10 ms·

T-Mobile: streaming music no longer counts against data cap

52 points by sahaskatta 12y ago

throwaway_yy2Di 12y ago
This is a major breach of net neutrality. T-Mobile wants to give customers free bandwidth to one type of service, while charging for bandwidth going eleswhere. The network costs are identical: it's not the place of a neutral ISP to discriminate on the contents of the bytes! (edit to correct error -- it's not restricted to T-Mobile's own music service. Mea culpa) (full disclosure: I'm a T-Mobile customer)
- hkmurakami 12y ago
  My first reaction was: "Hooray!" Then my immediate next reaction was "NOOOOOOO"
  - mikeash 12y ago
    I anticipate great amusement watching people try to reconcile their hatred of data caps for their love of net neutrality. My own reaction was pretty much the same. "Awesome! Wait, awful!"
    - hkmurakami 12y ago
      I'm soooo torn about my $30 prepaid T-mobile plan now :(
  - eob 12y ago
    Exactly. I'm not sure if this was a simple "let people have free music. That'll up our subscriber count" play or some masterful psyop mindtrick.
    - sroerick 12y ago
      It doesn't have to be masterful. T-Mobile can't issue a press release about free data, if everybody has unlimited data.
- Igglyboo 12y ago
  Until t-mobile says that other services will cost more, I see no problem with letting music be free.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - sroerick 12y ago
    Try building a small indie label web streaming music startup. And asking your customers to pay more because you don't have a T-Mobile partnership. "Letting music be free", as long as it participates in a corporate subsidy, no thanks.
    - chez17 12y ago
      I honestly don't understand your position. This was data that was being charged for before, now as a service to their customers they aren't charging for it. This is an attempt to gain more customers, it's not charging extra for other services, you have everything you had before, now if you choose to use these services you don't get the data billed to your account. It's not charging more for a fast lane, it's giving something away for advertising purposes. I am a web developer, net neutrality is very important to me, I just don't see how this is a major offense to that. Can you explain your position some more?
      - sroerick 12y ago
        First off, I take issue with your argument that this data costs money, and therefore making it free isn't an issue. The data costs money because the telecom industry has spent the last decade prying unlimited data plans out of the cold dead hands of your grandfathers. Do you remember AOL and the whole 600 minutes free spectacle? Do you remember how stupid that was? How many people do you know who either still have a grandfathered cell phone plan? How many people do you know who are angry that their grarndfathered plans are gone? Secondly, I take issue here because I have a strong libre-culture philosophy, and I really strongly believe you should be able to stream, download, remix, or publish everything. This policy by T-Mobile means that any hope of libre content on mobile is getting dimmer. This, combined with the artificial scarcity I mentioned before, make the game feel rigged.
- sroerick 12y ago
  Make no mistake, Rhapsody is the real winner here.
- turing 12y ago
  T-Mobile is claiming that they are not sponsorships and that Spotify, Rhapsody, Pandora, and the other launch partners are not paying for data-exempt status[1]. That said, this still raises serious net-neutrality red flags. 1. http://www.theverge.com/2014/6/18/5822996/t-mobile-music-freedom-net-neutrality http://www.theverge.com/2014/6/18/5822996/t-mobile-music-fre...
  - sroerick 12y ago
    Yes. The article makes the point, the issue is not charging for access, the issue is creating a corporate barrier to entry in the market. What if I'm a musician hacker, and I want to release a album app like Bjork or Jay-Z did? Do I get free data too?
    - Touche 12y ago
      This issue is also T-Mobile violating customer privacy.
      - sroerick 12y ago
        Great point.
        jbigelow76 12y ago
        The article mentions T-Mob's "unRadio" app. I would assume that using the app would require opting in to the data inspection requirements.
      - ahomescu1 12y ago
        How? I imagine it's implemented as "don't meter packets going to these IPs", for Pandora/whatever's streaming IP addresses. Adding some extra firewall/software rules doesn't violate privacy IMHO.
    - IBM 12y ago
