[ NNSquad ] Re: NPR on Internet Usage Charging

[Dave Kristol <dmk-nnsquad@kristol.org>]

Barry Gold wrote:
> [...]
> If those figures are anywhere _near_ right (even to an order of 
> magnitude _or two_), charging by the byte isn't going to solve the 
> problem.  Or, at least, it will solve the problem only by making those 
> applications go away.  Nobody is going to pay by-the-byte to download 
> petabytes of information.  They simply won't use those services.

And of course that may be the point.  In this article: 
<http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/patterson/23331>, the writer says:

However, many believe that AT&T, Time Warner, and other Net providers 
also have their eyes on the growing number of users who are legally 
downloading movies and TV shows from services such as Apple TV, the 
Netflix Player, and Vudu—all of which happen to compete with the VOD and 
PPV offerings of (you guessed it) AT&T, Time Warner, and their ilk.

In other words, even if you've dumped PPV in favor of Apple TV, you 
cable and/or telecom provider probably still wants a piece of the 
action—and through metered Net use, they may well get it.
===

So the ISPs will argue that metering is fair, but they are offering two 
competing services, one of which is inherently cheaper than the other to 
the consumer:  PPV/VOD, for which they charge directly, and Internet 
downloads or streaming of video.  It's hard to escape the conclusion 
that they hope to shift consumers to the service that's more profitable 
for them (PPV) or increase the consumer's cost (Internet) so the cost 
differential between the two is smaller.  And of course if they throttle 
Internet bandwidth, they can ensure a poorer "user experience" for that 
mode.

Dave Kristol