Comcast to Throttle Bandwidth Hogs For Up to 20 Minutes
A day after the Federal Communications Commission released official sanctions against Comcast for interfering with its customers' Net traffic speed, the Internet provider is talking up a new plan to slow down traffic for heavy users.
In an interview Bloomberg, Mitch Bowling, Comcast's senior vice president and general manager of online services, announced the introduction of Fair Share, a new traffic managing system that will reduce the top internet speeds for targeted customers for periods between 10 and 20 minutes.
(See related content: Elude Your ISP's BitTorrent Blockade)
Bowling says Fair Share will not focus on specific applications, like Bittorrent, that slow down the overall network traffic, but will determine in "nearly real time" if traffic is congested by heavy users. Consequently, Fair Share will impede the user's overall top speed for a limited amount of time, thereby decongesting the network and keeping a constant speed for the other users of that line.
The new traffic managing system comes as a reaction to FCC's August 1 ruling against Comcast which accused the company of "unreasonable network management practices" such as improperly blocking peer-to-peer (P2P) applications like Bittorrent or Aquisition, used to share audio and video files over the Internet. Comcast also says it plans to charge subscribers more that use a disproportionate amount of bandwidth compared to other users - a move that Time Warner Cable is testing now in Beaumont .
Comcast has 14.4 million Internet subscribers, making it the largest cable provider in the U.S. In October 2007, the traffic slowdown saga began when Comcast was accused of blocking some of its users access to P2P services. The Internet provider admitted temporarily limiting certain P2P channels and the FCC trial came to an end at the beginning of the month. FCC released the full text (PDF) of the ruling yesterday. The commission required Comcast to disclose in the future to users its plans to manage traffic, hence Fair Share.
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Wow, Comcast you are awesome. Thanks for giving some more of your customers to other companies, so what did you do for Satan to get this deal?
Commcast sells its customers an internet speed based on the cable program they buy. How in the hell are they then going to turn around and limit that speed or charge you more because you use what you purchased.
Another big business phucking the customer. Must be because of rising fuel cost.
Comcast's changes impact the network hogs and not the average user!
Hey, if I don't have any water pressure because the guy down the street is watering his 5 acre lawn 24x7, I am going to complain. The same applies for Internet performance. Why should the performance for 14.3 million subscribers suffer because 100,000 hog the networks? Seems fair to me. Hooray for Comcast and the ability to manage their company without government intervention.
Users, please realize that the Price for the Service has nothing to do with the Costs to provide that service. It's based on the Stock Price of the Company. When greed in the executive suite and failure to meet Wall Street's expectations occur. Someone has to pay! And that someone is anyone that they can figure out a way to fleece. Expect 'Pay by Minute' to happen in the next Economic Cycle.