9 ms·

So what does unlimited mean then in your definition? Even before they throttle, you will be limited by the throughput of the cell tower.

by hueving 11y ago

istvan__ 11y ago
This is not about the speed, more like about the volume of data. They limit you after you reached a limit that should have never reach because it was advertised limitless.
revscat 11y ago
Interesting question. "Unlimited: Wherein the amount of bandwidth, measured by megabits/s up/down, will not be artificially affected. While system outages or other technical limitations can at times affect throughput, at no point will AT&T or its subsidiaries place constraints upon throughput based upon the amount of data transferred over the course of one or more billing periods."
- derefr 11y ago
  Would an ISP still be able to call their service "unlimited", by this definition, if some of their distribution nodes (cable optical nodes, wireless cell towers, whatever) are oversubscribed+saturated to the point of degraded service for the customers on that node? If they could, then would they still be able to call the service "unlimited" if they enforced moment-by-moment QoS at the distribution node (so your neighbour's download will slow down to allow you to Skype, as if you were both connected through the same router in a building)? And if that is allowed, then what is the difference if they're doing the QoSing by long-time-window statistical aggregation rather than packet-by-packet prioritization? Decreasing the bandwidth available to a given link that has reached some monthly "quota" on a given oversubscribed node†, has exactly the same incentives as decreasing the bandwidth available to a given link for as long as someone else is trying to saturate the pipe with higher-priority traffic. Either method disincentivizes everyone on the link from "wasting" their bandwidth unnecessarily (in a "you don't want your neighbour to do X, so you stop doing X and hope that they have empathy" way), such that the link becomes less saturated on a long-term basis. But only one is ever highlighted by the news as explicitly breaking the promise of "unlimited." Why is this? --- † (...where that quota is the area-under-the-curve of the router's upstream bandwidth, divided by the number of users attached to the distribution point—in other words, the user's ration of the distribution node's available transit. If the quota is an arbitrary fixed number that isn't anywhere near this number, then that's just price-gouging.)
  - georgerobinson 11y ago
    I would think so. Let's use "unlimited" in the context of public transport. You have paid for a Travelcard on the London Underground Zones 1 to 6, including peak hours. If there is congestion on the line, or it's a busy rush hour morning is your Travelcard no longer "unlimited"? I mean you're not paying an SLA in which you're guaranteed a seat and that trains will be delayed no longer then X minutes. I'm not defending AT&T in the slightest, but I think "unlimited usage", "100% availability" and "100% link rate" are not the same.
    - derefr 11y ago
      I would almost say that an oversubscribed+QoSed line is the modern definition of "residential service", while guaranteed bandwidth (equivalent in effect, but not necessarily in implementation, to the "dedicated circuits" of DSL terminology) is the modern definition of "business service."
  - revelation 11y ago
    So many people here obsessed with making some kind of technical disambiguation. I don't think the lawyers care for that at all. Both intentionally throttling and not remotely providing the necessary infrastructure necessary to support use will get you into hot waters.
    - derefr 11y ago
      My question was more: If an ISP usually has enough pipe for everyone on each of their distribution nodes (that is, has no oversubscription—or, more practically, only oversubscription for aggregations of customers with statistically-predictable usage such that the node should reasonably never be saturated, with some extra engineering tolerance for the rare occasions usage goes above statistical norms)— but the ISP sometimes falls short when the introduction of a new service like VoIP or Netflix or Steam into the market, or lots of new denser construction in an area, makes demand outstrip their supply, then should they get in trouble for enforcing QoSing (through whatever means) on their distribution nodes, temporarily, while they work on upgrading those nodes? Because, if so, then ISPs should probably never use the word "unlimited" at all because they would still get in trouble for reasons (almost) completely out of their control. (I say "almost" because they could just refuse to sell service in oversubscribed areas. But customers would like that even less, if the ISP has a local monopoly. Alternately, ISPs could change to "dynamic billing" where everyone in an oversubscribed area gets billed for non-unlimited service for as long as they're oversubscribed, and then goes back to being billed for unlimited service once the oversubscription is over. This would be cool, but seems like one of those nearly-impossible-with-the-hardware-we've-got sort of things, especially for wireless ISPs where you don't stay on the same distribution node so you're constantly moving between oversubscribed and undersubscribed nodes.)
bachmeier 11y ago
For the purposes of this action, it means you can use it as much as you want. AT&T was selling it as unlimited 3G/4G, they were not told the conditions that would result in throttling, and they were not told that they would effectively have an unusable data plan after throttling. My memory may be fuzzy, but this story[1] provides a few more details. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/technology/FTC-says-ATT-deceived-consumers-on-unlimited-data-plan.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/technology/FTC-says-ATT-de...
msravi 11y ago
FYI, "unlimited data" != "unlimited throughput". No one's asking for unlimited throughput. What people who signed up thought they were getting was pretty straightforward - unlimited data at the throughput promised. Period.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- nathan_long 11y ago
  > unlimited data at the throughput promised I'm with you, but I've noticed that ISPs generally state speeds using "up to". Eg, AT&T's lowest U-verse tier gives you "Speeds up to 6Mbps". Which is exactly the worst guarantee possible. "Don't worry, we certainly won't give you more than 6Mbps!" Of course, if you pay them more, they'll guarantee not to give you more than 18Mbps.
Aloisius 11y ago
I would define it as without limits imposed by the company. Limits imposed by nature are fine. I'm not going to complain about unlimited talk time when there are only so many seconds in the month. I'm even ok with prioritization for congestion control since you're hitting a natural limit of available bandwidth. This is apparently what AT&T is doing now according to Ars Technica.
colechristensen 11y ago
When it comes to networking providers wired/wireless/mobile it means speed is invariant with regards to volume. Network neutrality means speed is invariant with regards to source. I have mixed feelings about traffic shaping between users and protocols – that is limiting a minority of whales taking an unfair share.
mangeletti 11y ago
Certainly "unlimited plan" doesn't mean "limited to a greater extent than the limited plan". If AT&T had set the bandwidth rate to match that of their normal 5GB plan, there would be no problems. In fact, I think that would be seen as expected behavior. What they instead did was punish their long-time customers who were grandfathered into a mistake that AT&T made. I signed up for unlimited data in 2008, after the second iPhone was out, so it's not like the term "Internet" was suddenly redefined and AT&T was in a new paradigm of mobile Internet access. What really happened is that they got greedy and oversubscribed their network, and they decided to punish us for that.
biot 11y ago
Throughput, latency, and so on are natural limitations of consuming bandwidth (internet and RF) which is shared across subscribers. What the FCC took exception to (and rightly so) is that AT&T imposed artificial limitations on subscribers based on their consumption. You can't say that your service has no limits but then go on and impose limits.
VLM 11y ago
My daily driver has an unlimited top speed. Rather optimistically according to my xbox and Forza it can top our around 100-110. (Edited to add, Forza seems to imply I can get my car up to 115 or so, then stability control loses it, but theres no hard coded limit). In the army I drove a pos HMMWV and it has a limiter topping it out at 55 mph from memory. Although if you remove the governor supposedly it rockets along at 75+. My pos would have leaked out all the oil or something before it ever got to 75, but in theory a reliable one can go that fast. The civilian model replaces the 100 HP indestructible engine with a 600 HP consumer engine so those move quite fast.

