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Xref: sserve comp.sys.powerpc:34923 comp.sys.intel:32482 comp.unix.bsd:16286 comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit:8225 comp.unix.sys5.r4:9363 comp.unix.misc:16239 comp.os.linux.development:23746 comp.os.linux.misc:35966 comp.os.386bsd.development:3263 comp.os.386bsd.misc:5532 comp.os.misc:3849 Newsgroups: comp.sys.powerpc,comp.sys.intel,comp.unix.bsd,comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit,comp.unix.sys5.r4,comp.unix.misc,comp.os.linux.development,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.386bsd.development,comp.os.386bsd.misc,comp.os.misc Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!news.hawaii.edu!ames!agate!news.ucdavis.edu!csus.edu!netcom.com!netcom6!tmb From: tmb@netcom6.netcom.com (Thomas Breuel) Subject: flat rates for Internet/phone (Re: X on dial-in) In-Reply-To: jfw@proteon.com's message of Fri, 10 Feb 1995 16:47:56 GMT Message-ID: <TMB.95Feb20042733@netcom6.netcom.com> Sender: tmb@netcom6.netcom.com Organization: NETCOM On-line services References: <3f44s2$jqm@maverick.maverick.tad.eds.com> <3h4363$jqv@deep.rsoft.bc.ca> <D3LFnr.KJG@bonkers.taronga.com> <D3ME6C.14t@pe1chl.ampr.org> <D3ns6F.2w9@bonkers.taronga.com> <D3pF0z.1rq@pe1chl.ampr.org> <3hdf66$qfn@park.uvsc.edu> <D3s19v.4M7@pe1chl.ampr.org> <D3sMnw.8vE@proteon.com> Date: Mon, 20 Feb 1995 12:27:32 GMT Lines: 67 In article <D3sMnw.8vE@proteon.com> jfw@proteon.com (John Woods) writes: | Precisely. Because I (for example) have a flat rate | Internet connection, I *know* what it cost me to be connected to the | Internet this month. I *know* what it will cost next month. I | *know* what it will cost a year from now, assuming my IP provider | remains in business, and that the local telco doesn't change the | ground rules. I think that flat rate service has been one of the greatest injuries to the Internet. If you pay a flat monthly rate, you pay that rate regardless of whether you make little use of the network (reading mail and news) or pull over a copy of X11 and the a.b.p.e archives, and run some Internet real-time voice program. Why is this bad? Because it genuinely costs more to provide you with more bandwidth for Internet extravaganzas. If Internet providers give one flat rate to everybody, those who make little use of the network, in effect, subsidize the heavy users heavily. A related problem is that I can't get good service on the Internet even if I am willing to pay more: since bandwidth doesn't cost anything, the only limit to how much bandwidth a user is willing to consume is his time and patience. Hoardes of recreational users seem to be content with low-quality, semi-interactive service for audio, video, and hypertext. But this means that some of those uses of the Internet that it was intended for originally, long distance collaboration via mechanisms like telnet have become intolerably slow. | If I paid by the packet for sent and received data, I might pay less | (my flat rate is pretty high), or I might pay more: even at $0.01 | per minute, if my line were to stay busy all month (lots and lots | and LOTS of junk email) I'd have a pretty frighteningly high bill. | (And if I paid only for sent data, well, someone only has to ftp to | my site and repeatedly take copies of some handy file to run up my | bill.) Well, we clearly need protocols for distributing costs over the Internet more effectively. If you provide information on the Internet on a volunteer basis, someone who actively pulls over that information should at least pay for the communications charges. In the short run, there are relatively simple things you could do for limiting your exposure (those are good ideas even with flat-rate service): place various limits on the total amount of data transmitted and the amount of data sent to any one host, use adaptive transfer rates (fast for short sessions, slow for longer sessions), etc. | No telco is likely to charge that little, | so you have to count on light utilization. It is, unfortunately, true that telephone companies that have a monopoly have a tendency to overcharge consumers relative to their costs. It would be the PUC's responsibility to take care of this. Fortunately, in the long run, prospects aren't so bad. Flat rates aren't really a problem for very local communications, and long distance data communications seems to be highly competitive so that rates will probably sooner or later reflect costs accurately. Note that several long-distance data carriers have already begun to charge, in effect, on a volume basis, giving discounts to customers that do not have high sustained data rates. Thomas.