Title: Throw a cap at me and lower my speed?!
Description: Rant and question
K-62 - November 13, 2005 04:07 AM (GMT)
I just discovered that Rogers (my ISP) has put in place bandwidth cap without a huge announcement. On top of that they have lowered my download speed by so much it’s not funny and they somehow made it so that when I run a test is doesn’t show, but it's noticeable. Bittorent and other P2P programs do not work no more and legal media downloads(i.e. itunes) have also stop connecting.
On the issues of the cap they say they you will not inform if you gone over it because according to them 60GB of bandwidth is what the "average person" might use in a year. What bout the other 2%?!
I call Rogers when I heard about this (from the tech guy that JUMPED MY FENCE to mess with that box on the side of my house).
The conversation went something like this:
The guy at Rogers said "there is away to check you bandwidth usage on our site."
So, I asked "is going to your site using my bandwidth?"
He responded "yes, but its only a little bit and it will be saved in your caches so you can assist it the second time without using any bandwidth."
"I clear my caches often because I pay my bill to you guys online and for other sercity reasons," I said to the guy who was by now sort of irritated with me.
Then he turned the tables on me, " why do you need too much bandwidth anyway do you download a lot of illegal movies and stuff?"
"Yes, I do!" I told him "and I think your stat is wrong there’s way more than 2% of you customers that use P2P and others that might have many computers on the same connection that will exceed your 60gb!"
"Maybe you should switch ISPs than" he told me straight up in a ratter unfriendly tone.
"You know what I think I will!" I said as a slam the phone (more like press the hang up button).
After my call to Rogers I went to their site and looked for the cancellation forms but it turned out that it would cost $100 and an extra $300 (some kinda traveling 10 blocks to my house fee) to discontinue the service. I was really mad by this time because I couldn't cancel without talking it over with my parents and my cousin. Well to plan ahead I called Bell Canada and asked about their DSL connections. They checked for me and found out that to get DSL I would have to pay them $1000 to dig a hole so then can install some wires and stuff, I declined.
Though I dont mine the cap, I really dont like how I cant use any P2P programs and how the surfing and download speeds have gone down so much.
Well I was wondering, can they do this? isnt it a breach of the contracted I signed a year ago, it was a fixed 2 year plan?
ZeRoRaVeN - November 13, 2005 04:18 AM (GMT)
Ahem, it depends on WHAT the contract said, frankly this is ridious, no media and such? It's plain stupid...
Being that the Rogers website doesn't load (Ha! maybe they exceeded their own cap)
http://yourgeeks.ca/wp/?p=35It seems to say media is allowed...
Ask for a copy of your contract, I know you live in Canada so your rights may differ from the ones I'm referring to which are the US, but here you have a right to obtain a copy of the contract which you should be able to. It seems there's been alot of people raging over this too..I smell lawsuit!
But basically...hmm..its not right..well...someone mentioned users might want to switch to Sympatico? Ever heard of it?
Hmm this is very interesting:
| QUOTE |
I found this letter, posted at the Globe and Mail website, to be most interesting.
Dear Editor:
As one of the people affected by Rogers' new bit cap, I have a few points that I have brought up to Rogers.
I have asked, and also suggest it to all Rogers users, that they no longer allow Rogers to bill them via e-mail. Emailed billings do use up a small percentage of my bit cap.
It's a small point indeed, but one that has a direct impact on Rogers. By forcing Rogers to do this by post, it will have to pay for the paper and postage.
I have also asked that monitoring of my usage be made available via software from my house. I understand that Rogers has tools in place for monitoring the usage, but by having to visit the Rogers website to view that usage, I am using up a percentage of my bandwidth, therefore using a portion of my cap every time I visit the page. This also requires that the information be accurate and honest.
Realistically, can we trust a company that is actively trying to curtail usage to deliver accurate statistics without some form of monitoring?
A senior support person told me that this page is cached on my hard drive and does not reload each time. However, for security reasons, I and many other users regularly clear our browser caches. This means a 1 or 2 megabyte hit each time I check my usage.
Rogers told me to get software off the Net to do this, but this will cost me to buy the program(s). I believe Rogers should provide this to me because they are implementing this policy shift.
Rogers also told me that it has no mechanism in place to deal with disputes over usage amounts. So we have no ability to contest their accusations.
I therefore asked to have monthly Internet billing include a complete breakdown of my usage. I point out to you that cellphone users are provided this service free of charge — I buy 50 minutes of air time for cellphone, which is analogous to my 60 GB cap. I'd like to know what I'm using. On my bill.
Rogers should also do a better job addressing spam. So far, it's highly inadequate. Each piece of spam uses a portion of my bit cap. Rogers is not doing enough to eliminate spam, which in turn cheats me by a small percentage each month of my 60GB limit.
Rogers should also change all of their Web pages so the graphics are at a minimum. Each time I have to visit a Rogers page, I use up a portion of my bandwidth/bit cap downloading unnecessary graphics.
I believe all users who subscribed to Rogers' Extreme service and paid the extra cash for the high-speed modems should receive a rebate or credit on their accounts, because they are now no longer useful. We bought this service based on expected usage.
The person I spoke to at Rogers even went so far as to suggest I curtail my usage of services such as newsgroups, streaming Internet radio, on-line gaming and downloading software updates to conserve my usage. I asked him then what was the point of having high-speed then? He avoided answering.
We Rogers users are fed up. We need a change, we need support and we need it fast.
Barrie Jones, Pickering, Ont. |
That's quite amusing to read...ah it seems Sympatico had caps but the customers managed to get rid of it...but this is really ridious..bandwidth caps? This should be put on renewing/signing up customers because you DID NOT sign up for that stuff....
