Is there a "good" uncapped provider?

Osiris85 said:
Because of TOPTV?

Could you explain this a bit more? ( Never really read the news until a few months ago :D )
Click to expand...

Google "Technological Convergence".

It pretty much boils down to Naspers protecting their turf and looking ahead to where telecommunications and online media are headed.
 
Fcon_Vpro said:
It all comes down to : You get what you pay for.
I have an IS Express+ Uncapped accounts and it works great for me as long as Seacom isn't down.
I also use an IS Business ADSL(Satellite) account at work and that runs great. But thats close to R3k/m
I think the problems with Mweb are just a symptom of the entire industry.
But I think most ISP's do make an effort to deliver a great product. Ive had gr8 support experiences with Axxess and Openweb during bad patches.
Click to expand...

i call BS BS BS you dont get what you pay for if we were getting what we payed for we would be getting 100Mb connections

proof http://allyours.virginmedia.com/websales/product.do?id=15208

but if you reckon youre getting a good service at the price you paying, all i can do is shake my head...
not sure what their AUP or FUP is but i bet its better than ours...
 
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Osiris85 said:
Axxess UNCAPPED AND UNSHAPED accounts, in the fine print you are bound to the IS 20% usage policy where you will be shaped. If you get shaped then this is not a true unshaped account and users chose these accounts to avoid the IS shaping policies if I'm not mistaken? This is a prime example of false advertising as the product should rather be called Semi-shaped. Long story short "Yes our product is UNSHAPED, but you will be SHAPED if you download too much

Check out the detail of their uncapped offerings and you will see the 24 hour policy
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It is unshaped until you go above their limits.

i.e. you're getting all the smarties at once.

At least they set limits. With MWEB it's limited
to a degree most of the time and getting worse.
That makes it tricky for online gaming.

They also seem to make it very bad for anyone
using torrents and Rapidshare.
SabreWolfy said:
What was MWeb's intention then in offering shaped uncapped with the existing T&C? Surely they must have anticipated that many users would download large amounts of data? Other ISPs have FUP relating to the amount downloaded and throttling, etc. and others are using the 80%/20% rule. Is MWeb's "termination" approach a desperate knee-jerk response or was this their plan all along to deal with "heavy" users? The "Internet Addict" account was released later -- almost as an afterthought?
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MWEB wanted to offer world in order to attract
customers.

The mistake they are making is to change the
quality mid-contract. i.e. increasing shaping for
example.

They had to have known that people would set
up their PC's to download all they can. Any CEO
who says they never considered that is either lying
or went to a special school.
 
GingerBeer said:
It is unshaped until you go above their limits.

i.e. you're getting all the smarties at once.

At least they set limits. With MWEB it's limited
to a degree most of the time and getting worse.
That makes it tricky for online gaming.

They also seem to make it very bad for anyone
using torrents and Rapidshare.

MWEB wanted to offer world in order to attract
customers.

The mistake they are making is to change the
quality mid-contract. i.e. increasing shaping for
example.

They had to have known that people would set
up their PC's to download all they can. Any CEO
who says they never considered that is either lying
or went to a special school.
Click to expand...

But why call it UNSHAPED when they will SHAPE you after a certain limit? IIRC ( thanks SabreWolfy :D ) UNSHAPED means no shaping at all? Semi-Shaped mean UNSHAPED until a certain threshold?
 
Osiris85 said:
Axxess UNCAPPED AND UNSHAPED accounts, in the fine print you are bound to the IS 20% usage policy where you will be shaped. If you get shaped then this is not a true unshaped account and users chose these accounts to avoid the IS shaping policies if I'm not mistaken? This is a prime example of false advertising as the product should rather be called Semi-shaped. Long story short "Yes our product is UNSHAPED, but you will be SHAPED if you download too much

Check out the detail of their uncapped offerings and you will see the 24 hour policy
Click to expand...
Well to use some old arguments, the
product is unshaped and you would
therefore get more out of it.