      Why is that a concern to me though (I'm representing the public)? Net neutrality proponents regularly couch their rhetoric in being an issue for the public's interest. To me it seems like one industry (tech/web companies) jockeying over another industry (telcos/cable) to accrue the benefits/cost savings to themselves. Start ups and other businesses that exist on the web don't like the idea of sponsored data because it could possibly raise their costs of doing business, but again why is that something the public should care about and that government should step in to prevent? No one is providing Jolla with protections or subsidies to better compete with Apple or Samsung, but yet the web companies in pushing for net neutrality (and waging a great PR campaign that enlists the greater public to their side) are essentially asking for one. Maybe your music start up will have to pay carriers to better compete with Spotify or Apple, that's really your problem and perhaps you'll have to suck up the additional operating expense.
- whyenot 12y ago
  It's also fantastic for tmobile customers who like music. If it reduces my monthly bill, I'm all for it.
- batiudrami 12y ago
  This is something what was very common when 3G first became available in Australia - you'd have a very low data limit (~200MB) but could pay extra for unlimited access to other services (like $4/m for unlimited Facebook or whatever) - basically that 'nightmare scenario' net nutrality image which has been going around for years[1]. I don't think it was very sucessful (this was before the the iPhone and the changes it brought so browsing the internet on your dubmphone sucked anyway) and was gradually phased out. Another comparison, many Australian providers already have a 'freezone'[2] which does not count towards your download limit. This is sometimes paid sponsorship (Australian Football streaming is free on Telstra) and sometimes due to peering agreements or house run servers (many ISPs run their own Steam content servers) which make data through certain channels considerably cheaper for the ISP. That said, from a consumer perspective, I would be stoked if my telco said that I could have free music streaming at no extra cost, though. It might just be a positive customer benefit, or it may be something more sinister - who knows. [1] http://i.imgur.com/UguEpIm.jpg http://i.imgur.com/UguEpIm.jpg [2] http://freezone.iinet.net.au/ http://freezone.iinet.net.au/
- girvo 12y ago
  Yeah it is a breach of net neutrality... but mobile hasn't ever really had net neutrality anyway, not like we've had with fixed line internet. Mobile and fixed line connect to the same internet, but through very different means and with very different obstacles in implementation (mobile having far more), so I'm not 100% sure that this is a bad thing... but it could become one.
- politician 12y ago
  Step 1) Announce free music-colored bits Step 2) Report monthly bandwidth usage by bit color Step 3) Bill monthly by colored segments Step 4) Ratchet up the price of bandwidth by increasing the charges related to one colored bit bucket while periodically offering discounts on other colored bit buckets to maintain market share and drive marketing messages. Not the typical 3 steps to profit, but close -- and without a hand-wavy step 2. If this works, expect the rest of the industry to follow shortly.
- eli 12y ago
  There has never been net neutrality on mobile. For the longest time it was against Verizon TOS to use any VoIP apps on a tethered connection.
sroerick 12y ago
Well, every ounce of goodwill I had for T-Mobile just went way out the window.
- akerl_ 12y ago
  Sorry they decided to adjust their formula so people can use their connections better? As was pointed out elsewhere, streaming music is comparatively low-bandwidth. T-Mobile already offers unlimited plans where the first $X amount is at LTE speeds, so what they're doing here is saying "for things we tag as streaming music, we'll just go ahead and count that from the other side of unlimited, since the effect on you/us is nil, and you won't burn LTE time on things that can't utilize LTE speeds anyways"
bobbles 12y ago
It's funny that in Australia the carriers realised that offering free data on facebook, twitter etc would increase the number of people that would move to the service, and from my POV seemed like a good deal for all involved. The state of the US carrier system has messed itself up so badly that a carrier trying to offer something for FREE is now being attacked by the customers it's trying to serve. What a joke
- dm8 12y ago
  Because it's directly at loggerheads with net neutrality. And it's not free. Rhapsody may be paying for data costs. Imagine you are a small startup competing against Rhapsody. Customers will always go for Rhapsody since it doesn't count against data caps. And as a small startup you can't afford to pay required money to carrier and even if you can afford then it's at the mercy of your carrier. Why do you need gatekeepers?
- mikeash 12y ago
