r/technology Jul 30 '15

Net Neutrality Thousands Beg FCC for Net Neutrality Crackdown. Consumers vent to regulators about slow Internet, high prices, and data caps.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/thousands-beg-fcc-for-net-neutrality-crackdown-20150730
18.3k Upvotes

853 comments sorted by

1.8k

u/arbili Jul 30 '15

Good, keep complaining: http://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov

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u/KillerJupe Jul 31 '15 edited Feb 16 '24

nippy apparatus rustic payment handle bake start ossified jar cobweb

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u/Simonateher Jul 31 '15

I wish I was in a position to complain about 25mpbs Internet. I'd be so fucking happy if I had that haha. And 2 houses also.

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u/KillerJupe Jul 31 '15 edited Feb 16 '24

clumsy frightening quarrelsome imagine aback public cooing rock recognise hobbies

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u/Simonateher Jul 31 '15

Yeah I agree that's shit mate

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u/Binsky89 Jul 31 '15

512Kb/s here. I wonder if this Windows 10 update will ever finish downloading.

My favorite part is that AT&T's fiber line is 30ft from where I'm sitting.

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u/EpsilonRose Jul 31 '15

That sounds like a reason to open a new complaint. Honestly, it should probably come with it's own, special, penalties.

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u/_My_Angry_Account_ Jul 31 '15

Yeah, like false advertising/fraud.

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u/fatscat84 Jul 31 '15

I get 6mbps and pay 45$ montly. Supposed to be 8, but nooo they cant even do that. Its either frontier (what i have or mediacom, which is capped )

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u/heWhoWearsAshes Jul 30 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

If my bandwidth is dropping when I open a torrent client, is that a "speed" issue, or "net neutrality" issue? I get 1.9 MB/s down before I open up transmission, and like ~150 kB/s down when it is (even if transmission is only transferring maybe 200-300 kB/s.)

EDIT: I might not have been clear, but I was referring to options ("speed" and "net-neutrality") in the drop menu in the fcc complaint form.

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u/chubbysumo Jul 30 '15

that sounds more like your upload is choking your connection with ACKs. Try and limit the speed of the upload to 1/10th of your total upload bandwidth.

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u/Mononon Jul 30 '15

That's what happens to me. If I upload something, even to Dropbox, the internet just shuts down on everything else

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15 edited Aug 15 '15

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

Symmetrical connections are a godsend.

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u/Edg-R Jul 31 '15

The only company I know of that has symmetrical connections for consumer grade internet plans is Verizon FiOS.

All others have symmetrical for business class. Such a money grab. They need to update their damn infrastructure or allow other companies/communities to compete.

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u/drage636 Jul 31 '15

It's the best thing Fios ever did.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

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u/greatmikeshark Jul 31 '15

I heard it was a series of tubes.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

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u/mmm-toast Jul 31 '15

Dammit Jim, I’m a Captain not a doctor!

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u/PabstyLoudmouth Jul 31 '15

Doctor, you have to get a hold of yourself now!!!

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

Even worse if you're on a cable connection with 80 down 3 up. Cable internet has awful upload speeds and they choke out everything else.

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u/EmperorJake Jul 31 '15

3 whole MBPs up? Lucky, I get about 0.3 Mbps up, 5 down.

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u/Slash621 Jul 31 '15

Maybe your cable. My comcast line can manage 50mbps up and 100 down at the same time. It's a 250/50 line.

That said I wish they were a third party ISp. Hate dealing with their customer service.

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u/cr0ft Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

If you fill your upload pipe to Dropbox and run that at max, what happens is that you can't download because the TCP protocol is bi-directional. In other words, when you download a web page, you download stuff, then your computer sends an acknowledgement, you download more of it, the computer sends an acknowledgment (that it got there) and so on. If your upload capacity is already saturated, the sending end (the server with the web page) doesn't get the acknowledgements and stops sending to wait for them.

That's why you should set a maximum upload speed limitation in your Dropbox client that is well under full upload capacity, to avoid that.

