View Full Version : Curious, How Do These Packages Sound?
Ignition
31-01-2006, 16:35
I'm being nosey ;)
How would this set of packages sound to people:
Basic Internet: 1Mbit download, 256kbps upload £15/mth
High Speed Standard: 5Mbit download, 512kbps upload £25/mth
High Speed Extreme: 10Mbit download, 1Mbit upload. £35/mth
Basic package to carry a data cap of 30GB/mth of which no more than 10GB/mth can be upload.
Standard package to carry a data cap of 60GB/mth of which no more than 20GB/mth can be upload.
Extreme to carry no set cap, however...
All packages are subject to fair use policy and to traffic shaping / profiling where appropriate to ensure network performance and integrity
Packages with set caps, when these caps are broken the basic package will then drop to 128kbps downstream and 64kbps upstream and the standard package to 256kbps downstream and 128kbps upstream. Customers will be allowed to exceed caps once in each 3 monthly period by up to 25% before the speed restriction comes into effect. There will also be PAYG options for people who wish to 'top up' their allowances to avoid these limits or return their service to normal speeds.
Notification of current usage levels to take place via email alerts every 25% of traffic limit, and at 90% and 100% a 'click through' warning where customer will be directed to a web page informing them of this, and asking them to click to indicate they are aware. At 100% customers will, of course, be informed if they are in their 'grace month' of cap breaking or if they are to be slowed down and to what data rates. There will of course be PAYG options as detailed below.
There will be no web caching employed, however peer to peer caching will be used, as stated above traffic shaping / profiling will be used where appropriate.
Customers who regularly exceed traffic caps will be asked to upgrade to a higher tier or leave the service. This will be in the form of 'click through' notifications informing them of the downgrade in speed. Should the speed downgrade happen 3 times in a 6 month period they will be considered as regularly overusing. Click through takes the form of automatic redirection to the fair use policy and the customer will be required to indicate their agreement. Until this is done all traffic will be blackholed.
Customers on 10Mbit who are compromising network performance in their areas will be provided a click through warning and be automatically redirected upon access to the net to the fair use policy, and asked to signify agreement and comply by clicking a button.
10Mbit customers who continue to use heavily will be downgraded without option to standard package with no option to upgrade until they have stayed within the standard package limits for 3 months.
The ISP will guarantee that barring a fault or the throttling for going over cap a 10Mbit/1Mbit service will always run faster than 5Mbit/512kbit, and 5Mbit/512kbit will never drop below 2.5Mbit/256k, barring of course outside internet issues. This speed to be proven in case of dispute by an on-net HTTP speedtes. 1Mbit service will always maintain 512k/128k.
Yes it's far from a 'clean' connection, hey it's big brother'ed to hell. It's fast, it's cheap, your thoughts?
EDIT: This service would also offer a 'boost' option. With this option you can move up to the next tier up for £1.50, or to the top tier from the bottom tier for £3.00. This boost will last for 48 hours or for 5GB, whichever comes first.
If you wish to buy extra bandwidth after using a full allowance, or if on the boost option it will cost 50p/GB. There will be a 'top up' style page available a la pay as you go mobile services. A customer will be able to top up PAYG bandwidth at any time, this will be usable at their standard or boosted level, even if they have been downgraded to the slowed service after breaking limit.
Either of the top 2 packages would suit me fine.
Who is it with? Or just a thought?
I've already signed up... But then I woke up.
Standard would probably suit me fine for speed bandwidth usage. If the ISP took the mickey and my connection averaged at 2.5mbps all the time, i'd probably spend the extra £5 and get the garanteed 5mbps download. Depends on how much I download. If it contained decent newgroup access, I might need to up it to Extreme.
Ignition
31-01-2006, 17:03
I've already signed up... But then I woke up.
Standard would probably suit me fine for speed bandwidth usage. If the ISP took the mickey and my connection averaged at 2.5mbps all the time, i'd probably spend the extra £5 and get the garanteed 5mbps download. Depends on how much I download. If it contained decent newgroup access, I might need to up it to Extreme.
No it wouldn't I typo'd the price, it's actually an extra tenner as the packages will be £15, £25 and £35 a month.
Original post edited to offer boost and PAYG topup options.
Also note that the above bandwidth guarantees don't guarantee performance on anything apart from web browsing / http downloads, and certainly not P2P. They also only offer this performance under normal conditions not fault conditions.
These should be fairly painless to achieve given the caching and traffic shaping / profiling though :)
---------- Post added at 17:03 ---------- Previous post was at 16:50 ----------
Either of the top 2 packages would suit me fine.