  We're tired of our cell carriers telling us how we can use their service. For example, it's common for carriers to charge extra for tethering. That is to say, they want more money to transmit bytes to and from your phone if your phone is forwarding for your laptop than if your phone is using that data itself. Even though their costs are identical and they actually have to go through contortions to catch people doing this using the more clever schemes for it, they still insist on charging more. We want dumb pipes that deliver data and care not for what kind of data it is. Any step away from that is bad. That's what this represents, and "free" doesn't make up for that. You talk about free data to Facebook as if it's a universally good thing. Imagine if someone is making the next great Facebook competitor. Now, instead of a level playing field, they'll have to contend with the fact that people get to access Facebook for "free" while they use up their data quota talking to the new service. Any time someone gives you something for "free", look around to see if you can spot the sucker. It might be you.
- cstrat 12y ago
  The people sharing concerns with what T-Mobile are doing aren't looking at it through a short sighted consumer lens. It's a great move for consumers right now who stream music. However it is encouraging a tighter coupling between content producers and service providers - which dismantles the neutrality of the Internet. In the long run, consumers are said to loose out because only the biggest businesses will be able to afford to maintain their tight coupling. Smaller players will lose out.
LeoPanthera 12y ago
Unless you use Rdio. And then it still does.
- fmela 12y ago
  The page also doesn't mention Google Music.
- sahaskatta 12y ago
  They are taking a vote to add other services to the data-free list. They have just about every major one listed including Amazon Music, Beats, TuneIn, SoundCloud, and Xbox Music. Google Music is currently taking a huge lead over the others.
jack-r-abbit 12y ago
I'm not sure why everyone is freaking out about this. Remember when you got so many minutes of talk time a month? Now we get unlimited talk. Remember when you had to pay for texts? Now we all get unlimited texts. Remember when streaming music ate your data limit? Now we all get unlimited music streaming. Not sure what the issue is.
- jmgrosen 12y ago
  If it were unlimited music streaming, that'd be pretty much fine. However, it's not -- it's free music stream for a particular six services.
  - jack-r-abbit 12y ago
    Well... I count 7. But anyway... from their FAQ: Q: Will you add more streaming providers over time? A: Absolutely! And we want to hear from you! Who do you think we should add next? Vote at #MusicFreedom and be heard! Q: Can any streaming services ask to become part of Music Freedom? A: Yes. Any lawful and licensed streaming music service can work with us for inclusion in this offer, which is designed to benefit all of our Simple Choice customers. Click here, send us an email and we’ll get back to you to begin the process.
  - jlebar 12y ago
    > If it were unlimited music streaming, that'd be pretty much fine. To be fair, it's unclear how you'd actually implement this. Would you suggest a special bit on the TCP packet saying "this is for music streaming" (cf RFC 3514)? Or, more seriously, would T-Mobile have some form where anybody could enter a Bro filter to identify traffic coming from "their" "music streaming" service? Setting aside the fact that writing and running an arbitrary number of arbitrarily-complex DPI filters is hard, how would T-Mobile filter out people abusing the system ("my music streaming service also lets you stream one of ten songs, or you can torrent; the traffic is designed to be indistinguishable") without appearing to be biased towards big incumbents?
    - Touche 12y ago
Touche 12y ago
How do they know the customer is listening to music? Deep packet inspection?
- glifchits 12y ago
  Probably just by checking if the origin of certain requests is a server belonging to one of their partner sites?
  - Touche 12y ago
    Partner sites serve more than just music bits.
    - glifchits 12y ago
      Yeah, but it doesn't make sense that T-Mobile would charge you for the album art or the banner ad and not the music file.
      - Touche 12y ago
        What about viewing their website, why should that be free?
      - jack-r-abbit 12y ago
        Seems like they think it makes sense to do that. From the fine print at the bottom of the page: > Licensed music streaming from included services does not count toward Simple Choice high speed data allotment on T-Mobile’s network; song downloads, video content, and non-audio content excluded.
- sahaskatta 12y ago
  They state that the following music services will not count against your data plan: "Pandora, iHeartRadio, iTunes Radio, Rhapsody, Spotify, Slacker, and Milk Music."
  - 12y ago
mikeash 12y ago