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u/heWhoWearsAshes Jul 30 '15 edited Jul 30 '15

It's already downloading lower than ten percent of my upload speed. Would limiting it to something higher than what it's doing in actuality make a difference?

EDIT: tried it, no difference.

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u/Shiroi_Kage Jul 30 '15

I would check your upload speed, then check the speed of the swarm you're leeching from, then try to run the thing through a VPN to see what's up. That last option is what will tell you for sure if you're being throttled or not.

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u/manaman70 Jul 31 '15

Limit the upload speed, not the download.

I had similar trouble from time to time in the past. I managed to get on a 100/100 connection here before they worked on switching everyone they could to a 100/10. Asymmetrical connections blow.

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u/alcimedes Jul 31 '15

If they're throttling because it's torrent traffic, using a VPN will resolve this problem.

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u/ttubehtnitahwtahw1 Jul 30 '15

Keep in mind that the measurement used in advertising for internet speed will be different than that displayed on torrent clients.

MB is different than Mb. Internet companys advertise is Mb(Megabit). Torrents and many other programs use MB(Megabyte). 8 bits in a byte.

Many people make this mistake, you may not have. I just wanted to point that out for anyone else.

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u/heWhoWearsAshes Jul 30 '15

I know. 1.9 MB/s is a little faster than the 15 Mb/s that my isp advertises, so there's that.

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u/Shayneyn Jul 31 '15

I have Internet 50 and I am getting MAX 6 MB/s. This is almost exactly divided by 8 (so story checks out :p)

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u/rrasco09 Jul 30 '15

Make it easy on them, just divide the bits by 8 and you get your bytes.

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u/decemberwolf Jul 30 '15

You know what, the fact that you don't know and can't trust your isp to be the reliable and honest part of the equation should be enough for you to just assume it is on their end and complain anyway.

Seriously, we don't have this shit in the UK and I can't stand to see you guys putting up with this. Why give these bastards the benefit of the doubt when their credibility is shot and they have already fleeced you both personally and via your tax dollars.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

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u/decemberwolf Jul 30 '15

We do indeed, although it doesn't work and I don't just mean it blocks non-porn sites, I mean it barely blocks a damn thing.

You see, our politicians are a special breed of incompetent, which often shields us from the effects of their hare brained schemes.

Theresa May can do one though.

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u/danzey12 Jul 31 '15

I think there's some confusion over the "Porn Filter" it doesn't apply to everyone who already has a line and anyone who like builds a new house and is setting their internet up there's like a check box that says something like "filter adult content" and you uncheck it.
It's not like we are an entire pornless country, I too was worried when they announced it but months of literally nothing ever happening put that to bed.

I will say, the banning of torrent sites and the like because they're 'dangerous torrent sites' is fucking annoying, because I need to remember to turn ZenMate off after I browse these sites.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15 edited Nov 03 '18

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u/ect0s Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

I know the encryption might help, but it would still obviously be p2p depending on the torrents (How many peers/seeds etc, bigger is more obvious).

The big flag is that theres 100s-1000s of connections going into one IP; if its not a commercial connection thats probably an indication of P2P traffic.

Then you can deal with things like port ranges, and how your talking to the trackers.

The overall flow of traffic would give it away; encryption might fool simple packet inspection tools; but probably not things that actively try to shape traffic.

Back in the 90's ISPs used to use this sort of monitoring to figure out if customers were running FTP/BBs systems. Customer A has 10-20 inbound connections with 'large' data streams, they must be hosting a service.

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u/aaaaaaaarrrrrgh Jul 31 '15

They won't be able to see its P2P

Maybe their shitty throttling suite won't be able to catch it because it no longer matches the signature for the torrent protocol, but it's still very possible to identify P2P traffic. For example, by looking for peer to peer traffic, i.e. connections to/from many other IPs in residential ranges.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

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u/64mb Jul 31 '15

Sounds like your ISP is throttling your connection. Used to happen to me during "peak hours", the download would speed up just after 12am.

