Web Africa Home Uncapped Feedback

[froot]

This sort of side stepping makes me reconsider moving to the so called "better" isp's

There hasn't been an official response from any of the ISPs regarding "an acceptable amount of use" on the accounts.

 

[Reaver.ZA]

There hasn't been an official response from any of the ISPs regarding "an acceptable amount of use" on the accounts.

No I guess not but I still want this question from Fulton17 answered: "Surely your systems should be throttling / prioritising / shaping / controlling your users when they exceed their windows so that they do not do "excessive" usage?"

 

[Chaos247]

There hasn't been an official response from any of the ISPs regarding "an acceptable amount of use" on the accounts.

believe it or not telkom is actually treating me really well. line is stable and speeds consistent. problem is I wanted to move to a 4mb line but telkom is way to expensive. i think i'll stick with my 1mb line and a consistent service.

 

[Necuno]

We've had to start clamping down a little due to some users pushing through excessive usage on our Uncapped accounts. No ones accounts are getting terminated because of this email.

To be honest I would like to know what is excessive:

Would it be doing 6-12 gig a night for whole month ?
Would it be downloading a steam game of 15G, then beta client of some MMO for another 10G and finally doing updates up too 5G ?
Would it be a whole day of downloading, but at 50% of line speed ?

My target usage is very much steam games, beta invites, HD streaming, weekly from 10pm to 5/6am and obviously sometimes during the day especially weekends. During the day is normally limited to 200/250KB since I like to play MMOs and other online games.

I'm no bandwidth whore, meaning 24.7 usage, but I do use my line when I use it. So my usage is anything from 50GB up too 200GB and sometimes 250GB a month.

What I find a bit confusing about this is that you have very strict / clear / prescriptive AUP / FUP's in place with 6 hour and 7 day rolling windows. Surely your systems should be throttling / prioritising / shaping / controlling your users when they exceed their windows so that they do not do "excessive" usage? As some people have noted these thresholds are by now means high (if anything they are very low).

Prophet's question is spot on - what is excessive?

Also when you started uncapped you spoke about these thresholds etc being a guide line and only implemented if there is a network capacity issue. I can only assume that if you are having to now email some people who are "excessive" users, and taking into account your thresholds, that you are having network capacity issues.

Whilst I would enjoy being on uncapped, these issues do concern me as to the cost benefit of my great priced capped account vs uncapped.

Very good to know these things a long with my simple questions. Silence isn't the way to go. Seems that you guys are going to be FlagShipped.

There hasn't been an official response from any of the ISPs regarding "an acceptable amount of use" on the accounts.

Then at least like Mweb did general guide lines, which WA can't even manage, which clearly was at what my questions was aimed.

 

[froot]

Then at least like Mweb did general guide lines, which WA can't even manage, which clearly was at what my questions was aimed.

Well assuming excessive is what you do when you exceed your boundaries and hit the shaping tool, this is then non-excessive?
On the 1Mbps package: 2.184GB during 0-6am and 1.58GB from 6-24h * 31 days = 116GB.
I didn't work it out for 384 of 4Mb.
Technically you can use 0.79 per 6h three times in a day (6-12,12-6,6-midnight) but this would exceed your 7 day window, which only allows you to do 11GB per 7 days.

 

[Necuno]

Well assuming excessive is what you do when you exceed your boundaries and hit the shaping tool, this is then non-excessive?
On the 1Mbps package: 2.184GB during 0-6am and 1.58GB from 6-24h * 31 days = 116GB.
I didn't work it out for 384 of 4Mb.
Technically you can use 0.79 per 6h three times in a day (6-12,12-6,6-midnight) but this would exceed your 7 day window, which only allows you to do 11GB per 7 days.

Then why bother with shaping tools and download windows. Seems then that this is more of a capped product.

To give you a real world example, I've just started to download diablo 3 beta and it is 15 gig. That's twice over their 4 meg window afaik. Not to mention I still want to properly update my skyrim with latest texture packs as well as get the creation kit. My TOR is also outdated. TOR needs to be updated 2x since there is two pcs, then there is rift in line. After that I would need to catch up with bleach and naturo which is at least another 700 mb gone.

I suppose I can never use my line when I need to when I have a WA account. Nor expect answers when I ask something that is a little above board. Which creates a problem...

 

[Gtx Gaming]

Diablo 3 only 4gb odd, i am downloading it atm

but yes it is stupid , i also want to know how much is abuse etc.