Looking into this a little, I don't understand it at all. The plans already include unlimited data. They say "no overages. Ever." They do have one limit, which is 1GB on LTE (per month, I assume). After that, your speeds are reduced to 3G. What makes this hard to understand is that 3G is perfectly adequate for music streaming. You really only need about 100kbps to stream high-quality music, and even half-assed 3G is adequate for that. Hell, I've managed to stream music over EDGE before, with the only problem being the injection of lots of annoying GSM buzz into my stereo system. So I guess what it comes down to is, they're making it so that a certain class of slow-and-steady LTE usage, which doesn't need anything close to LTE speeds, will no longer affect your ability to get LTE speeds when you actually need it. Or something like that. Which is nice, but nowhere near the big deal they make it out to be.
- akerl_ 12y ago
  It's a huge deal. I use iTunes Radio and similar when I'm driving to listen to music. I get 5GB per month of LTE-speed, after which they crank me down to sad-town speeds. Previously, on months where I drove more often, I hit the cap. This means I'll not have to care about keeping an eye on my usage. You're correct about the actual change they made: letting me do something that's comparatively low-bandwidth without it counting against my high-bandwidth concerns. But for me at least, you've underestimated the benefit: I'm unlikely to need to look at my usage again or do math to decide if it's time to stop streaming. I'll just rock on.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    Could you not just turn off LTE while streaming music and get most of the same benefit? Or do they give you 1GB of all traffic, after which you get throttled?
    - akerl_ 12y ago
      The latter. I get 5GB of data at any speed, then Edge after that.
      - 12y ago
mwsherman 12y ago
We should consider the possibility that non-neutral arrangements will take the form of discounts, not price increases. This is analogous to the fact that Amazon, WalMart et al can negotiate better shipping rates with Fedex, USPS et al, and can in turn offer free or cheap shipping to the end user. This is also cheap for T-Mobile. Streaming music is not a zero impact on bandwidth, but (say) a 256K stream is small on (say) a 5mb/s connection. And like most consumer bandwidth, it assumes that most people won’t use it, most of the time.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
tzs 12y ago
I'm not sure there is a net neutrality issue here. Let me pose a hypothetical to try to bring into focus what I'm having trouble understanding. HYPOTHETICAL: You have internet through an ISP that charges for data. I am a provider of paid content (movies, music, ebooks...whatever) and you are a customer of mine. Your ISP provides detailed billing that breaks down your bill by IP address. I allow you to send me a copy of your ISP bill each month, and I figure out from the detail billing break down how much of your data costs were due to downloading or streaming content you purchased from me. I reimburse you for that. QUESTIONS: 1. Is there a net neutrality violation here? 2. If you say that there is, can anything be done to stop it? 3. If there is NOT a violation of net neutrality here...does that change if the ISP makes it easier for me to pay part of your bill? For instance, suppose the ISP offers to save me the hassle of getting and reading a copy of your bill and instead they track your usage of my data and they bill me, and deduct those costs from you bill? (The situation in #3 is essentially, I believe, what AT&T called "Sponsored Data", and was pretty widely frowned upon by net neutrality advocates). 4. If you say that the original hypothetical was OK, but the ISP getting involved as described in question 3 is not, what is it about ISP involvement that makes a difference? I am assuming that the ISP offers the "pay for your customers' data" service to anyone, for any kind of data.
- arg01 12y ago
  It's one of those nebulous things. For example. Is it illegal for me to pay you a commission to sell products for me? Is it illegal for you to subcontract selling these products? Is it illegal for the subcontractors to subcontract? Is it illegal for me to give a signing bonus if you recruit your friends to work for me? Is it illegal for you to get a bonus based on your direct and indirect contribution to how well the company is doing? Of course none of these are illegal on their face but if you add them all up into a pyramid scheme you can bet that it's objectionable to many and that in many countries it's illegal. It's a shade of gray. Many people here believe that the importance of keeping the net neutral is huge (even while giving a wink and a nod to QOS and other realistic compromises). You can even tell by the mixed reactions throughout the comment thread that people believe this to be a very slippery slope, they want this but are worried about even precedents like this one. As your comment highlighted net neutrality can be nebulous so when you push a boundry it is quite possible that there is very little to stop you continuing to push. Having said that I don't necessarily disagree with your reasoning, it's one of the reasons I support Aero being legal. Possibly a little hypocritically.

