Comcast Restricting User Traffic, Whether You Like It Or Not...

@jlenti (10)
United States
August 29, 2007 5:26pm CST
This is in my opinion a serious issue to all Comcast customers and affiliates, other smaller companies have started doing this also. As I was randomly searching the internet today (seems to be a regular thing lately), I came across this article on another site. Comcast has started whats known as a "Tiered" Internet. Simply because, it is not all open anymore. There are different protocols now associated on different unavailable Tiers. They have restricted access to the default BitTorrent seeding (uploading) protocol. Now, I am not a huge torrent user although I surely have used it. But why am I paying money for what they advertise as "Unlimited Access" on their commercials, if they're going to restrict how much of the internet I can use. Not only that, they force you into yearly contracts and then change the contract details? I don't understand how thats legal, and if anyone can please explain how it is, I'd love to hear it. Please visit the link below, it's an important issue. Comcast is slowly turning into a huge monopoly, Microsoft all over again. http://ubuntu-tutorials.com/2007/08/21/comcast-is-starting-the-tiered-internet-whether-we-like-it-or-not/ Also, voice your opinion to to FCC at this link if you're interested. http://www.savetheinternet.com/yourstory Thanks for reading, I hope to get some interesting opinions and responses.
1 person likes this
3 responses
Sojournstar
@cempires (171)
• United States
29 Aug 07
Both us, and my parents in law just dumped comcast last month. Our reasons were different than what you mentioned, mostly due to horrible service. They had Verizon installed, and we have been on Verizon since January already, and so far so good. Altho we Verizon for the inrenet, we had comcast for tv, and booted it out, and installed Direct TV Satelite, and we really like it.
jlenti
@jlenti (10)
• United States
29 Aug 07
I agree. It's not just this that has me hating Comcast. Their service is terrible. Verizon has better service, but they're just as bad as Comcast on the corporate scamming level. Comcast, Verizon, Telus (VERY large Canadian telecom company), and TONS of others are lobbying for a tiered internet. Where companies and end users that can afford it, will have the faster services at outrageous prices. They will intentionally downgrade the bandwith capabilities to normal users, and charging more for the different services in their different "Tiers". IE: HTTP/HTTPS would be one tier, basic web browsing. Anything other than that might be more expensive, so forget downloading music or YouTubing for your convienient low cost price. You're going to pay an extra $9.99 a month for that or maybe more. And if you want to send emails? Forget it, thats gonna be a different tier because it's a different protocol. It will be ridiculous if we don't put our foot down now. We need to support Net Neutrality, look it up on www.savetheinternet.com It is a SERIOUS issue, and you might not think it is now. But wait until it costs you $65 a month for internet just so you can Youtube. Or wait until you can't use your favorite search engine because it's not your ISP's "preferred" network. It's not a joke.
suspenseful
@suspenseful (40192)
• Canada
30 Aug 07
I am a Canadian. If what I read is true, then perhaps up here in Canada, we might be affected, because in certain matters we do follow the United States. Already we have four speeds from light use, regular use (the one we use), fast use, and extremely fast use and I do not want the regular users downgraded to light use and forbidden to get on sights because we are not upper class. So I was wondering whether what Comncast is doing, might happen up here.
AnjaP
@Rollo1 (16679)
• Boston, Massachusetts
30 Aug 07
There's a reason I call Comcast "The Great Satan". I did a post on Comcast recently on one of my blogs, they are dumping users who they say are using too much bandwidth, but they refuse to reveal how much is too much. Comcast won't publicly announce their usage ceiling so you can't know if you have gone over it. They just suspend you for 12 months. I have gone to Verizon myself. I also note that Verizon was recently listed in a list of the top internet providers. I can deal with DSL vs cable, I have no trouble uploading or downloading, and I don't have to pour more money into the totalitarian behemoth that Comcast has become.