Who is it with? Or just a thought?
As a consumer and someone who's worked in the industry for a while this is what I think makes a feasible, sustainable product. All the monitoring, etc, is fully automated and has already been employed by other ISPs. The traffic shaping facilities are going to be used fairly soon by a number of ISPs and already are by others.
In my opinion these products are fair, sustainable, good value and quality products which cater for virtually everyone apart from the really heavy bandwidth users, however these guys can't complain as if they are extracting the urine they will be given ample warning and opportunity.
No-one can claim to not be aware of how much they are downloading as they'll be updated regularly, the PAYG top-up is there, there's some leeway, boost option for when you need that Linux ISO a little quicker.
All of this can be automated. If networks are in danger of congesting this can be automatically detected and users profiled to see who is hammering their bandwidth if anyone. If no-one then upgrade time.
Also the contention on the service, as traffic shaping is involved, would be better managed. Gaming traffic could be managed and prioritised, VoIP, etc. You may only get the bare minimum on your porn download but your VoIP and gaming experiences will still be good :)
Traffic shaping done to guarantee service not stick two fingers up at the customer and allow more cramming onto pipes by throttling everyone to death.
EDIT: Another side effect is it encourages heavy downloading to be done out of hours as obviously speeds on FTP / NNTP / P2P will be better outside of peak hours, as the dynamic traffic shaping will have more bandwidth free to allocate to these protocols.
prefer it as it is now, unlimited 1 or 2 meg, capped 10meg
AbyssUnderground
31-01-2006, 19:00
If NTL did that and the network coped better then Im up for it. Id be happier with a fast network and traffic shaping than a slow network with no shaping.
The High Speed Extreme would suit me just fine.
DieDieMyDarling
31-01-2006, 19:23
I thought the argument for capping was always that 1 10mb customer took up the same bandwidth as 5 x 2mb or 10 x 1mb customers, and that's why the highest speed had to be capped.
I'd be more than happy to go with your planning, but i can't see ntl being so keen. :D
To be honest, i'd be happy if the two lower connections were un capped, with the extreme connection having a cap. 5mb is more than enough speed, especially considering that most people on 10mb now don't actually get anything near 10mb.
technically v good packages, however far too complicated to be able to market effectively.
Generally, people look at a maximum of three things when chosing a packaging [assuming they have already chosen a provider] speed, cap, cost.
If you start adding up and down caps/ payg/ traffic shaping and the killer "fair usage" it all gets messy.
sicknote
31-01-2006, 23:04
ignition m8 if only...if only:)
Sign me up to this one please- High Speed Extreme: 10Mbit download, 1Mbit upload. £35/mth ;)
I'm on the 10 Mb now, in a good month I'll d/l somewhere near to my limit ( once ) but have u/l almost twice that, ( in that month ) if I'm gonna pay for a tier, I'd like to know what limitations I have, and not have a faceless somebody say, sorry, I think your an unfair user and get my connection throttled :2cents:
ian@huth
31-01-2006, 23:46
The thing that I like about that service is that you know exactly what is being offered and can make a decision on whether your usage fits in with what is being offered. It has some guarantees that I have never seen from an ISP who supplies residential services. The boost option takes care of the occasional variation to your normal usage that occurs from time to time such as when setting up a new system.
rogerdraig
31-01-2006, 23:52
any thing that isnt unlimited will not survive
with tv and films ect coming people wont want to pay twice
and most like me want a fixed bill no cut off though i have never worried about speed
Ignition
01-02-2006, 01:55
technically v good packages, however far too complicated to be able to market effectively.
Generally, people look at a maximum of three things when chosing a packaging [assuming they have already chosen a provider] speed, cap, cost.
If you start adding up and down caps/ payg/ traffic shaping and the killer "fair usage" it all gets messy.
Really?
http://www.videotron.com/services/en/internet/6.jsp
You don't need to market all the complexities, and would be stupid to. Fair usage standard part of T+C, caps speak for themselves, PAYG easy enough to cope with, traffic shaping sits with the T+Cs.
All I need to advertise is:
1Mbit downstream 256kbit upstream, 30GB/mth traffic allowance. *
5Mbit downstream 512kbit upstream, 60GB/mth traffic allowance. **
10Mbit downstream 1Mbit upstream, unlimited ***
Extra bandwidth over inclusive allowance chargeable at 50p per Gigabyte or part thereof.