52 points by sahaskatta 12y ago

This is a major breach of net neutrality. T-Mobile wants to give customers free bandwidth to one type of service, while charging for bandwidth going eleswhere. The network costs are identical: it's not the place of a neutral ISP to discriminate on the contents of the bytes! (edit to correct error -- it's not restricted to T-Mobile's own music service. Mea culpa) (full disclosure: I'm a T-Mobile customer)

hkmurakami 12y ago
My first reaction was: "Hooray!" Then my immediate next reaction was "NOOOOOOO"
- mikeash 12y ago
  I anticipate great amusement watching people try to reconcile their hatred of data caps for their love of net neutrality. My own reaction was pretty much the same. "Awesome! Wait, awful!"
  - hkmurakami 12y ago
    I'm soooo torn about my $30 prepaid T-mobile plan now :(
- eob 12y ago
  Exactly. I'm not sure if this was a simple "let people have free music. That'll up our subscriber count" play or some masterful psyop mindtrick.
  - sroerick 12y ago
    It doesn't have to be masterful. T-Mobile can't issue a press release about free data, if everybody has unlimited data.
Igglyboo 12y ago
Until t-mobile says that other services will cost more, I see no problem with letting music be free.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- sroerick 12y ago
  Try building a small indie label web streaming music startup. And asking your customers to pay more because you don't have a T-Mobile partnership. "Letting music be free", as long as it participates in a corporate subsidy, no thanks.
  - chez17 12y ago
    I honestly don't understand your position. This was data that was being charged for before, now as a service to their customers they aren't charging for it. This is an attempt to gain more customers, it's not charging extra for other services, you have everything you had before, now if you choose to use these services you don't get the data billed to your account. It's not charging more for a fast lane, it's giving something away for advertising purposes. I am a web developer, net neutrality is very important to me, I just don't see how this is a major offense to that. Can you explain your position some more?
    - sroerick 12y ago
      First off, I take issue with your argument that this data costs money, and therefore making it free isn't an issue. The data costs money because the telecom industry has spent the last decade prying unlimited data plans out of the cold dead hands of your grandfathers. Do you remember AOL and the whole 600 minutes free spectacle? Do you remember how stupid that was? How many people do you know who either still have a grandfathered cell phone plan? How many people do you know who are angry that their grarndfathered plans are gone? Secondly, I take issue here because I have a strong libre-culture philosophy, and I really strongly believe you should be able to stream, download, remix, or publish everything. This policy by T-Mobile means that any hope of libre content on mobile is getting dimmer. This, combined with the artificial scarcity I mentioned before, make the game feel rigged.
sroerick 12y ago
Make no mistake, Rhapsody is the real winner here.
turing 12y ago
T-Mobile is claiming that they are not sponsorships and that Spotify, Rhapsody, Pandora, and the other launch partners are not paying for data-exempt status[1]. That said, this still raises serious net-neutrality red flags. 1. http://www.theverge.com/2014/6/18/5822996/t-mobile-music-freedom-net-neutrality http://www.theverge.com/2014/6/18/5822996/t-mobile-music-fre...
- sroerick 12y ago
  Yes. The article makes the point, the issue is not charging for access, the issue is creating a corporate barrier to entry in the market. What if I'm a musician hacker, and I want to release a album app like Bjork or Jay-Z did? Do I get free data too?
  - Touche 12y ago
    This issue is also T-Mobile violating customer privacy.
    - sroerick 12y ago
