On Sun, Dec 01, 2002 at 04:53:17AM -0500, Kragen Sitaker wrote:
> Don Castella writes:
> > This is nothing more than a vain attmept to rationalize theft of service.
>
> I think you may have misunderstood the article; it doesn't discuss
> using other people's bandwidth without their permission, but rather,
> using the bandwidth you've paid for to provide service to other people
> (and, also, just letting other people use your computer, for example
> by streaming data from it). That does not seem to me to fit the name
> "theft". It's the same thing I do when I run a web site or a mailing
> list on my DSL line, after all.
>
> Several ISPs have enacted policies to stop their customers from
> sharing their network access with others, but this seems reprehensible
> to me. I hope these policies become illegal.
As a co-founder of an early ISP (TLGnet), I had originally defended
these appropriate use policies as the low pricing of residential
broadband supports it. Up until recently[1], wholesale broadband
costs were at $200-500 per Megabit per month. In other words, if
you decide to pull down a constant 1Mb/s of bandwidth on your 1.5
Mb/s DSL 24 hours a day for a full month, the ISP would have to pay
this rate to transit providers that it connects to. This is a bit
simplistic as this is ignoring peering agreements where the ISP may
be getting bandwidth at a reduced rate, and recurring and capitol
costs associated with getting that bandwidth to you. (ie. Billing,
collections, administration, routers/dslams/computers, DSL and
leased lines, rent, employees' salaries, etc.)
ISPs assume that customers will be using a small fraction of the
bandwidth available to them. In this way they can charge $50 a
month to the consumer. If the model is broken where the average
bandwidth is more than what is estimated, then these low residental
rates will need to be raised.
This is why it has always been encouraged by folks at BAWUG to go
out and get a broadband service that allows sharing. Where they
have figured in the higher costs of bandwidth.
Tim
[1] A number of ISPs such as Cogent are offering wholesale bandwidth
at $30-50 a Megabit per month. There is some industry concern
about the peering arrangement they have and how they can continue
to offer these prices and be profitable. Many other co-location
providers are using Cogent and this pricing in their service
pricing (ie. Level3, Stream Guys, etc.) We may get to the
point, like in Japan that bandwidth costs are just not a factor
to end user pricing. For instance, in Japan you can get 6Mb/s
DSL for $20 a month and 12 Mb/s DSL for about $30 a month.
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