It's also R196 compared to R219
on MWEB for 384k.

They tell people that there is a limit
up-front. We just want to know how
much people are using to get into the
20% band.



Osiris85 said:
But why call it UNSHAPED when they will SHAPE you after a certain limit? IIRC ( thanks SabreWolfy :D ) UNSHAPED means no shaping at all? Semi-Shaped mean UNSHAPED until a certain threshold?
Click to expand...
 
SabreWolfy said:
:wtf: We've discussed this kind of thing many times -- you cannot compare international prices with local prices, primarily because of the massive IPC/LLU pricing strangehold in this country, which is because of which state-owned monopoly?
Click to expand...

That link is for a fibre line. IPC and LLU doesn't affect fibre to the home.
 
SabreWolfy said:
What was MWeb's intention then in offering shaped uncapped with the existing T&C? Surely they must have anticipated that many users would download large amounts of data? Other ISPs have FUP relating to the amount downloaded and throttling, etc. and others are using the 80%/20% rule. Is MWeb's "termination" approach a desperate knee-jerk response or was this their plan all along to deal with "heavy" users? The "Internet Addict" account was released later -- almost as an afterthought?
Click to expand...

Hi SabreWolfy

I can honestly say no to this on both counts.

Enacting the AUP was not a knee jerk response, it's an ongoing process that needs to be followed. Every ISP can and should protect it's network and it's customers from those who wish to use their products in an inappropriate fashion.
In terms of the adding of the Internet Addict product, you are quite right in saying that it was released later, but this is not because it was an afterthought. Our intention was always to introduce an unshaped product into the 'power user' niche, however the timing was very tight around the launch of the uncapped services and as Internet Addict was still under development the decision was made to launch it a little later, rather than delay any further.

What I can also tell you is that in total we have asked less than 30 customers to change to more appropriate products. We strongly feel that these were all extreme cases and we stand by our decision to go this route. We have however taken all of the feedback and concerns raised in these discussions into account regarding the AUP process and I can assure you that going forward every customer who we feel is contravening the AUP will recieve a fair warning and an opportunity to explain and rectify their behaviour before any further action is taken.

Kind Regards
MWEB Operations (Tech Manager)
 
@MWEB Operations At which point do you consider someone to be a power user? 50gb, 100gb, 150gb, 200gb or 250gb??
 
This is how I see things - please note this is my personal opinion.

I see myself as a gamer. I get home, buy games digitally through Steam, Battle.net or whatever. I might download something now, tonight, tomorrow while at work or in three month's time/ I surf the web, watch videos on Youtube, read interactive online mags, etc etc etc.

HOWEVER, my torrent use is maybe 0.5% of the cap that I use and the maximum I've managed to pull was like 90-odd gigs.

This is exactly what MWeb's intention was when they launched the product. I am their ideal user. If everyone did what I do, there won't be problems.

So, as a result, I find MWeb's product brilliant. I pay R539 per month and can do what I like - just like the OP said! He pays R200-odd on his 384 line, so that is awesome.

What some of you should maybe consider is building a download server between 10 mates, everyone chips in R200 and voila the download server sits on the Addict option...
 
@soundbox

I don’t feel it’s really possible to define what constitutes a power user by quantifying it in xx number of gigabytes.

Dareno’s description of his own usage is a classic example of what I would consider to be the average user however it’s by no means all encompassing. One of the best things about the Internet for me is the diversity of the people on it and the wide variety of pastimes they come up with while online.

In the same way someone could be a power user for a number of different reasons, however for me the key attributes that determine if someone is a ‘power user’ is the need for an unshaped experience and/or the need to constantly transfer data at line, or near line speeds on a daily basis.
 
MWEB Operations said:
Hi SabreWolfy

I can honestly say no to this on both counts.

