Comcast confirms: We ban downloaders after 90 GB

Comcast alternatives

Comcast recently bought our local cablevision. The first month the download speed was slightly higher and then it dropped to half of cablevision's speed. There are no alternatives. Comcast bought exclusive rights along with cablevision. DSL doesn't work in all areas. I tried to get it 2 years ago and they couldn't make it work because of my neighborhood's fiber optic phone lines. They could get a "ping" but no page would open.

I download a lot more than

I download a lot more than 90gb per month on my comcast. We watch our TV and movies streaming. I have never run into any problem in the past 5 years of comcast use. I think the issue is, folks who use file sharing or bittorrent, because while downloading you are also UPLOADING (bittorrent) a tonne of data. Granted the upload speed is 45KBPS but that's still a lot if you're sharing router time with your neighbours on comcast's system.

is the limit a life time

is the limit a life time limit or a monthly limit?

I have no problem with a

I have no problem with a company setting a limit to my use of their services, but I do expect it to be up front with that information. If Comcast is not telling their users that there is a monthly limit, then they are in the wrong, no matter what else is said or done. If the company does tell its users that there is a limit, then IMHO, no harm, no foul.

WRT to future use patterns, I strongly suspect that as broadband usage increases for things such as HD movies, etc., so will Comcast's limits. They will have to do so or they will lose customers right and left to those companies that do.

To the industry shill TNT

To the industry shill TNT (yes I'm resorting to name calling in my opening sentence):

What makes you judge & jury when it comes to incriminating legitimate users of an "unlimited" Internet service?

Comcast's policy has always been "unlimited - until you exceed an (earlier perceived) arbitrary limit". Now that we have a supposed hard number of that cap (90GB) we're identifying a serious problem with the service Comcast is providing.

Yes, the vast majority (80%?) will never come close to that limit but for those are are legally consuming content delivered via the Internet and Comcast has deemed itself the police of your Internet connection (in a sense it really is) and will "arrest" you for an unknown violation (read the Constitution and you should understand my analogy) I hope you can understand why people are upset and making this news.

Implying that those who reach or exceed the cap as doing something "illegal" and would only have to modify their behavior is preposterous and ludicrous. That's almost like going to the doctor with "It hurts when I do this" and he replies with "Don't do that. $20 please."

Expand your mind beyond what you feel it's limits are - "...I'm just a lot smarter than everybody else..."

Then revisit your comments before you actually hit the "Post" button.

The problem is not that

The problem is not that there is a limit. The problem is the customer is getting blindsided. Why not a simple meter the customer can view on their account page. (They do know where to go to manage their account don't they?) They manage to put on the home page all that other crud, why not a simple display bar. Don't tell me they don't know your IP address.

What if you download from Comcast instead of Netflix? Do they change the limit for that?

(My guess is not.) They will be encouraging you to download their on demand video, then ding you when you buy too much product? That doesn't seem to make much business sense, but then it's possible the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

For example, has anyone called Comcast Marketing and explained that after a customer buys a couple hundred dollars of product from them, their company will cut the customer off?

Those numbers have been

Those numbers have been around since this whole "invisicap" malarky began. Extrapolating from them is an exercise in trying to make news where there isn't any.

Honest people... THERE IS NO HARD CAP, invisible or otherwise. If you violate the cap, the chances are 99.9% you're violating the TOS. Just stop the behavior and you'll never have a problem. Comcast isn't going to say, "violate the TOS half the time, and you'll be okay."

The other side of not having a hard cap is that they're also saying, "if you keep your violation reasonable, we're going to look the other way."

This is a case of where subscribers really should be happy with the status quo. A hard cap would be considerably worse for everybody.

PS I have no official links to Comcast. I'm just a lot smarter than everybody else, apparently.