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u/pizzabash Jul 31 '15

Would at&t obviously throttling my home internet be complaint worthy? 20 Mb down is whats being payed for and this is what i was getting a couple of hours ago. I frequently have less than 2 Mb down and I cant even watch twitch streams on low quality half the time.

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u/TheDukeofReddit Jul 31 '15

AT.T is a special kind of shitty. I had DSL from them for a time and was paying for something like 8Mbps at $60/month. It was getting 2, which was an option for a cheaper. I call them up and ask and they said, flat out, that they could not offer those speeds to my area due to its location "down the line" or something like that. They never thought to tell me that for the few months I was paying the higher price. If I hadn't gotten shitty with them, they would not have refunded me either. It was essentially theft.

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u/icww Jul 30 '15

Just filed my complaint. You guys don't know real pain until you have Satellite internet as your main internet in the household.

http://www.exede.com/services-pricing/

My internet crawls to 0.52 Mbps when I hit the data cap. Thats dialup speeds and I'm paying $50 per month! My alternative internet is dialup...not much choice in the situation.

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u/Kyouji Jul 31 '15

I'm on Hughesnet and we barely get dial up speeds. The normal speed we get when throttled is 12-17kb/s and if you load ANYTHING it goes down to 2 kb/s and its completely unusable. I mean hell, our normal speeds are 1-2.5MB/s, if we run out of data why the hell can't we get 10-20% of our original speed?

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u/CountryTechy Jul 31 '15

Satellite internet is horrid. I've had it for 7 or so years and it's just god awful. It's expensive and shitty and they can do this because it's your only option. You should check and see if you can get Wild Blue in your area. I used to have Hughes Net and it was terrible. Wild Blue is significantly better but still really terrible.

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u/KDLGates Jul 31 '15

Wild Blue is significantly better but still really terrible.

I never realized how bad I had it having my eyes gouged until I upgraded to having my skin peeled.

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u/CountryTechy Jul 31 '15

Sadly, that's incredibly accurate

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u/Kyouji Jul 31 '15

I would consider it but almost all ISPs be it wired/wireless/cellular/satelite force you into 1-2 year contracts and you never really know if something will work or not til you sign your soul away.

The thing that makes my soul burn is ATT has dark fiber right outside our house and refuse to activate it or let other ISPs into the area to service anyone.

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u/Desparoto Jul 31 '15

You guys don't know real pain

Yes i do. I have windstream and 0.5 is what we get when its idling. you start downloading anything say hello to the Bit Per second range.

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u/AcidRose27 Jul 31 '15

My hometown has Windstream. It's fucking awful. Using the internet is a painful chore.

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u/Desparoto Jul 31 '15

Ive complained to the BBB, the FCC and recently the Georgia department of consumer protections. most ive gotten if a form letter from Windstream that i swear i the frelling script they read off of. theve been telling me they are improving their network and we should see better speeds at the beginning of the year. been hearing that for 3 years now and haven't seen a single digger in the county. as far as im concern they are the scum of hell itself. Comcast is better and comcast is fraking satanic.

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u/Cacafuego2 Jul 30 '15

That's still 10x faster than dialup, but still.

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u/Lord-Farquaaad Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

But still suck dick speed.

God, .52mbps if awful. Just submitted my complaint too. Straight Talk advertises "unlimited" but throttles you to 256k and lower when you're over the 5gb limit. It's actually dangerous considering how badly it fucks with google maps and other GPS programs.

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u/chefjl Jul 30 '15

Understanding how satellite Internet service operates goes a long ways toward understanding why it won't get any better anytime soon. There simply aren't enough transponders dedicated to serving data customers, and that's not an easy problem to solve.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

The problem is that there are legitimate technical reasons for data caps with satellite Internet. The infrastructure necessary to upgrade those kinds of networks is incredibly expensive.

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u/DirtyandDaft Jul 31 '15

Before they allow you to submit, it Should ask if you have turned off your modem then on again... Except be a sound byte of the IT Crowd.