So what does unlimited mean then in your definition? Even before they throttle, you will be limited by the throughput of the cell tower.

by hueving 11y ago

So what does unlimited mean then in your definition? Even before they throttle, you will be limited by the throughput of the cell tower.

istvan__ 11y ago

This is not about the speed, more like about the volume of data. They limit you after you reached a limit that should have never reach because it was advertised limitless.

revscat 11y ago

Interesting question. "Unlimited: Wherein the amount of bandwidth, measured by megabits/s up/down, will not be artificially affected. While system outages or other technical limitations can at times affect throughput, at no point will AT&T or its subsidiaries place constraints upon throughput based upon the amount of data transferred over the course of one or more billing periods."

derefr 11y ago
Would an ISP still be able to call their service "unlimited", by this definition, if some of their distribution nodes (cable optical nodes, wireless cell towers, whatever) are oversubscribed+saturated to the point of degraded service for the customers on that node? If they could, then would they still be able to call the service "unlimited" if they enforced moment-by-moment QoS at the distribution node (so your neighbour's download will slow down to allow you to Skype, as if you were both connected through the same router in a building)? And if that is allowed, then what is the difference if they're doing the QoSing by long-time-window statistical aggregation rather than packet-by-packet prioritization? Decreasing the bandwidth available to a given link that has reached some monthly "quota" on a given oversubscribed node†, has exactly the same incentives as decreasing the bandwidth available to a given link for as long as someone else is trying to saturate the pipe with higher-priority traffic. Either method disincentivizes everyone on the link from "wasting" their bandwidth unnecessarily (in a "you don't want your neighbour to do X, so you stop doing X and hope that they have empathy" way), such that the link becomes less saturated on a long-term basis. But only one is ever highlighted by the news as explicitly breaking the promise of "unlimited." Why is this? --- † (...where that quota is the area-under-the-curve of the router's upstream bandwidth, divided by the number of users attached to the distribution point—in other words, the user's ration of the distribution node's available transit. If the quota is an arbitrary fixed number that isn't anywhere near this number, then that's just price-gouging.)
- georgerobinson 11y ago
  I would think so. Let's use "unlimited" in the context of public transport. You have paid for a Travelcard on the London Underground Zones 1 to 6, including peak hours. If there is congestion on the line, or it's a busy rush hour morning is your Travelcard no longer "unlimited"? I mean you're not paying an SLA in which you're guaranteed a seat and that trains will be delayed no longer then X minutes. I'm not defending AT&T in the slightest, but I think "unlimited usage", "100% availability" and "100% link rate" are not the same.
  - derefr 11y ago
    I would almost say that an oversubscribed+QoSed line is the modern definition of "residential service", while guaranteed bandwidth (equivalent in effect, but not necessarily in implementation, to the "dedicated circuits" of DSL terminology) is the modern definition of "business service."
- revelation 11y ago
  So many people here obsessed with making some kind of technical disambiguation. I don't think the lawyers care for that at all. Both intentionally throttling and not remotely providing the necessary infrastructure necessary to support use will get you into hot waters.
  - derefr 11y ago
    My question was more: If an ISP usually has enough pipe for everyone on each of their distribution nodes (that is, has no oversubscription—or, more practically, only oversubscription for aggregations of customers with statistically-predictable usage such that the node should reasonably never be saturated, with some extra engineering tolerance for the rare occasions usage goes above statistical norms)— but the ISP sometimes falls short when the introduction of a new service like VoIP or Netflix or Steam into the market, or lots of new denser construction in an area, makes demand outstrip their supply, then should they get in trouble for enforcing QoSing (through whatever means) on their distribution nodes, temporarily, while they work on upgrading those nodes? Because, if