Comments on: Comcast: TV Everywhere Will Eat Into Your Metered Broadband

By: Kyle Brady: A Blog - Incorrect Base Assumptions About Network Management

Kyle Brady: A Blog - Incorrect Base Assumptions About Network Management — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 07:08:02 +0000

[...] bytes transferred, is a gray area at best – setting an arbitrary size for acceptable P2P traffic, or any type of traffic, creates artificial pricing levels, not to mention potentially endorsing the acquisition of [...]

By: Bill

Bill — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:24:36 +0000

This is one of the reasons why I moved to FIOS and will never look back to Comcast. While FIOS might have caps down the line, there aren’t any now. The TV Anywhere deal is the only thing Comcast can do to keep people from dropping cable TV in favor of online video services. If they don’t adjust the cap at the same time they are not helping their cause any. I will never be a Comcast customer again, they don’t put customers first no matter how many different ways they try to spin it.

By: Q dub

Q dub — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:54:44 +0000

Umm…this is a good thing in a weird way. It’d be a very very bad sign if Comcast’s own streams were excluded from the cap, which meant that they would most _certainly_ lower or freeze the cap where it is. At least now, they have to raise the cap over time to match their own video customers’ consumption pattern.

By: Phil

Phil — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:05:33 +0000

@Chuck.

yeah, because of a LACK OF COMPETITION.

By: Chuck

Chuck — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 02:58:47 +0000

Comcast has absolutely NO incentive or interest in raising caps when doing so would LOWER revenue.

By: Janko Roettgers

Janko Roettgers — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 22:27:14 +0000

How is this an argument against net neutrality? If anything, it’s an argument against bandwidth caps …

By: Andrew

Andrew — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 21:52:45 +0000

One of the many reasons why the advocates for supposed “network neutrality” are totally wrong-headed.

By: Dameon Welch-Abernathy

Dameon Welch-Abernathy — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 20:49:23 +0000

Perhaps I am being a bit Pollyanna about the whole thing, but Comcast has repeatedly stated they are really only looking to catch the < 0.5% of the customer base that use substantially more bandwidth than the average user. I suspect as more and more people actually watch streaming media online (be it from a Comcast-authorized source or otherwise), driving the average usage numbers up, we'll start Comcast adjust this "cap" (which is more of a guideline anyway) upward.

By: Gadget Sleuth

Gadget Sleuth — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 17:21:14 +0000

Comcast loves to do what they can to charge you more. It’s a shame they’re the only game in town around here when it comes to broadband internet. The way they do business irks the heck out of me.

By: Om Malik

Om Malik — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:25:59 +0000

Chris,

I tweaked the post to be clear and concise, and hence you might be feeling the confusion. To clarify, the answer is yes: the streaming bandwidth consumed when watching videos using TV everywhere would be counted towards the total monthly bandwidth usage quota.

Hope that clarifies it.

By: Om Malik

Om Malik — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:18:03 +0000

yeah that is true Stacey but it is precisely what they want to do — circumvent network neutrality.

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:17:51 +0000

Your RSS (in Google Reader) and your article do not line up in a very important way… the response that Brian gave is shown as “yes” in Google Reader and “no” in your article. Big difference, I imagine you would agree.

Here is what your RSS summary says in GR:

“While on the conference call to announce the TV Everywhere initiative being promoted by Time Warner and Comcast, I asked Comcast CEO Brian Roberts if the content streamed as part of this new effort will be free from bandwidth quota his company has started imposing on this customers. His answer: yes. He explained…”

Note that this is identical in every way EXCEPT the one that really tells us what Comcast’s feelings are on this. Although we can infer from the rest of the article that the answer was “yes,” it also makes me wonder whether you heard what you thought you heard.

Thanks for the clarification for one of many big fans of your blog.

By: Comcast and Time Warner Talk TV Everywhere, But Don’t Say Much

Comcast and Time Warner Talk TV Everywhere, But Don’t Say Much — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:17:40 +0000

[...] asked a good question about whether or not this video consumption online would count towards Comcast’s bandwidth [...]

By: Stacey Higginbotham

Stacey Higginbotham — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:11:48 +0000

Om, if they excluded it from the bandwidth cap, the FCC might come down on them for violating net neutrality by giving their service a competitive advantage over alternative online TV offerings. Or that’s the likely rationale from Comcast. Plus, this may be a good thing since they have said that as usage rates rise, the cap will rise.

By: Tony Z

Tony Z — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:09:28 +0000

So this would be network-neutral streaming? Interesting. I just wish they had an unlimited offer above the cap for power users.