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Comcast is trying out more flexible ways to implement its bandwidthcaps by experimenting with tiered service options. Comcast says that it will temporarily suspend enforcement of its250GB monthly data limit on residential users while it conductstrials of two different new bandwidth cap plans. Comcast says thatit is conducting trials of the two new cap plans throughout thesummer, although the company isn't yet saying where the trials willtake place. BACKGROUND: Bandwidth caps coming to AT&T wireline services RELATED: AT&T ups "unlimited" 3G throttling cap to 3GB The first data cap plan will be a tiered service where users willsign up for three different levels of data usage and will thus beable to consume more data per month if they're willing to pay morefor a higher service tier. The lowest tier in this particular planwill have a monthly 300GB data cap and will go up from there ifusers want to upgrade their plans. Users who subscribe to the toptiered plan and who still exceed their data cap will be able topurchase additional data in increments of $10 per 50GB. The secondplan Comcast is trying out will set a flat one-tier limit of 300GBper month and will give users who exceed that cap the option to buydata in increments, just as the tiered approach does. But no matter which of the two plans Comcast ultimately decides toenact, this means that Comcast customers will see their monthlybandwidth caps increased to a minimum of 300GB. Comcast says thatmost users will never come close to exceeding the bandwidth cap asit notes that its Xfinity subscribers use an average of 8GB to 10GBper month, or less than 4% of the impending 300GB cap. Cathy Avgiris, Comcast's executive vice president and generalmanager for communications and data services, said in a blog posttoday that one main reason Comcast decided to make changes was themedia attention surrounding its bandwidth caps policies followingthe introduction of its Xfinity TV app and its XfinityTV on theXbox app, among others. "Some of the conversation around our product introductions focusedon our data usage threshold, rather than on the excitingopportunities we are offering our customers," she wrote. "So as themarket and technology have evolved, we've decided to change ourapproach and replace our static 250GB usage threshold with moreflexible data usage management approaches." ISPs have been experimenting with implementing bandwidth caps since2008, when Comcast, Time Warner Cable and AT&T, all announcedthey were trialing new capped services. Implementing data capseffectively has proven to be a challenge for ISPs, however, asTime-Warner Cable eventually decided to shut down a trial programthat put bandwidth caps on its cable Internet services due tocustomer complaints about the potential for paying overage charges.AT&T last year finally implemented data caps on its wirelineservices by offering a 150GB cap for its DSL customers and a 250GBcap for its U-Verse customers. Verizon this week said it will soon make even "grandfathered" subscribers to move from$30 per month unlimited data plans to tiered plans when theyupgrade to 4G LTE phones. Brad Reed covers both Google and the wireless industry for NetworkWorld. Be sure to check out his blog, Google Reed-er, and followhim on Twitter at @bwreednww. Read more about anti-malware in Network World's Anti-malware section. I am an expert from usbpowerpacks.com, while we provides the quality product, such as Portable Power Bank , 2.0 Multimedia Speakers Manufacturer, Portable Power Bank,and more.
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