the piggybacked state and local taxes) enjoyed by firms in the US. And yes, US corporate taxes ARE near the highest 'enjoyed' in the world.

Oh.

And a country whose area is less than many states. Gee, why not compare Japan or a European country to something more commensurate in terms of density, population distribution, and topology? Oops, we've already lost them...

Next they will be shocked to learn that the 'rich' also pay a grossly disproportionate portion of the income taxes in the US as well...but one shock at a time for those of such limited awareness... Damned rich...

Why even try to explain real factors in business to a bunch of folks who feel entitled to free broadband just as they entitle themselves to free music without regard to any of the real market factors that only they are at liberty to blithely ignore with the righteous indignation.

I am still waiting for all of the 'oh so righteous' folk to start their own companies for music distribution - which they can freely distribute over their own free broadband network as they become fabulously rich and successful doing what no one else can do.

The irony is that I don't quite understand why anyone who needs simple ADSL access subscribes to any cable service rather than subscribing to one offered by the telcos for 1/3 to 1/2 the price for equivalent service. But hey, its their choice. Just can the whining and enjoy.

You would think that surely there is SOMEONE who could help them in their high school DECA club to develop a viable business plan!

LOL!

At first you seemed informed but really you know very little about the world.

For example lets look at Sweden a country roughly the size of California. They are on average 10Mb/s - 100Mb/s connections. They have the population of roughly LA. They are just as spread out as many parts of the United States. Oh and guess what Sweden has much higher income tax then we have. Around 40-46%. Your point is really moot at this point. LA and just about all of our major cities have population densities higher than that country. Why don't we have faster speeds in our cities?

Also our government has given lots of money to the telcos to get service to areas that have low population densities.

There is absolutely no reason why we have slower speeds in our major cities and highly populated areas. It is all about simply improving profits to keep the shareholders happy.

Oh and California or New York are both states that compare very well with European countries... We still have garbage for our connections.

News flash! It is more complex than you would have us believe. Comcast offers a business-level option, but it apparently doesn't increase your bandwidth allowance. It increases your speed. At least, bandwidth is not addressed in the paperwork I was given when I signed up for my business account. I don't expect to get free internet service. I want a service that treats customers in a direct and polite manner since we are paying for the service. I want a service that spells out its terms clearly and that lets me pay for what I use without surprises on my bill. If I need to use extra bandwidth, I want to be able to pay for it in a straightforward manner without being labeled as a problem user. I think these are reasonable things to expect, especially from a business level account.

AT&T is planning to impose limits as well. Last I heard they want to set 150GB. See here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10082615-93.html

Verizon has been quiet thus far.

The screenshot lists 250Gb as the limit?! Jeez, what on earth could you download in a month to use up a quota like that...aside movies, that is.

I'd be pushing to use 50Gb. And yet there are people complaining about caps of 250Gb!?

Put a 360 online with Netflix streaming and get back to me. I can hit 250GB a month easily.

yeah, funny how that works. Guess if you want "on demand" content, you will have to use Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, etc... to avoid the extra charges.

So you watch on average three 2.75GB movies a day?

That's 8GB a day on months with 30 days, or 333MB per hour, or 5MB/minute of *constant* use.

Want to try that again without making anyone who actually thinks about it laugh out loud?

Users expecting this kind of service are not the kind of users Comcast wants on their residential service plans anyway.

So yeah, cut the cord, man. They'll be all too happy to see you go.

I've seen insane caps before, but this is by far, on the better side of them. 250GB? Nice. Try 50MB....not so nice.

Oh geesh! Facts! That strategy will get you nowhere! LOL!

I think you miss the real point... ;-))

The entitled crowd doesn't care about the REAL world impact of such a limit, it is the concept of a limit itself that they hate.

As they are entitled!

Heaven forbid they should evaluate services and see which best suits their actual usage patterns, and heaven forbid they should have expected to pay for their needs - it is ALL about them! And they deserve whatever they want - NOW, and for FREE. It doesn't matter how others are impacted.

The irony is that if you could see behind the keyboard, these entitled folks are no older than 22, and they certainly do not have the responsibility of providing for the total care of themselves, let alone for the welfare of others!

The extent of their worries are compressed low-fi MP3s, games, videos... and, well, more compressed MP3s, games and videos. And as likely as not, their main mode of transportation is a skateboard. All for me, me, me, me, me , me , and me. Like little birds in the warm secure nest that OTHERS provide, screaming at the top of their lungs for their parents to provide for the little entitled monsters.

NM Eww, you just piss me off!

You really fail to see the point. These packages are advertised as UNLIMITED. Do you know what that means? No cap. No limits what so ever. They already cap you on speed. So you are already limited to the amount you can use by keeping your connection maxed 24/7.

If they don't have the bandwidth in their back hall networks to the backbones then they need to spend the money we are paying them to upgrade. This lack of bandwidth on their networks is really a made up marketing BS so they can add these cap to stifle the competition that is popping up from Online services. It is simple anti-competitive practices.

I personally don't use Comcast, but I think the point is that people are paying the same price as they used to when they got 'unlimited' bandwidth; assuming they haven't lowered the price since the cap.

Not to mention that there are some places that cable is the only way to get high speed where the phone lines aren't updated to get fiber optic, T1, or even DSL (I know some people).

And last, who gives a s*** what people download? Like your s*** you download is some how better?

They are not unlimited. They don't even claim to be, unless you are ignoring the fine print on the screen during those commercials or on the mailers.

The unlimited portion refers only to the availability of the connection. It does _not_ refer to the usage of the connection, throughput, bandwidth, or any other application of the service.

For those that may need an explanation of why this is used as a selling point, you need only remember as far back as dial-up. Dial-up is an on-demand connection, and as such it's availability is limited to when _you_ invoke it and if the service has open lines (Remember the days of AOL dial-up when you had to dial through a cycle of 8 numbers to get one that had an available slot?).

That's it.

They were never offered unlimited bandwidth. Even the majority of their business SLA plans cap usage. No ISP that I am aware of has _ever_ offered truly "unlimited" usage.

As I said below, read the fine print.

Bye-bye comcast! :)

Bulls***. What are you going to switch to? Nothing. DSL is slow. Sat uplinks have high latency.

There isn't anything to switch to that's better, only worse. And I doubt you're going to ditch your broadband for ISDN or dialup.

So you don't have a choice, unless you want to move.

Well, even though I'm not a big fan of the cap, I do think it's pretty decent to have a tool that allows you to monitor your use so you can keep your head off the chopping block.

I just hope it's accurate.

So many people are watching streaming television shows nowadays, and I'm curious to see how much of an impact those shows have on the final numbers.

Nice.. I wonder how that will compare to other services that offer unlimited service for a flat rate.. is comcast using the cell phone model now.. Also will ATT, Verizon and Qwest are charging comcast for internet in a different way to make more money on there side. rather then selling comcast a 100G pipe??

1T = 1.5MB with a 300G cap as a biz service..

Nope the backbones are not charging more. Bandwidth cost in data centers has continuously dropped for years and still is. It simple greed for greater profits and to stifle the cannibalization of the other services they offer.

Oh and I doubt they'll have caps on T1's they already cost so much 400-900 a month.
Oh and the max you could possibly use on a T1 is 972GB and that is keeping the download and upload maxed 24/7 for 30 days. 300GB seems unreasonable even though most companies with T1's don't use even close to 300GB.

It will be interesting to compare this to my router's bandwidth stats...

yes I completely agree. As I bet they'll have usage from every bit that hits your router. But your router doesn't count as bandwidth usage because it drops those packets at the firewall.