Aww crap, here it comes, since I use TWC for my Internet provider, this could really suck, but then that’s what work bandwidth is for right?!?
Originally posted here
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Time Warner Cable Inc on Thursday will begin testing a service that charges consumers of high-speed Internet service based on their usage.
Broadband subscribers in Beaumont, Texas, will be charged $1 per gigabyte above monthly allowances, a company spokesman said.
The new policy is intended to address the top 5 percent of users, who have spent a “disproportionate” amount of time on Time Warner Cable’s network, a company spokesman said.
Such usage is “taxing the infrastructure,” the spokesman said. “In order to make investments in the infrastructure, we have to find the revenue to pay for it.”
Consumers in the test region will be offered several levels of service. A $29.95 per month plan for slower speeds of 768 kilobits per second and a 5 gigabyte limit would let users send and receive about 349,525 e-mails, play 170 hours of online games, or download 1,383 digital songs per month.
At the high end, a $54.90 monthly fee for a 15-megabit-per-second service and a 40 gigabyte monthly limit would allow subscribers to watch 124 hours of standard-definition videos or download 11,070 songs.
Some technology blogs have criticized the new pricing structure and usage limits, which they said would curtail interest in viewing videos online and enrage consumers who currently pay for unlimited service.
“Setting the caps is a very simple matter to change,” the spokesman said. “If usage patterns are such that we need to change those, we certainly can.”
(Reporting by Kenneth Li; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)
