Article: Telkom SA cuts broadband prices

[MaD]

I beg to differ, P2P shaping shouldn't be a requirement but capping should.

Of course the higher the cap the better, but any uncapped service will be abused.. just look at Sentech.

As it is at the moment, less than 10% of ADSL users reach their 3GB cap.

 

[Gaz{M}]

If only 10% of ADSL users reach their cap, then there doesn't need to be a cap. If 10% use 90% of the bandwidth, that doesn't matter. It's the way the world works. Look at insurance for example. If you are a good risk, you are subsidising all the bad risk people with your premiums if you don't claim. Another example is air tickets. The earlier you buy a ticket, the cheaper it is. If you buy at the last minute, you pay a fortune and are subsidising the cheaper tickets sold weeks before. Everywhere in the consumer world, people are subsidising other's depending on the service. It makes sense and everyone is happy. Without it, prices would be rediculous.

With regards to P2P shaping, i was reading an interesting article showing that the problem with P2P is UPLOAD traffic more so than download traffic. Local ISP's should heavily shape UPLOAD traffic out of SA and that way literally double the available international bandwidth. This will not affect the speed of P2P gloabally, since each torrent has many peers, each supplying a trickle of bandwidth.

 

[Edinetz]

You seem to miss the point of a cap. If the 10% who reach their cap where allowed to use increase usage, more capacity would be needed which would increase costs and the cost of ADSL would need to be increased. The point that is trying to be made is 3Gb is enough because 90% of users don't even use 3Gb (don't totally agree I think 90% is to low to count). Its not the same as insurance because the higher the risk the more premiums you pay.

 

[Gaz{M}]

You seem to miss the point of a cap. If the 10% who reach their cap where allowed to use increase usage, more capacity would be needed which would increase costs and the cost of ADSL would need to be increased. The point that is trying to be made is 3Gb is enough because 90% of users don't even use 3Gb (don't totally agree I think 90% is to low to count). Its not the same as insurance because the higher the risk the more premiums you pay.

No i have not missed the point of the cap. In fact i have reliable inside information from Telkom engineers who have said that the last day of the month donwload frenzie doesn't clog the network in the slightest. 90% of ADSL subscribers are performing bursty tasks like browsing and email, leaving large amounts of spare bandwidth unused. If 10% are downloading constantly, they have access to huge amount of idle bandwidth. With port prioritising in place, P2P will be throttled to a level that allows http,smtp,ftp etc to always get full speed priority. Therefore the cap is unnecessary.

Secondly, i used insurance as an example, not as a direct comparison. Yes, a higher risk does increase your premiums, but who's to say just because im under 25 and male and drive a citi golf that i should pay R800 a month just because most other males my age are crap drivers? So if i never have an accident i'm subsidising the bad drivers. I was never a high risk, yet i pay for other people who are.

 

[freeek]

if i count the people I know that have adsl. All of them reach their cap at least by the 25 of the month. These are not heavy downloaders like me but gamers and a few chicks who just browse, email, play stupid flash games, greeting card crap and ocasionally dl'd some music. They are the type considered the normal user yet they still reach their cap at the end of the month. I find that 10% is very unbelievable!

Being relistic telkom will never raise the cap to 10gigs. What I expect them to do is simply raise it to 5gig and only count international traffic! P2P should definitly be shapped or prioritized!

 

[RoosTa]

I agree that P2P traffic should be shaped, but leave the game ports unshaped. Games generally take up little bandwidth compared to P2P uploading/downloading.

 

[Peapod]

Telkom first cut broadband prices last September but critics have said broadband prices in South Africa are still very steep compared to Europe and the United States where ADSL access could be had for as little as $20 a month.

Shares in Telkom were 0.79 percent stronger at 113 rand while the Johannesburg Stock Exchange's Top-40 index rose 0.48 percent.

These paragraphs followed each other in the article. No wonder the share performace is so great - slash operating costs, have the highest telecomms costs in the world, have your customers do your market research and demographics fo new poduct implementation and voila! A P&L statement any trader would give a leg for.