* No more than 10GB/mth of allowance to be upload (data transferred from customer's equipment to the internet
** No more than 20GB/mth....
*** There are no formal limits to this service however it is subject to fair usage and terms of service as shown in customer policy at http://....... (links to standard network degredation clause, along with this section note traffic shaping.)
Introducing *boost* service - on lite or standard and need more bandwidth? Click here to find out how! (Links to prices and options for boost).
Small print for the win....
---------- Post added at 01:41 ---------- Previous post was at 01:39 ----------
any thing that isnt unlimited will not survive
with tv and films ect coming people wont want to pay twice
and most like me want a fixed bill no cut off though i have never worried about speed
Unless your film company is going to pay your ISP for carrying traffic tough luck I'm afriaid. See the Extreme service tier I propose, no limits so long as you don't extract the urine.
You do highlight a good point though, regarding the video content. Someone is going to have to pay for this bandwidth somewhere and as content providers are advocating P2P distribution (saves them bandwidth) others will have to pick up the tab. IE you.
---------- Post added at 01:47 ---------- Previous post was at 01:41 ----------
I thought the argument for capping was always that 1 10mb customer took up the same bandwidth as 5 x 2mb or 10 x 1mb customers, and that's why the highest speed had to be capped.
I'd be more than happy to go with your planning, but i can't see ntl being so keen. :D
To be honest, i'd be happy if the two lower connections were un capped, with the extreme connection having a cap. 5mb is more than enough speed, especially considering that most people on 10mb now don't actually get anything near 10mb.
I find those ideas hilarious.
Kinda pointless too. I want to download lots of DVDs, I can either pay ntl £25 a month and download 600GB worth, over 120 single layer DVDRs, or I can pay them £35 a month and download 15.
Ummm. Que?
2Mbit is still more than enough to cane a network, if someone were caning my bandwidth I'd rather they give me £35 a month and I shape them down during peak times than they pay me £25. Again the shaping provides an incentive to download out of hours as there'll be less higher priority traffic on the network.
---------- Post added at 01:49 ---------- Previous post was at 01:47 ----------
The thing that I like about that service is that you know exactly what is being offered and can make a decision on whether your usage fits in with what is being offered. It has some guarantees that I have never seen from an ISP who supplies residential services. The boost option takes care of the occasional variation to your normal usage that occurs from time to time such as when setting up a new system.
The guarantee incase you didn't notice was based on an on-net HTTP test. HTTP would be given a fairly high priority on my traffic combing system. Cunning bugger aren't I? ;)
---------- Post added at 01:52 ---------- Previous post was at 01:49 ----------
I'm on the 10 Mb now, in a good month I'll d/l somewhere near to my limit ( once ) but have u/l almost twice that, ( in that month ) if I'm gonna pay for a tier, I'd like to know what limitations I have, and not have a faceless somebody say, sorry, I think your an unfair user and get my connection throttled :2cents:
If you're caning Bittorrent, etc, you're naturally going to be throttled as it'd have a low priority in my idea of a traffic combing ruleset. During off-peak hours you'd see much nicer performance, however what do I care, no point in the bandwidth sitting there unused and ideally want the pipes as close as possible to 100% utilisation 24x7 without compromising the experience.
If you insist on trying to evade my traffic shaping I'll insist on forcibly reminding you of our agreement for your service. You will have to go out of your way to nail my bandwidth that you rent a share of. Play by my rules and accept you can have as much as you want so long as someone else doesn't want it and we stay friends :romance:
---------- Post added at 01:54 ---------- Previous post was at 01:52 ----------
ignition m8 if only...if only:)
I'd welcome someone with more experience in product design showing me why this is unfeasible.
---------- Post added at 01:55 ---------- Previous post was at 01:54 ----------
prefer it as it is now, unlimited 1 or 2 meg, capped 10meg
Yep, bizarre really that you can do 600GB/month download for £25 a month but only 75GB for £35.
Just to point out something that is in my masterplan:
During off-peak hours you'd see much nicer performance, however what do I care, no point in the bandwidth sitting there unused and ideally want the pipes as close as possible to 100% utilisation 24x7 without compromising the experience.
No Plusnet style ownage due to not wanting to supply enough bandwidth, but no stinginess, costs me virtually the same whether the pipes are saturated or empty at 2am, knock yourselves out.
If you're caning Bittorrent, etc, you're naturally going to be throttled as it'd have a low priority in my idea of a traffic combing ruleset. During off-peak hours you'd see much nicer performance, however what do I care, no point in the bandwidth sitting there unused and ideally want the pipes as close as possible to 100% utilisation 24x7 without compromising the experience.
