Wednesday, January 14, 2004
Broadband by the minute?
In a move that seems a backwards-step from the new-fangled, always on, flat rate internet connections, at least one company in Europe is now offering surfers the option of paying by the minute for ADSL services. I've wondered before just how much research went into the flat-rate billing model, and I've seen comments that providers are finding that this is not as profitable as they were hoping... in fact, this kind of flat-rate billing showed itself to be open to 'abuse' by a small number of customers who were using more than their fair 'share' of the available bandwidth, and providers (one high profile example was NTL) imposed caps on how much you could download using their 'unlimited' services.
The real reason I wonder if a move back to time-based billing is a backwards step is because of recent research that has suggested that the benefits from having always-on connections go beyond simple economics (for the consumer). A report by the Work Foundation indicates that the internet experience via broadband is qualitatively different to 'per minute' use, with the former being more ongoing, relaxed, and exploratory, rather than task-focused and time-limited. ISPs obviously need to make a profit, so we might well see more of these 'backward steps', but we need to remember that a good internet experience is about more than just how fast and how cheaply you can download a file. Feeling that you can take your time and have a look around is just as important.
In a move that seems a backwards-step from the new-fangled, always on, flat rate internet connections, at least one company in Europe is now offering surfers the option of paying by the minute for ADSL services. I've wondered before just how much research went into the flat-rate billing model, and I've seen comments that providers are finding that this is not as profitable as they were hoping... in fact, this kind of flat-rate billing showed itself to be open to 'abuse' by a small number of customers who were using more than their fair 'share' of the available bandwidth, and providers (one high profile example was NTL) imposed caps on how much you could download using their 'unlimited' services.
The real reason I wonder if a move back to time-based billing is a backwards step is because of recent research that has suggested that the benefits from having always-on connections go beyond simple economics (for the consumer). A report by the Work Foundation indicates that the internet experience via broadband is qualitatively different to 'per minute' use, with the former being more ongoing, relaxed, and exploratory, rather than task-focused and time-limited. ISPs obviously need to make a profit, so we might well see more of these 'backward steps', but we need to remember that a good internet experience is about more than just how fast and how cheaply you can download a file. Feeling that you can take your time and have a look around is just as important.
(c) 2003-2005 Russell Beale
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