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Uncategorized Sunday, May 1st 2011 at 2:00 pm

AT&T to Cap Broadband Usage Starting Monday

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Starting Monday, AT&T will place a cap on its broadband Internet services. Following Comcast’s broadband cap and AT&T being the number two carrier in the U.S., the majority of the U.S. broadband Internet will now be saddled with a cap. AT&T will be placing a 150 GB monthly cap on its DSL users and a 250 GB monthly cap for its UVerse users.

AT&T plans to charge an extra $10 a month if users go over their designated cap, with a recurring $10 charge for each 50 GB over the cap the user goes. Not counting torrent and other nefarious data usage, Wired points out that the 150 GB and 250 GB caps may at first seem like a decent amount, but in this day and age of Netflix and online gaming, those caps could easily be reached. Wired does a bit of the Netflix math, and states that streaming standard content ranges anywhere from .3 GB an hour to 1.0 GB an hour, whereas streaming HD content can max out at 2.3 GB an hour. This may not seem like a lot, but in a household with more than one resident, the data usage can climb extremely high, based solely on average usage: Assuming a standard four-person family home has Netflix, and each stream their own HD video content, they could hit over 10 GB usage per hour and breach their DSL cap in only 15 or so hours. This, of course, isn’t even considering torrent downloads or online gaming.

Though one may think the employment of a cap is a way to reduce costs, Wired points out that broadband costs aren’t exactly sucking broadband providers dry, and the real reason companies are slapping caps on their services is to fix congestion:

The drive to cap usage is ostensibly a way to reduce costs. But in reality, it’s not about the cost of data – bandwidth costs are extremely low and keep falling. Time Warner Cable brought in $1.13 billion in revenue from broadband customers in the first three months of 2011, while spending only $36 million for bandwidth — a mere 3 percent of the revenue…

The real problem ISPs want to fix is congestion due to limited infrastructure. Cable customers share what are known as local loops, and the more that your neighbors use their connection, the less bandwidth is available to you — a situation that becomes painfully clear in the evening, when cable users see their throughput fall.

With AT&T’s entry into the ring of bandwidth caps, it looks like we’re headed toward a throttled — or extremely expensive — future of the Internet.

(via Wired)

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  • Kal

    They started metering on every 27th of the month according to their usage website. From 4/27/2011 to 5/1/2011 my household already used close to 50GBs. It is a big house. I was under the impression it starts May 2nd and not a few days earlier. This is not fair and wrong if I am penalized for going over their 150GB limit when they cheated.

  • http://twitter.com/Wasson_C Wasson_C

    Engineered scarcity (lack of improvements I thought I was paying for). I guess the government needs to step in here unfortunately? This is what happens when business has gone bad. Consumer protection agency is sounding like a great idea.

  • http://twitter.com/donavoncade Donavon

    ” Assuming a standard four-person family home has Netflix, and each stream their own HD video content, they could hit over 10 GB usage per hour and breach their DSL cap in only 15 or so hours.”

    To do that, your connection has to consistently pull nearly 23 mbps for the entire duration of that 15 hours. The average AT&T DSL user gets between 3 – 6 mbps. At 6 mbps, it takes 2 days and 7.5 hours to download that lowest cap of 150 GB. You’d have a watch a full length film in HD for 27 days out of the month to hit 150 GB. Meaning you only had 3 – 4 days left on almost staying under the cap. Most people don’t watch that many movies or download that much data for any purpose. And for those thinking it after I say that, I think even the horniest bastards out there would be hard pressed to watch that much porn.

  • Tjames

    The problem isn’t that we will actually reach the cap. The problem is that AT&T is creating a scarcity of a product (ie the internet). They are charging customers extra for what costs them nothing.

    In a few years (if it takes that long) the caps will be lower until home broadband will be charged by the gigs used. You will be able to get 10g a month for $20 and up from there. Things are about to get rificulous.

  • Domino4life8

    Companys like Microsoft, Netflix, & Hulu need to team up and fight this too. If they start scaring consumers about using to much bandwith. Those companys will also be affected cause us consumers wont use thier services as much or at all.

  • http://www.waynejohn.com/ Wayne John

    Just called AT&T regarding UVerse, and they stated that this IS NOT happening for UVerse customers. At least, not at this time.

    Makes me wonder where the source of this article is. Wired didn’t quote any sources.

  • Carl

    What no one is talking about here are Verizon’s plans. If they follow com and at&t, then there’s no where to go – maybe mom and pop’s internet? If Verizon doesn’t follow them, the lost of subscribers will likely force AT&T and Comcast to make adjustments.

    If Verizon doesn’t follow, they will advertise that like crazy and we’ll see some kind of Net war.

  • Bandgo

    This is why the government broke AT&T up in the first place. It is a greedy company. For example, I have cell service in a Central American country, I have all that can be offered with a data plan. I pay $28 a month while AT&T charges for the same service in the US $135.00 per month.

    My point is, it is all about greed. FCC is not going to do anything to protect the consumer.

    Even as we speak, AT&T is buying out another phone company while AT&T is unable to maintain it’s own infrastructure. AT&T is not even in compliance with mandates set forth by FCC and FAA. The problem is, neither of the agencies has the where with all to audit any of the major phone companies in America. Nor do they have the interest. You can call these agencies until you are blue in the face, you will not see any action.

    It should make Americans wonder where our tax dollars are going when it comes to these none performing agencies.

    Yes, you are paying for all of this.

    Telling it Like it is.