[mythtv-users] Rogers On Demand On line launched

Brian J. Murrell brian at interlinx.bc.ca
Thu Dec 10 15:48:45 UTC 2009


On Thu, 2009-12-10 at 07:56 -0700, Brian Wood wrote: 
> 
> Since the data is presumably coming from and going to machines in their 
> own system, I'd think that the data cap shouldn't apply, they are not having 
> to purchase internet-wide bandwidth to support this,

I could only dream that that was the case for two reasons:

Yes, data transfer within your provider's network should not count
towards your monthly cap.  But that would be counter-productive to the
provider squeezing more money out of you by exceeding your cap.  Just
because it's logical, doesn't mean that's how it is, especially when
it's in the customer's interest.

But even more-so, I'd love for them to not be counting watching content
from their network in your cap so that when you do go watch content from
one of their competitors it would put them in an anti-competitive
conflict of interest, in effect making bandwidth caps illegal as they
become a tool used to restrict competition in their market.

I'm not so sure they are really that stupid.

> or maybe that's the 
> idea: make people use up their allowance with "cheap" data, and take some 
> load off their interconnect to the rest of the world.

And generate a new revenue stream of customers exceeding their cap and
being charged for the excess.

I have many times wondered if the "standard" 60GB cap (for "basic"
service) used here by the cable companies in Canada is not actually a
product of figuring out how much bandwidth is too little to replace your
cable service.

If I use the 2.2GB/h that my Hauppage cards are using to record video at
a quality that rivals the "live" picture as a benchmark, that's less
than 30h of video a month, or less than 1h a day.  Now most certainly
MPEG2 is not the standard for video you would likely get from the
Internet.

A friend of mine reports Netflix is streaming HD content at .9GB/h, so
even still, only 60h/month or 2h/day -- assuming all you did was stream
TV.  I'd hazard to guess the average Rogers customer (where customer ==
family/household, etc.) is watching way more than 2h/day.

> We all know cable systems have oversold their data capacity, if every data 
> customer started streaming Hulu at once they would be in serious trouble, 
> maybe they have finally figured this out and are trying to prevent that sort 
> of thing.

But if I *want* to stream Hulu and that's costing me (i.e. eating into
my cap and the penalties/extra charges when I exceed it) and streaming
from Rogers is not, Rogers are being anti-competitive and using one line
of business to prevent competition in another line of business.  IANAL,
but from what I understand, that's a no-no.

I'm not a Rogers customer though, so all I can do is make guesses at any
of this.  Somebody who is a customer is welcome to step in and fill in
the blanks.

b.

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