None of this would be a problem if the government didn't sell us out for what we already paid for and allowed these vultures into the system. It should have be national from the start. It costs them about nothing to have data run through those lines. All those caps exist purely to garner profit.
this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2024
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Mostly correct take IMO. I don't blame ISPs for trying. I blame government (and not necessarily just federal) regulations/regulators for allowing it.
I grew up in NY. We paid a boatload in taxes to make fiber happen everywhere. IT. NEVER. HAPPENED.
NY is strongly Democrat. Acting like Republicans are solely the problem is asinine, and nothing stops states from enacting their own laws within the state. If California and NY made it happen. Guess what would basically happen throughout the whole country?
Yeah point to me where I said this was the fault of the Rubes? Because I didn't say that. This was a joint captilistic operation to severe untold amounts of wealth from the working class. You paid all them taxes and nothing happened because the ISPs decides to pocket the public funds instead of doing anything and the government let them.
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I would just say, I do blame ISP's for trying. It's unethical to try and squeeze every cent out of your customers, community and country. It's never just "business". Businesses are operated by people while exploiting people. It's not a cold hearted machine doing the thinking, it's normal people making these unethical decisions.
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Yeah sure, then why is it that my entire bare metal server leased from OVH costs less than my Internet connection, and is fully unmetered access too.
I pay for a data rate and I should be able to use the full amount as I please. If we paid for the amount of data then why are we advertising speeds and paying for speeds?
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You have data caps on your broadband connections in the US? Does your phones have rotary dials too?
$190 bucks a month for a limitless connection is insane. I'm too cheap to pay 30€ a month for unlimited fibre connection so I use 4G router which gives me around 40Mbps unlimited connection and it costs me 10€ a month.
It is insane. Even worse is we (taxpayers) gave them money to improve infrastructure and they put it in their pockets instead.
And also you know we INVENTED THE INTERNET AND PAID FOR THEIR CABLES.
What the fuck do they even do? Sell data? Like this should just be a section of the government but everyone is obsessed with the private sector holding shit
Yes yes because any time the government does something to help individuals instead of business it's SoCiALiSm.
That seems like some one off or a rural connection.
I work with a large remote team across the US. Most people on my team have gig internet, some get slower 100 meg internet. Mine is gig, I pay $60/mo and have no data cap.
A lot of plans do. Especially with the major telecom networks like ATT and Verizon.
Recently had a smaller company come in and install fiber. $85/mo for Gigabit service with no data cap. That’s pretty good compared to what I was paying. ATT only offered 500Mb/s and that was over $110 a month with a data cap, I want to say 800GB.
Do not get reliable enough cell coverage for one of those mobile routers. But they aren’t any cheaper here since those are owned by the major telecoms.
yeah funny enough, this is more of a recent thing. it's still spreading at the moment. isps over here just kind of got it in their head that they could make extra money with this one day.
I want what you have so badly, I hate our ISPs
I pay double what I did in the city for half the speed, but thank fuck I've got no data caps or I'd not have moved here, and I've made a decent Internet plan a hard requirement on ever moving
The 6 TB of torrents I've uploaded in the last month appreciate it, I'm sure
Every place with free coffee refills knows there's a reasonable upper limit to what one person can consume.
And if they exceed it, it's coffee. It's dirt cheap (just like landline data)
The pandemic exposed the lie that ISPs need to cap data because of infrastructure limitations. We all went to WFH with no issues on the infrastructure.
The internet is not a ~~truck~~ Waffle House carafe.
Right. Everyone knows it’s a series of tubes! You’d think his fellow republicans would have explained this to him.
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But that would be fucking amazing.
I like my internet like I like my WH coffee. Scalding, bitter and inconsistent.
I like my internet like i like my coffee.
Filtered – yet full of unnecessary cookies and shit...
If there was a government-mandated monopoly on coffee and it was sold in L/s, we probably would.
funny that nobody argued opposite: all the new services are primarily streaming/hosted and otherwise "not here". New crop of tech solutions requires crap-ton of bandwidth. So caps prevent those companies from doing ripping off customers in other areas. How un-Republican is that? They are getting in the way of enterprises making a living! So the most Republican thing to do would be to let foxes watch the henhouse. Ask ISPs to regulate themselves so that "everybody"'s (and I mean every enterprise) happy. In other words getting in the way of this proposal is very much just "polid'ticking" trying to undo what dems are doing regardless whether it's actually a conservative thing to do or not.
What an ass backwards take
Data caps would be fine if they weren't colluding a monopoly.
Then everyone could freely switch to providers offering unlimited.
Dafuq?
Seriously, lol.
The two republicans mentioned in the article are for sure the two heads of that vomiting earthworm in the pic. The coffee analogy guy being the one vomiting his drivel of lead addled brainrot into an elementary school level take on broadband data caps and general economic theory.
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Ironically, he picked a metaphor that doesn't support his point at all
If you go to a Starbucks, it's like you're buying a set amount of data. You don't expect unlimited refills, because that's not how the transaction works - you buy the coffee by volume. It's yours with no strings attached
If you go to a restaurant, you buy access to coffee. I do expect unlimited coffee, I would be livid if they charged by the cup. However, you do not get to expect to take any coffee with you - you're using their "infrastructure" to hold your coffee, and you don't get to walk out with the cup. You don't get to share it with the restaurant or the table - you're burying a personal "subscription" to coffee for the duration of your stay
Coffee, like data, is effectively free at a restaurant. They must pay for the infrastructure, but after that each additional pot only costs a few cents. They must make at least 1 pot a day, and a human can't safely drink more than a couple pots in a day (which is an obscene amount only the heaviest caffeine addicts could tolerate). You get it one small cup at a time, if you bought a second cup you could double the rate of coffee delivery... They might even just give it to you for free, because it costs them so little and they want you to come back
You purchase access to coffee for a time, or you purchase coffee by volume. They shouldn't be allowed to charge for both - maybe if you've drank 14 cups and others want coffee, they should be given priority during lunch rush as the rate of coffee production is limited by infrastructure
It's actually a pretty decent metaphor, it just doesn't support his argument at all
I completely disagree that it is a decent metaphor. Unlike coffee, internet data usage is entirely nebulous to mostly everyone outside of the tech sphere. The metaphor serves as a way of misrepresenting a widespread ignorance for a fundamental understanding.
If we wanted a decent metaphor we'd have to compare data usage to something like health insurance. Well you see, you pay for your rate of coverage at these visits per year but also have to pay your deductible that might or might not be used off routine...
In the end if we want to simplify internet expense it is this: ISPs charge way more than they need to and search for ways to charge more to maximize profits without improving service.
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