If you insist on trying to evade my traffic shaping I'll insist on forcibly reminding you of our agreement for your service. You will have to go out of your way to nail my bandwidth that you rent a share of. Play by my rules and accept you can have as much as you want so long as someone else doesn't want it and we stay friends :romance:
Thats seems fair, I do most of my u/l d/l at night / off peak anyway :tu:
tomjleeds
01-02-2006, 08:28
Judging by the problems users have been having with the 10Mbps service, I personally think that 1Mbps/256Kbps, 3Mbps/512Kbps and 5Mbps/1mbps packages might be more appropriate, not only for users but also the network. If those packages were at the price points you suggested, with either no caps or 'flexible' ones as you suggested, contention issues would be lowered and customers would likely always see their stated speeds.
The obsession with going faster is getting a bit tiresome. I'm sure most users would rather have a dependable, consistent connection at a lower speed than one which doesn't perform as it should.
But then, what do I know? I'm just some guy!
ian@huth
01-02-2006, 09:41
any thing that isnt unlimited will not survive
with tv and films ect coming people wont want to pay twice
and most like me want a fixed bill no cut off though i have never worried about speedI would take the opposite view and say that anything unlimited will not survive unless very good traffic management is in place. You would then get complaints galore from a certain type of user because the queue of downloads that they set up is taking far longer than it should if the connection was operating at max speed.
TV and films coming is an interesting point. They will need plenty of bandwidth but who is going to pay for it, the consumer, the provider or someone else? Skybybroadband for instance uses p2p to supply the film. Unless you set your system up not to allow anyone to share from you there will be many users racking up bandwidth usage which you may be paying for. If everyone disallows others from uploading from them then the service will not work.
if the basic was 2mb capped for £15 i think more people would get BB.
Im on 2mb for £25 and to be fair feel a bit conned as my friend is on 2mb telewest for 14.99. which cant be right can it. if only i lived in his street.
Graham M
01-02-2006, 15:00
Im on 2mb for £25 and to be fair feel a bit conned as my friend is on 2mb telewest for 14.99. which cant be right can it. if only i lived in his street.
2 Different Companies, 2 Different Addresses "conned" isnt the right word as you cannot be with the other company and the one you are on cannot offer it.
DieDieMyDarling
01-02-2006, 16:32
I find those ideas hilarious.
Kinda pointless too. I want to download lots of DVDs, I can either pay ntl £25 a month and download 600GB worth, over 120 single layer DVDRs, or I can pay them £35 a month and download 15.
Ummm. Que?
2Mbit is still more than enough to cane a network, if someone were caning my bandwidth I'd rather they give me £35 a month and I shape them down during peak times than they pay me £25. Again the shaping provides an incentive to download out of hours as there'll be less higher priority traffic on the network.
I totally agree with you, i was very surprised that ntl announced 1mb and 2mb would be unlimited, yet 10mb would have a 75GB cap. Until i thought about it...
ntl released 10mb internet to keep in line with the competition, the release of 8mb and 24mb (similar game) on LLU exchanges, meant that ntl had to up the speeds, whether they liked it or not, just to keep in line with the competition. They probably don't really want people using it at it's full capacity, as it's a huge drain on teh networks, and if some people on here are to be believed, then it is already causing major problems on the network, only a very few people can get the full 10mb speeds (any time of the day), and various other things are slowing down and becomming a hassle, proxies and traffic shaping, etc.
It probably makes sense for ntl to allow those heavy users their unlimited connections, but to limit the speed at which they can use them, therefore clearing up the network traffic. In theory.
So, the point you make actually works in their favour, who is going to pay 34.99 for 75GB, when on 2mb you can download much more than that, and pay less.
My surprise comes from the fact that they offered the 2mb unlimited for such a low price. There have been rumours for ages that they were going to announce unlimted services, but i think most people thought these services would be in addition to the services already available, and would cost a little bit more. Ie, 1mb capped = 17.99 --- 1mb uncapped = 24.99, 2mb capped = 24.99 --- 2mb uncapped = 34.99.
2 Different Companies, 2 Different Addresses "conned" isnt the right word as you cannot be with the other company and the one you are on cannot offer it.
similar company offering similar service for £10 less. Yes i cant get Telewest god I wish I could in respect to price. lazy yes as I've got bt and ntl phones in the house so i do have a choice.
I'd rather not move as Ntl has been fine over the many years. but Telewest have the better price.
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