RE: Kicked Off PlusNet NOW!!

["Timothy Morris" <timothy.morris@xxxxxxx>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Calum Morrell [mailto:calum@xxxxxxx]
> Sent: 01 February 2001 12:00
> To: ukha_d@xxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [ukha_d] Kicked Off PlusNet NOW!!
>
>

> kicked off an ISP
> but the pathetic [and clearly fraudulent] activity of the various
> 24x7 ISP's
> sickens me. If a service is advertised as 24x7 then it should damn
well be
> usable by it's customers 24x7 - if it's not, then calling it 24x7
> cannot be
> legal as all the ISP's I know of are physically available for use
> 24x7 and they
> are using this term to distinguish between an off the shelf
> service and their
> own.

It isn't fraudulent. Their services are not advertised as 24x7, they are
advertised as unmetered. It is obvious to anyone with an even limited
understanding of how ISPs work, that there is no profit in allowing 24x7
connections for the prices charged by ISPs for unmetered accounts. If you
want 24x7 access you have to pay for it - in the order of ?40 a month plus
(cable users excepted, as their network infrastructure is totally
different).

>
> On to your final quote "So in answer to your post, I've thought
> about it - and
> never gonna happen." Really? You state that the bandwidth is a
> user problem and
> not BT's if too many people are on the same ATM switch ... but
> that's not the
> case though. BT have to pay to provide bandwidth and sustain it at a
level
> suitable for it's users [and remember, long term we're talking
> businesses here
> as well]. Like any other service BT provide, it will eventually
> have reasonable
> competition and they have to protect there shareholders. What
> this comes down to
> is that is a group of people are using up a large percentage of
available
> bandwidth on the network, that they may feel it is more cost
> effective to remove
> that group rather than pay for an upgrade.
>
> Never going to happen? I think if it can be done due to modem
> contention, it can
> be done for bandwidth contention.
>

You seem to forget that when you sign up for ADSL you are made aware of the
fact that there is a contention ratio of either 50 or 20 to 1 depending on
the service. If 50 users sign up at a local exchange and spend 24 hours
streaming media down from their selected ISP then each user is only going
to
be able to get just over 10K of bandwidth. No more or less than they have
paid for. In reality most internet traffic is burst which is why
'overbooking' is feasible throughout the network. How else do you think
that
ISPs can cope with only 155Mbps connections to the US?

Tim.