Here’s what’s happening: when customers buy our unlimited 4G LTE plan for their smartphones we include a fixed amount of LTE to be used for tethering (using the “Smartphone Mobile HotSpot” feature), at no extra cost, for the occasions when broadband may not be convenient or available. If customers hit that high-speed tethering limit, those tethering speeds slow down. If a customer needs more LTE tethering, they can add-on more. Simple.
However, these violators are going out of their way with all kinds of workarounds to steal more LTE tethered data.
Sounds fair to me.
It doesn’t sound fair to me. Unlimited means unlimited as in no limitations at least it should mean that! How the data is used whether it be on the phone an iPad, laptop / computer or Internet-of-things thing should make no difference. Policies such as charging more for tethering is the complete opposite of net neutrality.
/rant
“You guys, our networks aren’t designed to handle all of our customers using their devices at the same time. We can’t have some people using it all the time or we’ll have to invest in improving our network!”
It probably is fair, but it also probably violates most definitions of net neutrality
In his defense, the “unlimited 4G LTE” is for the smartphone, “we include a fixed amount of LTE to be used for tethering” and I’m pretty confident the ToS explicitly state that. Fair really has nothing to do with it, if you agree to the terms of the service you agree to terms of the service. Actively attempting to hide/disguise your usage pretty much proves you know what you’re doing violates those terms.
So, would it be better to NOT have unlimited data? Because if they would not be allowed to ration based on phone vs. computer, then they’ll ration some other means, most likely, fixed data plans. I feel that unlimited data with limited tethering would be better for most people, but because it violates some made up philosophical principle, it’s supposed to be bad.
True. How many people actually read the tos though? If you think the answer is everybody you’re kidding yourself. Most people probably assume they’re doing nothing wrong since as I pointed out unlimited data shouldn’t have any limitations now should it? An ISP I supposed to deliver data with no prejudice as to what the data is or where it’s come from.
Does “net neutrality” means simply “whatever the speaker desires in terms of policy”?
Charging more for a different mode of access, and saying you do so, is hardly a violation of “net neutrality”, which is a dubious principle in the first place, as pushed by its proponents*.
(See also T-Mobile’s site, which says “ON-SMARTPHONE ONLY” right under UNLIMITED.
And then also says “Includes up to 7GB Smartphone Mobile HotSpot data.*”
This is not buried deep in the fine print of the TOS where nobody will ever see it; it’s in ALL CAPS in the button you click to pick the plan, and in the second bullet-point below it.
It’s not a hidden secret; it’s well-publicised on the front page.)
(* From where I sit, it was always Google demanding its preferred outcome, pushing it as “otherwise they’ll charge you extra for Facebook!!!!”.
I’m with the network engineers who realize QoS and treating different data types differently is vital to making the Internet keep working.
And the opposite, in a real sense, of “net neutrality”.)
And raise our prices, which you’ll bitch about endlessly and say you’re moving to Sprint!
“Net neutrality (also network neutrality, Internet neutrality, or net equality) is the principle that Internet service providers and governments should treat all data on the Internet equally, not discriminating or charging differentially by user, content, site, platform, application, type of attached equipment, or mode of communication. The term was coined by Columbia University media law professor Tim Wu in 2003, as an extension of the longstanding concept of a common carrier.”
Wikipedia