ISPs charging per device

[Niall]

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/broadband/366004/british-isps-could-charge-per-device?DCMP=NLC-Newsletters

I was just reading through this and noticed the comment about increased loads for ISPs due to ipad use. How exactly has this increased a load for the ISP? Surely if you have a wi-fi connection, then you're already paying for it, and you'll either be using your PC or that, but not both at the same time? Yes you'll have the added app updates that you didn't before, but at a few mb a time, I'm somewhat baffled by this comment. You'll be using the internet, which you would on a PC/netbook/laptop, and possibly have even less bandwidth use if you use only that. If they're saying more people are getting broadband connections just to use their ipad, then that's increased revenue for the ISP surely?

Have I missed something, or are they just angling to charge customers more on a flimsy pretence?

[Rik]

Sounds like a PR campaign to me, Niall, of the sort Governments run. Make us think that something really bad is coming, then when the real bullet arrives, we all bit it gratefully. Charging per device is plainly ridiculous, charging by traffic type is more realistic, if undesirable.

[Lance]

The only thing I can think of is that its another device which is likely to be used concurrently with the existing devices. Take a typical family with 2 kids. Its possible they've got a pc which would have always been in use by one of the kids. Now with the iPad it enables the other kid to play on the web.

As for the charging, we get charged per line. If a user connects 50 devices they are still only going to use the same amount as one device (assuming it is constantly going). At the end of the day, this is just ISPs trying to find an alternative to supply the network they always should have been.

[Niall]

Personally I have no problem with traffic charges, as long as it's in the sort of frame we see now. You have a limit and if you pass it, you pay more. I honestly can't see how they could justify anything to say using an ipad or iphone on your broadband connection would cost you more/less than using your PC. I'm absolutely baffled by that way of thinking. Granted I don't know how ipad traffic is different to that of a PC, but I wouldn't have thought it's different at all; how can it be?

[zappaDPJ]

That article doesn't really detail the full horror of what's being proposed. It's not just about charging end users differing rates for the type of packets received, it's also about charging content providers more to serve their content or even blocking content to consumers. As an example the BBC could pay to get their iPlayer traffic prioritised on the network and failure to do so would see their content squashed or even potentially blocked by ISPs to end users.

We seem to live in a world where legalised blackmail and extortion is common place and this proposal is a prime example of it. Anyone that cares about net neutrality and ultimately the Internet itself should be up in arms about this. In actual fact this only serves to highlight that as far as the Internet infrastructure is concerned, ours is rotten to the core and not fit for purpose. We will all end up paying more for a third rate service AND have restrictions placed on the type of content received.

[cavillas]

Then if that arguement is carried to the extreme we should be paying seperatly for eac tv set in a house and also the lenght of time it is on and being watched.  I think the problem is that too many companies, politicians and other media are equating telvison useage with broadband useage, thye are two seperate systems and work on differing principles and useage.

[zappaDPJ]

Personally I have no problem with traffic charges, as long as it's in the sort of frame we see now. You have a limit and if you pass it, you pay more. I honestly can't see how they could justify anything to say using an ipad or iphone on your broadband connection would cost you more/less than using your PC. I'm absolutely baffled by that way of thinking. Granted I don't know how ipad traffic is different to that of a PC, but I wouldn't have thought it's different at all; how can it be?

Exactly that

[pctech]

Looks like a sales pitch for F5 kit to me.

He does have a point regarding the mobile networks though, as smartphones are constantly polling for new e-mail, facebook updates etc they are constantly establishing and dropping sessions which creates signalling traffic in addition to the data being carried (you cannot reserve dedicated bandwidth on a mobile network as the capacity of the local masts would quickly be filled up), the amount of signalling traffic generated in areas like London because of the iPhone let operators to have to upgrade capacity.

[sparkler]

great now they want us to pay them money so they can traffic shape us? they should be getting apple and content providers to pay

[zappaDPJ]

But that's exactly what's being proposed, content providers pay more or get shut out, an end to net neutrality. ISPs with sensible use policies like IDNet already provide the answer to any net capacity issues, you have complete neutrality, freedom of choice and effectively pay for the packets you use. Charging content providers is the start of a very slippery slope and one which will require them to recover costs from the end user.