so, then ISPs should probably never use the word "unlimited" at all because they would still get in trouble for reasons (almost) completely out of their control. (I say "almost" because they could just refuse to sell service in oversubscribed areas. But customers would like that even less, if the ISP has a local monopoly. Alternately, ISPs could change to "dynamic billing" where everyone in an oversubscribed area gets billed for non-unlimited service for as long as they're oversubscribed, and then goes back to being billed for unlimited service once the oversubscription is over. This would be cool, but seems like one of those nearly-impossible-with-the-hardware-we've-got sort of things, especially for wireless ISPs where you don't stay on the same distribution node so you're constantly moving between oversubscribed and undersubscribed nodes.)

bachmeier 11y ago

For the purposes of this action, it means you can use it as much as you want. AT&T was selling it as unlimited 3G/4G, they were not told the conditions that would result in throttling, and they were not told that they would effectively have an unusable data plan after throttling. My memory may be fuzzy, but this story[1] provides a few more details. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/technology/FTC-says-ATT-deceived-consumers-on-unlimited-data-plan.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/29/technology/FTC-says-ATT-de...

msravi 11y ago

FYI, "unlimited data" != "unlimited throughput". No one's asking for unlimited throughput. What people who signed up thought they were getting was pretty straightforward - unlimited data at the throughput promised. Period.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
nathan_long 11y ago
> unlimited data at the throughput promised I'm with you, but I've noticed that ISPs generally state speeds using "up to". Eg, AT&T's lowest U-verse tier gives you "Speeds up to 6Mbps". Which is exactly the worst guarantee possible. "Don't worry, we certainly won't give you more than 6Mbps!" Of course, if you pay them more, they'll guarantee not to give you more than 18Mbps.

Aloisius 11y ago

I would define it as without limits imposed by the company. Limits imposed by nature are fine. I'm not going to complain about unlimited talk time when there are only so many seconds in the month. I'm even ok with prioritization for congestion control since you're hitting a natural limit of available bandwidth. This is apparently what AT&T is doing now according to Ars Technica.

colechristensen 11y ago

When it comes to networking providers wired/wireless/mobile it means speed is invariant with regards to volume. Network neutrality means speed is invariant with regards to source. I have mixed feelings about traffic shaping between users and protocols – that is limiting a minority of whales taking an unfair share.

mangeletti 11y ago

Certainly "unlimited plan" doesn't mean "limited to a greater extent than the limited plan". If AT&T had set the bandwidth rate to match that of their normal 5GB plan, there would be no problems. In fact, I think that would be seen as expected behavior. What they instead did was punish their long-time customers who were grandfathered into a mistake that AT&T made. I signed up for unlimited data in 2008, after the second iPhone was out, so it's not like the term "Internet" was suddenly redefined and AT&T was in a new paradigm of mobile Internet access. What really happened is that they got greedy and oversubscribed their network, and they decided to punish us for that.

biot 11y ago

Throughput, latency, and so on are natural limitations of consuming bandwidth (internet and RF) which is shared across subscribers. What the FCC took exception to (and rightly so) is that AT&T imposed artificial limitations on subscribers based on their consumption. You can't say that your service has no limits but then go on and impose limits.

VLM 11y ago

My daily driver has an unlimited top speed. Rather optimistically according to my xbox and Forza it can top our around 100-110. (Edited to add, Forza seems to imply I can get my car up to 115 or so, then stability control loses it, but theres no hard coded limit). In the army I drove a pos HMMWV and it has a limiter topping it out at 55 mph from memory. Although if you remove the governor supposedly it rockets along at 75+. My pos would have leaked out all the oil or something before it ever got to 75, but in theory a reliable one can go that fast. The civilian model replaces the 100 HP indestructible engine with a 600 HP consumer engine so those move quite fast.