      Great point.
      - jbigelow76 12y ago
        The article mentions T-Mob's "unRadio" app. I would assume that using the app would require opting in to the data inspection requirements.
    - ahomescu1 12y ago
      How? I imagine it's implemented as "don't meter packets going to these IPs", for Pandora/whatever's streaming IP addresses. Adding some extra firewall/software rules doesn't violate privacy IMHO.
  - IBM 12y ago
    Why is that a concern to me though (I'm representing the public)? Net neutrality proponents regularly couch their rhetoric in being an issue for the public's interest. To me it seems like one industry (tech/web companies) jockeying over another industry (telcos/cable) to accrue the benefits/cost savings to themselves. Start ups and other businesses that exist on the web don't like the idea of sponsored data because it could possibly raise their costs of doing business, but again why is that something the public should care about and that government should step in to prevent? No one is providing Jolla with protections or subsidies to better compete with Apple or Samsung, but yet the web companies in pushing for net neutrality (and waging a great PR campaign that enlists the greater public to their side) are essentially asking for one. Maybe your music start up will have to pay carriers to better compete with Spotify or Apple, that's really your problem and perhaps you'll have to suck up the additional operating expense.
whyenot 12y ago
It's also fantastic for tmobile customers who like music. If it reduces my monthly bill, I'm all for it.
batiudrami 12y ago
This is something what was very common when 3G first became available in Australia - you'd have a very low data limit (~200MB) but could pay extra for unlimited access to other services (like $4/m for unlimited Facebook or whatever) - basically that 'nightmare scenario' net nutrality image which has been going around for years[1]. I don't think it was very sucessful (this was before the the iPhone and the changes it brought so browsing the internet on your dubmphone sucked anyway) and was gradually phased out. Another comparison, many Australian providers already have a 'freezone'[2] which does not count towards your download limit. This is sometimes paid sponsorship (Australian Football streaming is free on Telstra) and sometimes due to peering agreements or house run servers (many ISPs run their own Steam content servers) which make data through certain channels considerably cheaper for the ISP. That said, from a consumer perspective, I would be stoked if my telco said that I could have free music streaming at no extra cost, though. It might just be a positive customer benefit, or it may be something more sinister - who knows. [1] http://i.imgur.com/UguEpIm.jpg http://i.imgur.com/UguEpIm.jpg [2] http://freezone.iinet.net.au/ http://freezone.iinet.net.au/
girvo 12y ago
Yeah it is a breach of net neutrality... but mobile hasn't ever really had net neutrality anyway, not like we've had with fixed line internet. Mobile and fixed line connect to the same internet, but through very different means and with very different obstacles in implementation (mobile having far more), so I'm not 100% sure that this is a bad thing... but it could become one.
politician 12y ago
Step 1) Announce free music-colored bits Step 2) Report monthly bandwidth usage by bit color Step 3) Bill monthly by colored segments Step 4) Ratchet up the price of bandwidth by increasing the charges related to one colored bit bucket while periodically offering discounts on other colored bit buckets to maintain market share and drive marketing messages. Not the typical 3 steps to profit, but close -- and without a hand-wavy step 2. If this works, expect the rest of the industry to follow shortly.
eli 12y ago
There has never been net neutrality on mobile. For the longest time it was against Verizon TOS to use any VoIP apps on a tethered connection.