Enacting the AUP was not a knee jerk response, it's an ongoing process that needs to be followed. Every ISP can and should protect it's network and it's customers from those who wish to use their products in an inappropriate fashion.
In terms of the adding of the Internet Addict product, you are quite right in saying that it was released later, but this is not because it was an afterthought. Our intention was always to introduce an unshaped product into the 'power user' niche, however the timing was very tight around the launch of the uncapped services and as Internet Addict was still under development the decision was made to launch it a little later, rather than delay any further.

What I can also tell you is that in total we have asked less than 30 customers to change to more appropriate products. We strongly feel that these were all extreme cases and we stand by our decision to go this route. We have however taken all of the feedback and concerns raised in these discussions into account regarding the AUP process and I can assure you that going forward every customer who we feel is contravening the AUP will recieve a fair warning and an opportunity to explain and rectify their behaviour before any further action is taken.

Kind Regards
MWEB Operations (Tech Manager)
Click to expand...

This is definately welcome.
 
I think the issue may also be to advertise an uncapped product and offer it for everyone. Then as more people join, first the 'specialists' (as the ex-iBurst CEO referred to them) :) then the average users and the numbers go up, the ISP can TRIM the excessive users OFF their list of clients. This allows them to lower costs substantially. The 'power users' or 'specialists' are then booted off and they become a liability to whatever network takes them up - eg some booted from AfriHost went to MWEB and then they move to Axxess and possibly from there to OW.

One can find this pattern easily by looking at ISP offerings and finding different types of 'uncapped' accounts. There are accounts for lights downloaders and then there are accounts for heavy downloaders. Saying this, the MWEB Addict account is too expensive even for 24/7 line speed.
 
PeterCH said:
I think the issue may also be to advertise an uncapped product and offer it for everyone. Then as more people join, first the 'specialists' (as the ex-iBurst CEO referred to them) :) then the average users and the numbers go up, the ISP can TRIM the excessive users OFF their list of clients. This allows them to lower costs substantially. The 'power users' or 'specialists' are then booted off and they become a liability to whatever network takes them up - eg some booted from AfriHost went to MWEB and then they move to Axxess and possibly from there to OW.

One can find this pattern easily by looking at ISP offerings and finding different types of 'uncapped' accounts. There are accounts for lights downloaders and then there are accounts for heavy downloaders. Saying this, the MWEB Addict account is too expensive even for 24/7 line speed.
Click to expand...

Interesting points, however in our case you need to take into account that we migrated a major portion of our existing ADSL subscriber base onto uncapped products as soon as it launched so there was no gradual uptake - essentially everyone who was at a price point that was higher, or the same moved onto an appropriate uncapped product - I spent a lot of time on this migration myself and I can tell you it was the most fun I've ever had with a logistical nightmare :)

Our intention was then and still is to have an uncapped product which *everyone* can afford and notwithstanding IPC growing pains our network has been built to last based on that premise. I can't unfortunately comment on the pricing of the Internet Addict product, except to say that for now it is a premium service and it has been priced as such - let's see what the future holds as the South African Internet grows up :)
 
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MWEB, you hedged a previous question
of mine.

If you only kicked off 30 people, how were
such few people causing problems for the
network and why were they used as a j
ustification for th extra shaping??
 
GingerBeer said:
MWEB, you hedged a previous question
of mine.

If you only kicked off 30 people, how were
such few people causing problems for the
network and why were they used as a j
ustification for th extra shaping??
Click to expand...

I think you may be misinterpreting what was said in this regard. The bypassing of shaping has a direct impact on the bandwidth available for shaped traffic as it creates a false impression of the amount of high priority traffic in use. I can assure you that there are many more customers than these thirty who are bypassing shaping rules to some extent.
This is something we are working on both from a point of view of constantly improving the reporting that we use to detect this behaviour and updating the traffic managers to recognise the services being used.
 
Angellus said:
The 2nd bold bit is the most important to me and I think a fantastic move by Mweb. I think that's all a lot of people really wanted, just a warning if things get out of hand so it can be corrected, so thanks a lot for making that change and making it really clear for us. Now I can relax. :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the feedback Angellus - please do :)
 
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