Originally Posted By: Brons2
LOL you guys are funny. Bandwidth is not unlimited, despite what they might say. 100GB is a ton of data to be downloading! I'm not sure these caps are the answer, due to contractual issues, but in lieu of that, some sort of bandwidth shaping/prioritization has to be done, whether it's QoS or something else.
Maybe the best solution is just to turn down the network priority of those who have already exceeded a certain limit, rather than asking them to buy a higher tier or service. But still, the idea that bandwidth is absolutely unlimited is still absurd, it's not unlimited.
I run the network at the organization I work for and there's no way we'd ever let people download that much data. I'd turn em in to Internal Audit in a heartbeat. Of course, anything related to streaming is blocked anyways, it's pretty doubtful they'd ever get that high.
I use PdaNet on Android to tether my laptop into my phone - have no other internet connection. It will be interesting to see if they get on my case soon about my data usage. I know I am violating Verizon's terms of service for cell phone data service, so if I get in trouble it's my own fault. Maybe you guys should admit it as well.
I think the difference in usage profiles between a business and home network need to be put into perspective here.
On many of the networks I manage and monitor, bandwidth usage is of course one of the flagged criteria. As is what sites are visited... And at what times those sites are visited. Blocked site hits...etc.
In many of these cases, the ISP used imposes no form of bandwidth cap. In others, when dealing with providers like Cogeco Cable and BELL, there are caps in place. In either instance, cap or not, it is really of little concern, since the type of traffic moved across these networks never consumes anywhere near the volume of bandwidth allocated on the capped networks.
If you have an employee who is downloading Torrents at work, you have an employee issue, not a bandwidth limitation issue. Which I think is at least in part, the point you are trying to make. And while policy on many networks makes this forbidden (and oft near impossible to do anyway) I don't think this should be the case for a user in their home unless they are abusing the connection (something in itself which is going to have a lot of variance in the definition of).
At work, you are on company time. Time you are being paid to use productively.
At home, you are PAYING for the use of the connection through your ISP, and in most cases, it is not the same "class" of service; being a consumer-grade connection rather than a business-class connection.
An individual pays their ISP X amount of dollars every month to use this service. And as long as their use complies to the ISP's TOS, then there really shouldn't be an issue. And if there is no cap in that TOS, then the person really should be free to download as much as they like, since that is what they are paying for.
When an ISP over-subscribes to the point where THEY have a bandwidth issue, and then start rolling out caps to attempt to curb usage, to allow more over-subscription, then that is an ISP issue, not a user issue. I'm not sure if that is the case here, but I do know that one local ISP has no problem allowing cap-free Internet at a reasonable rate and have the backbone and infrastructure in place to readily cope with the usage that comes from this.
Now of course this is an expensive endeavour; keeping ahead of your subscribers is. But it makes for happy customers.