sroerick 12y ago

Well, every ounce of goodwill I had for T-Mobile just went way out the window.

akerl_ 12y ago
Sorry they decided to adjust their formula so people can use their connections better? As was pointed out elsewhere, streaming music is comparatively low-bandwidth. T-Mobile already offers unlimited plans where the first $X amount is at LTE speeds, so what they're doing here is saying "for things we tag as streaming music, we'll just go ahead and count that from the other side of unlimited, since the effect on you/us is nil, and you won't burn LTE time on things that can't utilize LTE speeds anyways"

bobbles 12y ago

It's funny that in Australia the carriers realised that offering free data on facebook, twitter etc would increase the number of people that would move to the service, and from my POV seemed like a good deal for all involved. The state of the US carrier system has messed itself up so badly that a carrier trying to offer something for FREE is now being attacked by the customers it's trying to serve. What a joke

dm8 12y ago
Because it's directly at loggerheads with net neutrality. And it's not free. Rhapsody may be paying for data costs. Imagine you are a small startup competing against Rhapsody. Customers will always go for Rhapsody since it doesn't count against data caps. And as a small startup you can't afford to pay required money to carrier and even if you can afford then it's at the mercy of your carrier. Why do you need gatekeepers?
mikeash 12y ago
We're tired of our cell carriers telling us how we can use their service. For example, it's common for carriers to charge extra for tethering. That is to say, they want more money to transmit bytes to and from your phone if your phone is forwarding for your laptop than if your phone is using that data itself. Even though their costs are identical and they actually have to go through contortions to catch people doing this using the more clever schemes for it, they still insist on charging more. We want dumb pipes that deliver data and care not for what kind of data it is. Any step away from that is bad. That's what this represents, and "free" doesn't make up for that. You talk about free data to Facebook as if it's a universally good thing. Imagine if someone is making the next great Facebook competitor. Now, instead of a level playing field, they'll have to contend with the fact that people get to access Facebook for "free" while they use up their data quota talking to the new service. Any time someone gives you something for "free", look around to see if you can spot the sucker. It might be you.
cstrat 12y ago
The people sharing concerns with what T-Mobile are doing aren't looking at it through a short sighted consumer lens. It's a great move for consumers right now who stream music. However it is encouraging a tighter coupling between content producers and service providers - which dismantles the neutrality of the Internet. In the long run, consumers are said to loose out because only the biggest businesses will be able to afford to maintain their tight coupling. Smaller players will lose out.

LeoPanthera 12y ago

Unless you use Rdio. And then it still does.

fmela 12y ago
The page also doesn't mention Google Music.
sahaskatta 12y ago
They are taking a vote to add other services to the data-free list. They have just about every major one listed including Amazon Music, Beats, TuneIn, SoundCloud, and Xbox Music. Google Music is currently taking a huge lead over the others.

jack-r-abbit 12y ago

I'm not sure why everyone is freaking out about this. Remember when you got so many minutes of talk time a month? Now we get unlimited talk. Remember when you had to pay for texts? Now we all get unlimited texts. Remember when streaming music ate your data limit? Now we all get unlimited music streaming. Not sure what the issue is.

jmgrosen 12y ago
If it were unlimited music streaming, that'd be pretty much fine. However, it's not -- it's free music stream for a particular six services.
- jack-r-abbit 12y ago
  Well... I count 7. But anyway... from their FAQ: Q: Will you add more streaming providers over time? A: Absolutely! And we want to hear from you! Who do you think we should add next? Vote at #MusicFreedom and be heard! Q: Can any streaming services ask to become part of Music Freedom? A: Yes. Any lawful and licensed streaming music service can work with us for inclusion in this offer, which is designed to benefit all of our Simple Choice customers. Click here, send us an email and we’ll get back to you to begin the process.
- jlebar 12y ago
  > If it were unlimited music streaming, that'd be pretty much fine. To be fair, it's unclear how you'd actually implement this. Would you suggest a special bit on the TCP packet saying "this is for music streaming" (cf RFC 3514)? Or, more seriously, would T-Mobile have some form where anybody could enter a Bro filter to identify traffic coming from "their" "music streaming" service? Setting aside the fact that writing and running an arbitrary number of arbitrarily-complex DPI filters is hard, how would T-Mobile filter out people abusing the system ("my music streaming service also lets you stream one of ten songs, or you can torrent; the traffic is designed to be indistinguishable") without appearing to be biased towards big incumbents?
  - Touche 12y ago

Touche 12y ago

How do they know the customer is listening to music? Deep packet inspection?

glifchits 12y ago
Probably just by checking if the origin of certain requests is a server belonging to one of their partner sites?
- Touche 12y ago
  Partner sites serve more than just music bits.
  - glifchits 12y ago
    Yeah, but it doesn't make sense that T-Mobile would charge you for the album art or the banner ad and not the music file.
    - Touche 12y ago
      What about viewing their website, why should that be free?
    - jack-r-abbit 12y ago
      Seems like they think it makes sense to do that. From the fine print at the bottom of the page: > Licensed music streaming from included services does not count toward Simple Choice high speed data allotment on T-Mobile’s network; song downloads, video content, and non-audio content excluded.
sahaskatta 12y ago
They state that the following music services will not count against your data plan: "Pandora, iHeartRadio, iTunes Radio, Rhapsody, Spotify, Slacker, and Milk Music."
- 12y ago

mikeash 12y ago

Looking into this a little, I don't understand it at all. The plans already include unlimited data. They say "no overages. Ever." They do have one limit, which is 1GB on LTE (per month, I assume). After that, your speeds are reduced to 3G. What makes this hard to understand is that 3G is perfectly adequate for music streaming. You really only need about 100kbps to stream high-quality music, and even half-assed 3G is adequate for that. Hell, I've managed to stream music over EDGE before, with the only problem being the injection of lots of annoying GSM buzz into my stereo system. So I guess what it comes down to is, they're making it so that a certain class of slow-and-steady LTE usage, which doesn't need anything close to LTE speeds, will no longer affect your ability to get LTE speeds when you actually need it. Or something like that. Which is nice, but nowhere near the big deal they make it out to be.