 

[Necuno]

Diablo 3 only 4gb odd, i am downloading it atm
but yes it is stupid , i also want to know how much is abuse etc.

Meh, I suppose it's 15GB then when it's uncompressed. No worries I'll pull the correct download stats for that running thread

 

[Abe]

While I agree that their shaping should sort out the people going over the top, I can understand why they don't give a number. People will then actively download until they hit that number. It's just the way people work.

 

[FreddyB]

Another Web Africa FAIL

Just got Debit order billing reminder email

from: Web Africa Billing [email protected]
date: Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 1:12 AM

Should the amount be incorrect, please contact us before EOB on Friday, 24 February 2012.

 

[Necuno]

While I agree that their shaping should sort out the people going over the top, I can understand why they don't give a number. People will then actively download until they hit that number. It's just the way people work.

My questions as well as Fulton17 is simple. We don't want exact number such as 250 is a no no, we are seeking in simplest terms what do they think is excessive.

As for example excessive usage is when you
1) download for 24.7
2) download a whole week at max
3) download 3 days for at max
4) avoid the shaper

Why the head-in-sand response?
How do they expect people to come and use their product when they can at will shift the goal posts on what is excessive?
Should we take it up with ISPA and ask them to ask WA the same questions?
Why not have the decency to just clarify and response?
Why the smoke and mirrors?
Are they afraid of confrontation?
Are they afraid of more questions?
Must we keep on asking this questions each day or each page?

 

[WAJeff]

Morning guys,

Just had a look at the last 2 pages of the What's going on thread.
From here onwards, can the guys who posted please PM me their details and I'll have things looked into.

With the amount of comments on the thread something must have not been functioning 100%, so would like to get to the bottom of this.
The guys who posted should be:

Alan
hereticangel
nfbs
CVRChameleon
mrlgm007
CPTBoy
Fulton
Sapphiron
bokka1
Friedpet
biometrics
Veroland
D.B.Cooper
CrazyBob
Abe
FreddyB
Pr⊕phet

As you guys can see, it'll be a lot of PM's that'll come into my inbox today, so I'll grab the info but have a copy paste response. So excuse the robot like tone, but I just want to have the info escalated onto our Networking guys.

 

[mrlgm007]

You should have my details as pm'ed you the week end , but another pm sent...

 

[WAJeff]

You should have my details as pm'ed you the week end , but another pm sent...

As I posted I saw you sent me a PM. Was just listing everyone's names up here.
Will have a look now and log the issues for you.

What are things looking like this morning guys, same issues or back to normal?
Due to the lack of posts for Sunday (yesterday) can I safely assume the issues where fixed?

 

[Necuno]

Morning guys.

Morning.

We just want some clarity as per our questions here.

One can't really in all honesty make a decision whether or not to come over to WA uncapped until they are at least answered to some degree what would give us the basic guidelines without obfuscating what is and what is not.

I would like to give you the opportunity to please clarify them before I have to take it up with IPSA.

Thank you.

 

[WAJeff]

My questions as well as Fulton17 is simple. We don't want exact number such as 250 is a no no, we are seeking in simplest terms what do they think is excessive.

As for example excessive usage is when you
1) download for 24.7
2) download a whole week at max
3) download 3 days for at max
4) avoid the shaper

Why the head-in-sand response?
How do they expect people to come and use their product when they can at will shift the goal posts on what is excessive?
Should we take it up with ISPA and ask them to ask WA the same questions?
Why not have the decency to just clarify and response?
Why the smoke and mirrors?
Are they afraid of confrontation?
Are they afraid of more questions?
Must we keep on asking this questions each day or each page?

I hope I can clear some things up for you:

Abuse/ excessive usage is measured by a system.
The users who constantly exceed thresholds are listed on our systems and usage snapshots are taken.

As long as users are within the thresholds (all listed here they won't receive a notification. As mentioned on the launch, these are guidelines and are fair for what the accounts are used for.
Whether users want to use their entire 7 day rolling window usage over 7 days, an hour - completely up to them.

Our AUP also mentions what is constituted as abuse on our network.

We're trying our absolute best to be upfront about things. For the moment, I'm in the process of hiring another guy to help out with the online communities - running solo at the moment. If I do miss a post, question or request - PM me, I'll always get to it.

