Google wants to make all of its products accessible to everyone, no matter where they’re located or what Internet conditions they’re working with. For those of you who travel or aren’t located in the U.S., you know that Internet connection speeds can be slow in third-world countries. Shoot, even when you’re in a local Starbucks, things can be slow. Today, the company… → Read More
The founders behind Karma (no, not that Karma) think that there’s something fundamentally broken in the market for mobile providers. And they’re hardly alone. So, the TechStars grads set out to create a new format, one that eschews the traditional subscription model for a pay-as-you-go approach to mobile bandwidth.
In an effort to realize their vision of providing anyone and everyone with a… → Read More
Comcast is about to nationally roll out its 105Mbps (!) Internet service. The ISP hopes to have the service in several of its top markets, including Boston, Chicago, Denver, and Miami, bringing the total number of potential subscribers up to 40 million. Considering so much of legitimate media consumption these days is based on streaming, having a super fast Internet connection will only help to a… → Read More
Bandwidth caps. We all love ‘em. Wait, no, we hate ‘em. Sorry. But even as AT&T gears up to impose bandwidth caps on its DSL subscribers, it should be pointed out that it’s hardly the only ISP that does so. You might even say that other countries have it worse. → Read More
Sometimes humor is the best mechanism to explain an opaque topic. Public Knowledge, a group that concerns itself with defending consumer rights in “the emerging digital culture,” has released a report today entitled “Peak Bandwidth.” Keep in mind today’s date, is all I have to say. The report says that the “era of plentiful, low-cost bandwidth is approaching an end. The supply of bits… → Read More
AT&T will impose a 250GB data cap for users of its DSL service. The company says that, based on trials, it only expects that less than 2 percent of its users will be affected by the cap. If these people want to continue consuming more than 250GB per month they’ll have to pay for the privilege. → Read More
Canada’s Internet innovation-killing usage-based billing scheme may already be dead in the water. The Toronto Star says the decision has been made to reverse the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s plan to implement the controversial billing method, which would have led to a situation where people there could have expected to pay up to CDN$2.35 per gigabyte. The CRTC… → Read More
For people who care, there’s another FCC bandwidth auction coming this July. They’re selling off more of the 700MHz range, which will probably start another bidding war between AT&T and Verizon. → Read More
A few weeks ago, some data came out suggesting that Netflix alone accounts for 21 percent of Internet traffic during peak TV hours. But if you add in a couple other sources of streaming video from the Web, namely YouTube and other forms of Flash video, the traffic share of Web video jumps to 37 percent (with 10 percent from YouTube and 6 percent fro Flash video). BitTorrent is another 8 percent… → Read More
When we last left the intrepid research scientists at Intel, they had managed to hit 40Gbps throughput using something called the Avalanche Photodetector. It’s been two years since that report (yeah, this has been in development for a while), and the gang at Intel have not been idle, let me tell you. They’ve managed to improve the field of photonics to achieve throughput of 50 Gbps! While not as… → Read More
Will the Internet run out of bandwidth? That’s the concern expressed by an upcoming study, and it could mean the end of the Internet as we know it. Uselessly slow Web sites (think: YouTube, Hulu), Internet “brownouts” (“please wait: processing request”), and general mayhem could be the norm in just a few years’ time. So let’s freak out about it. → Read More
Well, isn’t this exciting? Because Google’s bandwidth needs have exploded it’s looking into making its own router. Quick, cue dramatic music → Read More
Looks like AT&T is on its way to implementing Time Warner-style bandwidth caps. Residents of Reno, Nev. will be the guinea pigs this time around, with AT&T looking to impose a 20GB per month bandwidth limit for its lowest tier of broadband service; bandwidth limits increase as you move up AT&T’s service pyramid. The limit tops out at 150GB per month when using the company’s… → Read More
T-Mobile has removed the 1GB 3G data cap ahead of the G1‘s launch. People had been freaking out, as they do, the past two days when they read the fine print of T-Mobile’s terms and conditions, realizing that the wireless carrier imposed a “soft” 1GB cap on 3G data. Meaning, that if you downloaded more then 1GB of data—isn’t that a big selling point of the G1, fast… → Read More
So Comcast is implementing a 250GB monthly bandwidth cap starting next month. While some consumers are up in arms about the true meaning of “unlimited” internet access, others have focused on how these caps will affect the innovation of web-based services, particularly video streaming and downloading. Roku, maker of the Netflix-streaming box (reviewed here), isn’t too concerned, according to… → Read More
In November of last year, Rambus announced The Terabyte Bandwidth Initiative in which they stated they were going after, well, a terabyte of bandwidth. They have been making progress and recently showed off some working silicon. Rambus is looking to provide the architecture that will be needed for tomorrow’s hungry graphics processors. They plan to achieve the goal by using 32x Data Rate… → Read More
How quickly would you reach Time Warner’s 40GB data cap? I’d be finished in like a week. No lie. By now you’re probably well aware of Time Warner’s scheme to charge you by the gigabyte. Arrington wrote a piece yesterday on TechCrunch saying how it would destroy innovation—how can YouTube et al. make money if no one has the bandwidth to watch videos, or… → Read More
Google is calling out Verizon to the FCC in regards to the V’s recent win in the 700MHz bandwidth auction. One of the rules the winners have to abide by is the open access portion, stating that the bandwidth the carrier uses would have to be open to any application on any device, not just those supplied by the winner. The Goog thinks that Verizon’s reading of the rule is more along the… → Read More
[photopress:comcastwwbt.jpg,full,center] Our cup runneth over! Comcast is now working with BitTorrent, Inc. The two companies struck a deal that will see Comcast stop blocking BitTorrent traffic while simultaneously upgrading its capacity to handle all that bandwidth. The AP reported last fall that Comcast was selectively blocking BitTorrent [upload] traffic; the FCC later discovered the same… → Read More
[photopress:fiberunity.jpg,full,right] I can’t stand the name—Unity—but I recognize its worth. Kinda. Six international companies have signed up to create a new Trans-Pacific Internet fiber optic cable that may (the numbers aren’t finalized yet) increase the bandwidth capacity by 7.68 Terabits/s. The companies, of which Google is most recognizable ’round these parts… → Read More
We all knew this time would come, and last week’s disturbing news that Time Warner would be testing bandwidth caps in Texas came as no surprise. But we never thought the limits would be so low. Granted, 5GB is the bottom of their estimates as to where they might place caps, but they shouldn’t even be thinking at that level. That amount of data would be gone in a snap for any heavy… → Read More
Comcast employees are on lockdown with the recent storm of controversy regarding accusations that the ISP is throttling Bit Torrent traffic. Those in Comcast’s support department is finding out that if you let customers know their traffic is being modified, you will lose your job. Customer support reps are supposed to stick to a script and if asked about “the situation”, lie… → Read More
Without grabbing a dictionary, it’s pretty safe to say that most people would interpret the term "unlimited" to mean "without limits" or "endless" or "we won’t cut off your service if you download too much stuff." → Read More
Comcast is threatening to cut off Internet access to so-called bandwidth hogs, only they’re not exactly specifying what constitutes bandwidth “hogging.” (If you can decipher what downloading “100 times the average national Comcast bandwidth usage” means you deserve a treat.) One banned user created a Weblog to vent his frustrations. His situation is even more… → Read More
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