HaTcH - November 13, 2005 04:35 AM (GMT)
Why not just stop paying for your internet? They'll come along an just disconnect it for you, for free :P
As for blocking P2P crap, thats none of their business IMO. Blocking certain protocols and crap is censorship, and that is bad.
ZeRoRaVeN - November 13, 2005 04:45 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE (HaTcH @ Nov 12 2005, 11:35 PM) |
Why not just stop paying for your internet? They'll come along an just disconnect it for you, for free :P
As for blocking P2P crap, thats none of their business IMO. Blocking certain protocols and crap is censorship, and that is bad. |
Just about every ISP does that anyway, they block certain ports so you can't user a server with the connection. But I don't think they blocked media, nobody mentioned that, and if they did it would be a BIG issue...and they mentioned streaming and music and such themselves...
You mean they'll actually do something for free after all the cheapness?
That's just plain wrong...do you live in a rural area or something? Because where I live there's alot of competition, let's see...time warner, verizon, sbc, RCN, optimum, just to name a few..and that's only high speed..but that's because I live in a city *shrug*
I get T1 speeds! yay!
K-62 - November 13, 2005 04:58 PM (GMT)
I dont live in a rural area, where I live there are actually over 100 ISP but they are mostly DSL. As I said before I cant get DSL unless I give Bell/Sympatico $1000 to dig a hole and add more copper lines. I live in a semi-new housing area so those things have not been installed by the government as of yet.
| QUOTE |
I have asked, and also suggest it to all Rogers users, that they no longer allow Rogers to bill them via e-mail. Emailed billings do use up a small percentage of my bit cap.
It's a small point indeed, but one that has a direct impact on Rogers. By forcing Rogers to do this by post, it will have to pay for the paper and postage. |
Im going to do that :lol:
Downloading of legal music and streaming can be done but its extremly slow and I have their fastest connection(4000/800), I uses to take like 2 seconds to load streaming video now it takes so long I just havent taken the time to wait.
| QUOTE |
| Ask for a copy of your contract, I know you live in Canada so your rights may differ from the ones I'm referring to which are the US, but here you have a right to obtain a copy of the contract which you should be able to. It seems there's been alot of people raging over this too..I smell lawsuit! |
I dug around and found the original copy of the contract, and the thing is I didnt even sign it yet! It's not even filled out, the installers copy is still stuck to it! It goes on for 3 pages about their rights and like 3 paragrahs about mine, then in really small print it says:
| QUOTE |
| Rogers or Yahoo! may establish general practices and limits concerning use of the Servives, and may modify or undate the Service at anytime. You continued use of the Service means you agree to them |
So by the sound of the if I were to say use 0b of my bandwidth next month it would mean I dont agree? and they will have to discontinue my service free of charge right? Well according to them I have to pay them a disconnection fee, also have to pay if I dont pay my bill.
I think Rogers is doing all this cause they spent too much money buying the Sky Dome($25 million CAD, about $21.24 million USD) ,now Rogers Centre. Sooner or later they are going to buy the CN Tower and rename it the Rogers Tower, God I hate to think what they can do with the worlds largest transmission tower.
Illidan - November 28, 2005 11:50 AM (GMT)
You can get by the P2P restrictions. Blocking or restricting this excellent form of technology is terrible behavior for a "Technology" or "information" related company.
Under the flimsy excuse of restricting the transfer of illegal files, Rogers is destroying or damaging the many helpful uses of P2P technology. By forcing users to directly download large files such as game demos, software that is in the public domain, and home-movies Rogers is hurting the producers of such material.
Legal content available through the Bittorent network alone includes versions of almost every Linux distribution in existence, the work of many small bands who choose to place some or all content in the public domain for publicity reasons, the Finnish feature film "Star Wreck - In the Pirkenning," the "Pure Pwnage" shows, the weekly video podcast "Diggnation", and uncountable others.
At the moment, the (arguably) best bittorrent client happens to be Azureus, which can display its beautiful graphical interface on every system, fully supporting the the Safepeer plugin which automatically blocks the ip addresses of known RIAA and MPAA affiliates (Recording Industry Association of America, etc.) and other known perpetrators of spyware, malware, and rootkit infections.
The RIAA and MPAA are known to constantly scan the BT networks to find supposed "pirates" who may or may not be infringing copyrights, sueing users at random based on the results of automated searches and scans, excoriating YOUR privacy as a legal computer user morally and judicially bound to follow all relevant laws.
http://azureus.sourceforge.net/To resolve the issue of your IS provider's disappointing restrictions on interstate trade, Azureus allows you to change the port it connects on. I believe your ISP blocks certain types of traffic based on the port it travels on, thus easily possible to get through the blocks. Good luck, my dear sir.
ZeRoRaVeN - November 29, 2005 03:50 AM (GMT)
Yes yes, we all know about the "legal uses" of P2P technology...but let's face it, P2P technology does have legimate uses, but it's purpose has been so heavily exploited that Rogers can't be blamed THAT MUCH for thiking along the lines. I'm not saying they're right, I know alot of programs and stuff are distributed off bittorrent, but I doubt they see that view, they only see what's been mostly happening and have been grabbing the attention of the media and everybody, why? Because it's illegal. Legal stuff bore the media and everyone, so the legimate uses don't get the exposure they deserve. However in any case, they have no right to decide stuff like this whether it's mostly for illegal or legal use.
Bittorrent however, shall be the one technology that cannot be shut down, or if it's can which I doubt is possible, it'll be very difficult, because it has no network. Napster made the mistake by having a central server, today most P2P networks don't make that mistake, but if their main node goes down, while you still can transfer speeds will dramitically drop and perfromance will take a great suffer.
Besides most people get anime off bittorrent...oh look Zoids Genesis 34 RAW is out on BT...