As a content provider I supply content free to the Internet. I pay for the domains, the servers and for the bandwidth consumed. I also donate a huge amount of time to it without reimbursement. The only income I get is a meagre amount via affiliate links. If an ISP wanted payment to carry my content across their network I'd have to recover those costs from end users. Imagine what it would be like if every content provider required you to take out a subscription to view their content.

[Rik]

IDNetters will be charging £5pm. 

[pctech]

Would probably be time to give up on home Internet connections.

[zappaDPJ]

IDNetters will be charging £5pm. 

Bargain!

[Rik]

I thought so.

[pctech]

Bye bye IDNetters 

[Rik]

[sparkler]

But that's exactly what's being proposed, content providers pay more or get shut out, an end to net neutrality. ISPs with sensible use policies like IDNet already provide the answer to any net capacity issues, you have complete neutrality, freedom of choice and effectively pay for the packets you use. Charging content providers is the start of a very slippery slope and one which will require them to recover costs from the end user.

As a content provider I supply content free to the Internet. I pay for the domains, the servers and for the bandwidth consumed. I also donate a huge amount of time to it without reimbursement. The only income I get is a meagre amount via affiliate links. If an ISP wanted payment to carry my content across their network I'd have to recover those costs from end users. Imagine what it would be like if every content provider required you to take out a subscription to view their content.

this is a good thing the internet would become so costly to use that people will stop using it and go to there local shops instead of wasting time paying bt for substandard internet also people can find alternative sources of entertainment to the internet like murder/rape vandalism drugs the way this country is going i wouldn't be suppressed if we have to pay to use the pavements in a few years

[Rik]

I guess we already do through Council Tax.

[sparkler]

thats a ripoff just like the tv licence but thats what you get for living in a non democratic country were the politicians can do what they like not what they promised to do

[Rik]

If only election manifestos were binding.

[Polchraine]

thats a ripoff just like the tv licence

Would you care to explain?

For around £145 you get access to two full BBC channels plus all of the radio channels and BBC subsidies to Ch4 and Ch5.

ITV, Ch4 and Ch5 are not free but paid for by advertising - most of which is ignored.   Consumers pay for that advertising - and again have no real choice.   The estimated cost per household for the non-BBC is around £500 per annum.  Or three times the cost of the BBC.

[gizmo71]

For around £145 you get access to two full BBC channels plus all of the radio channels and BBC subsidies to Ch4 and Ch5.

ITV, Ch4 and Ch5 are not free but paid for by advertising - most of which is ignored.   Consumers pay for that advertising - and again have no real choice.   The estimated cost per household for the non-BBC is around £500 per annum.  Or three times the cost of the BBC.

I object to the TV license on two grounds.

Firstly, most of it is spent on the sort of rubbish other channels quite happily churn out, distorting the market and generating ever increasing piles of steaming such and such like Strictly Come Ice Cooking and The Pop X Idol Factor. I can see no case whatsoever to spend public money on this drivel.

Secondly, and more fundamentally, I object to the TV tax on the basis that people can evade - sorry, avoid - paying it by not having a telly. If it really is in the public interest, it should be funded from general taxation - like schools and hospitals. Funding it through its own tax suggests it has no net benefit to society as a whole, and as such has no place being publicly funded in the first place.

[Ray]

As I understand it the TV License is for being able to receive, watch and or record live TV broadcasts from any source such as Sky/Freesat, ITV etc. on any device capable of receiving live broadcasts, more details here, it is incidental that the License fee goes to the funding of the BBC.
No doubt knowing our Politicians even if they stopped using it to fund the BBC we would still be expected to pay it, it's like the Vehicle Excise Duty which would be fairer to my mind if it was scrapped and included in the cost of fuel.

[Rik]

I thought that, at one point, a Govt decided to scrap VED, Ray, and replace it with increased fuel duty. The started raising the duty, but forgot to abandon the VED.  

[Ray]

I thought that, at one point, a Govt decided to scrap VED, Ray, and replace it with increased fuel duty. The started raising the duty, but forgot to abandon the VED. 

Yes, that sounds about right, Rik,