akerl_ 12y ago
It's a huge deal. I use iTunes Radio and similar when I'm driving to listen to music. I get 5GB per month of LTE-speed, after which they crank me down to sad-town speeds. Previously, on months where I drove more often, I hit the cap. This means I'll not have to care about keeping an eye on my usage. You're correct about the actual change they made: letting me do something that's comparatively low-bandwidth without it counting against my high-bandwidth concerns. But for me at least, you've underestimated the benefit: I'm unlikely to need to look at my usage again or do math to decide if it's time to stop streaming. I'll just rock on.
- mikeash 12y ago
  Could you not just turn off LTE while streaming music and get most of the same benefit? Or do they give you 1GB of all traffic, after which you get throttled?
  - akerl_ 12y ago
    The latter. I get 5GB of data at any speed, then Edge after that.
    - 12y ago

mwsherman 12y ago

We should consider the possibility that non-neutral arrangements will take the form of discounts, not price increases. This is analogous to the fact that Amazon, WalMart et al can negotiate better shipping rates with Fedex, USPS et al, and can in turn offer free or cheap shipping to the end user. This is also cheap for T-Mobile. Streaming music is not a zero impact on bandwidth, but (say) a 256K stream is small on (say) a 5mb/s connection. And like most consumer bandwidth, it assumes that most people won’t use it, most of the time.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

tzs 12y ago

I'm not sure there is a net neutrality issue here. Let me pose a hypothetical to try to bring into focus what I'm having trouble understanding. HYPOTHETICAL: You have internet through an ISP that charges for data. I am a provider of paid content (movies, music, ebooks...whatever) and you are a customer of mine. Your ISP provides detailed billing that breaks down your bill by IP address. I allow you to send me a copy of your ISP bill each month, and I figure out from the detail billing break down how much of your data costs were due to downloading or streaming content you purchased from me. I reimburse you for that. QUESTIONS: 1. Is there a net neutrality violation here? 2. If you say that there is, can anything be done to stop it? 3. If there is NOT a violation of net neutrality here...does that change if the ISP makes it easier for me to pay part of your bill? For instance, suppose the ISP offers to save me the hassle of getting and reading a copy of your bill and instead they track your usage of my data and they bill me, and deduct those costs from you bill? (The situation in #3 is essentially, I believe, what AT&T called "Sponsored Data", and was pretty widely frowned upon by net neutrality advocates). 4. If you say that the original hypothetical was OK, but the ISP getting involved as described in question 3 is not, what is it about ISP involvement that makes a difference? I am assuming that the ISP offers the "pay for your customers' data" service to anyone, for any kind of data.

arg01 12y ago
It's one of those nebulous things. For example. Is it illegal for me to pay you a commission to sell products for me? Is it illegal for you to subcontract selling these products? Is it illegal for the subcontractors to subcontract? Is it illegal for me to give a signing bonus if you recruit your friends to work for me? Is it illegal for you to get a bonus based on your direct and indirect contribution to how well the company is doing? Of course none of these are illegal on their face but if you add them all up into a pyramid scheme you can bet that it's objectionable to many and that in many countries it's illegal. It's a shade of gray. Many people here believe that the importance of keeping the net neutral is huge (even while giving a wink and a nod to QOS and other realistic compromises). You can even tell by the mixed reactions throughout the comment thread that people believe this to be a very slippery slope, they want this but are worried about even precedents like this one. As your comment highlighted net neutrality can be nebulous so when you push a boundry it is quite possible that there is very little to stop you continuing to push. Having said that I don't necessarily disagree with your reasoning, it's one of the reasons I support Aero being legal. Possibly a little hypocritically.