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If you use more than 2 GB per month, you deserve to pay more than the rest of us who do not. Why is this hard to understand? Question for Mr. Gruber: do you th

If you use more than 2 GB per month, you deserve to pay more than the rest of us who do not. Why is this hard to understand? Question for Mr. Gruber: do you think pay-per-byte cable/DSL internet would be a good idea also? If not, why not? If yes, how do you explain the market's overwhelming preference for flat-fee over pay-go?

spicyj 16y ago
Why wouldn't it be? All of the other utilities are sold at metered rates or tiered pricing.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- jmm 16y ago
  Unless you count trash pick up as a utility. Would that it were tiered/pay per lb... would encourage less waste.
  - sjs 16y ago
    In some provinces here in Canada we do have limits on our trash pickup.
  - chaosmachine 16y ago
    There's a per-bag fee (you have to buy tags to put on them) in many places.
- mnemonicsloth 16y ago
  I'm not sure what you're saying here. Obviously, ISPs could charge by the byte. To my knowledge none do, for reasons others have mentioned already. We don't like thinking about the marginal cost of web pages, and nobody wants a nasty surprise on their internet bill at the end of the month. Tiered pricing isn't germane to metering. A power company might place me in one service tier, and a megawatt aluminum smelting operation in another. They might pay less per kWh than I do, but we both pay ~20% more if we use 20% more power. OTOH, while Time Warner will let me pay an extra $10 to upgrade from "5Mb" service to "15Mb" service, my monthly bill is fixed regardless of my usage level.
MisterHux 16y ago
I'm actually finally getting sick of Gruber's incessant cheer-leading of every little move that apple/AT&T do. I know its his job, but seriously some of these moves are beyond stupid. And praising them with a straight face is ridiculous.
- texel 16y ago
  He's not praising all of them by any means though– on what points do you disagree?
- raganwald 16y ago
  He refers to the tethering charge as "bullshit." Is that cheer-leading? If so, I what kind of language should he use to express vituperation? He also expresses contempt for changing the plan on a flagship product a month after release. This doesn't sound like cheer-leading to me. More importantly, he isn't praising the moves so much as saying that he will save a few bucks with the new plans, and that for all of the problems 3G on an iPhone with AT&T is less shitty than another product a MiFi. I get the sense you're reviewing other things he's written and not this specific post.

spicyj 16y ago

Why wouldn't it be? All of the other utilities are sold at metered rates or tiered pricing.

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
jmm 16y ago
Unless you count trash pick up as a utility. Would that it were tiered/pay per lb... would encourage less waste.
- sjs 16y ago
  In some provinces here in Canada we do have limits on our trash pickup.
- chaosmachine 16y ago
  There's a per-bag fee (you have to buy tags to put on them) in many places.
mnemonicsloth 16y ago
I'm not sure what you're saying here. Obviously, ISPs could charge by the byte. To my knowledge none do, for reasons others have mentioned already. We don't like thinking about the marginal cost of web pages, and nobody wants a nasty surprise on their internet bill at the end of the month. Tiered pricing isn't germane to metering. A power company might place me in one service tier, and a megawatt aluminum smelting operation in another. They might pay less per kWh than I do, but we both pay ~20% more if we use 20% more power. OTOH, while Time Warner will let me pay an extra $10 to upgrade from "5Mb" service to "15Mb" service, my monthly bill is fixed regardless of my usage level.

MisterHux 16y ago

I'm actually finally getting sick of Gruber's incessant cheer-leading of every little move that apple/AT&T do. I know its his job, but seriously some of these moves are beyond stupid. And praising them with a straight face is ridiculous.

texel 16y ago
He's not praising all of them by any means though– on what points do you disagree?
raganwald 16y ago
He refers to the tethering charge as "bullshit." Is that cheer-leading? If so, I what kind of language should he use to express vituperation? He also expresses contempt for changing the plan on a flagship product a month after release. This doesn't sound like cheer-leading to me. More importantly, he isn't praising the moves so much as saying that he will save a few bucks with the new plans, and that for all of the problems 3G on an iPhone with AT&T is less shitty than another product a MiFi. I get the sense you're reviewing other things he's written and not this specific post.