 

[Necuno]

I hope I can clear some things up for you:

Abuse/ excessive usage is measured by a system.
The users who constantly exceed thresholds are listed on our systems and usage snapshots are taken.

As long as users are within the thresholds (all listed here they won't receive a notification. As mentioned on the launch, these are guidelines and are fair for what the accounts are used for.
Whether users want to use their entire 7 day rolling window usage over 7 days, an hour - completely up to them.

Just a little bit concerned how well this product fairs with usage of digital distribution. I can't think of any recent game that is less than 5 gig download and it might be a problem with "Home Uncapped 4Mbps - 6 hours - 3.165 GB". However you did say constantly exceeding, so I guess it be fine if you exceed it three times in a month to get your games.

Downloads in download plus times is exempted from the rolling? This was mentioned earlier afaik.

Because coming back to steam for example, I buy myself skyrim which is about 6gb and downloading that exceeds my download window, but now I want to catch up on some of my anime. This however is queued for download+ hours.... But I'm in a window until 7 days is passed, I guess that would be fine?

Worst thing I can think of is not being able to play having to wait until download+ hours to update all my games or my pc or pods for my iPhone.

There in lies what I'm not sure of, that was why I asked what is excessive. Because currently I can't see how I can use WA Uncapped without at least being excessive more than one time a month. Which means that you have 4 strikes in a month (7 days) which cuts it pretty close...

Does each month being excessive count up? What if I had to download something big once and then now I'm over? 3 months in a row == email ?

Our AUP also mentions what is constituted as abuse on our network.

Read and understood as:

1) stay in your window.
2) don't fool the shaper.

We're trying our absolute best to be upfront about things. For the moment, I'm in the process of hiring another guy to help out with the online communities - running solo at the moment. If I do miss a post, question or request - PM me, I'll always get to it.

Thanks for answering and good luck with that.

 

[Friedpet]

The users who constantly exceed thresholds are listed on our systems and usage snapshots are taken.

As long as users are within the thresholds

I'm almost always deprioritised! Me and my brother are both downloading steam games almost non-stop for the past month...

Does this now mean I'm going to get a warning etc?

 

[Necuno]

I'm almost always deprioritised! Me and my brother are both downloading steam games almost non-stop for the past month...
Does this now mean I'm going to get a warning etc?

That will be part of my problem as well. TBH I don't think this product was intended at all for more that one user that doesn't use digital distribution or any related streaming services like Hlulu, Sky or related. This is also why I said I'd also be in constant violation at least once to twice a month because of steam as well as beta testing, then we have not even touched on the issue of diffent mmos being playd and they need updates and traffic as well

 

[Necuno]

I hope I can clear some things up for you:

Abuse/ excessive usage is measured by a system.
The users who constantly exceed thresholds are listed on our systems and usage snapshots are taken.

As long as users are within the thresholds (all listed here they won't receive a notification. As mentioned on the launch, these are guidelines and are fair for what the accounts are used for.
Whether users want to use their entire 7 day rolling window usage over 7 days, an hour - completely up to them.

Just a little bit concerned how well this product fairs with usage of digital distribution. I can't think of any recent game that is less than 5 gig download and it might be a problem with "Home Uncapped 4Mbps - 6 hours - 3.165 GB". However you did say constantly exceeding, so I guess it be fine if you exceed it three times in a month to get your games.

Downloads in download plus times is exempted from the rolling? This was mentioned earlier afaik.

Because coming back to steam for example, I buy myself skyrim which is about 6gb and downloading that exceeds my download window, but now I want to catch up on some of my anime. This however is queued for download+ hours.... But I'm in a window until 7 days is passed, I guess that would be fine?

Worst thing I can think of is not being able to play having to wait until download+ hours to update all my games or my pc or pods for my iPhone.

There in lies what I'm not sure of, that was why I asked what is excessive. Because currently I can't see how I can use WA Uncapped without at least being excessive more than one time a month. Which means that you have 4 strikes in a month (7 days) which cuts it pretty close...

Does each month being excessive count up? What if I had to download something big once and then now I'm over? 3 months in a row == email ?

Our AUP also mentions what is constituted as abuse on our network.

Read and understood as:

1) stay in your window.
2) don't fool the shaper.

We're trying our absolute best to be upfront about things. For the moment, I'm in the process of hiring another guy to help out with the online communities - running solo at the moment. If I do miss a post, question or request - PM me, I'll always get to it.

Thanks for answering and good luck with that.

/bump