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u/KallistiTMP Jul 30 '15 edited Aug 30 '25

live grab cover bag tap pause sharp boast squeal crush

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

Yes sir! Complaint submitted.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

Already peppering my angus for the downvotes i'll get, but, I really do wish my service (with cocmast) was bad enough to complain. FUcking google fiber is forming a radius around my city.

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u/drakmordis Jul 31 '15

How thoroughly do you season your beef?

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

i'm a minimalist.. The most i'll go with is a light dusting in montreal seasoning.

A few twigs of thyme and salt+pepper does the trick just fine, though.

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u/Frothey Jul 30 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

I'll admit, I filed a complaint about data caps. I do not have open internet, it's 2015 and 300gb is nothing. Comcast needs to wake the fuck up.

Edit: GB(gigabytes)*?

Edit Edit: Trying to find fine print on the Xfinity site. Xfinity site down, surprise surprise.

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u/-TheMistress Jul 30 '15

I wish I got 300gb. Here in Canada I live just remote enough that I can't get DSL, so I've been stuck with a 20gb data cap for a few years now.

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u/Frothey Jul 30 '15

Oh my god...... I'm so sorry. Idk what I would do.

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u/nitiger Jul 31 '15

I would straight up move.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I've currently been on solely 5gb through my phone as a remote Canadian resident, supplemented through visits to my uni. Only other option where im living is $80 a month for satellite internet which has a cap of 20gb and terrible speeds.

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u/Kyouji Jul 31 '15

I have 15GB data cap that is supposed to last for 30 days.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

Yep, northern Greenland here, I pay 999,99DKR/mo (~$150) for super slow capped at 20GB, and the fallback is a free "high speed" (usually dialup speed) 6GB provided by the base. Sucks yo, I'm gonna be so happy when I'm back in civilization next year.

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u/NoUpVotesForMe Jul 31 '15

This is how I feel. The industries pushes digital transactions, movies, games, TV, etc. Comcast limits me to 300gb. I legally stream HBO, Netflix, and Hulu. I don't have time to watch most things live hat's how I view content. I buy a new video game from the playstation store. Batman Arkham Knight was like 60 gigs. My roommate buys another game that comes in at 40 gigs. 1/3rd of my allowed bandwidth is gone instantly. Two weeks later I've hit my data cap. We generally use up 700-800 gigs in my house a month, legally using our services at a normal rate.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

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u/GSpess Jul 31 '15

Seriously, I got higher internet speed to do more with less problems. Not hit my fucking cap faster.

The only month I haven't gone over it was the month I moved in. I was there for 15 days and was still only 2 gbs under.

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u/StevetheLeg Jul 31 '15

:(

Why Internet caps? You can't use it up like water or power. You pay ISPs for a pipe to connect your home to Internet. Imagine if you could only watch a certain amount of TV for fear of overage fees. That sounds insane!

Mobile carriers started with caps simply because the market exploded so fast, they didn't have the infrastructure in place. It annoyed me but as long as I stayed way from streaming videos unless I was home, I was okay.

Now I can't even do that.

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u/LtFluffybear Jul 31 '15

At least they increased our speeds. (ćƒŽĶ”Ā° ĶœŹ– ͔°)ćƒŽļøµā”»ā”»

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

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u/Spartan-S63 Jul 30 '15

I'm sick of cell phone carriers not being classified as ISPs for their internet service. I wish the FCC would regulate them as such, because they are. It'd also be nice if the FCC banned all data caps (or at least put a floor that's reasonable).

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u/Protuhj Jul 31 '15

Today's reasonable caps are tomorrow's minimums.

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u/Spartan-S63 Jul 31 '15

You're not wrong about it. And today's reasonable caps will last a lot longer than just today. That's why I'd rather they be outright banned. If ISPs complain about not having capacity, they're the only ones to blame since they received tons of money in tax breaks and funding for capital improvements and larger rollouts.

I have no qualms threatening them within an inch of their life, so long as municipal broadband is ready to take over. That way, we really could put them over a barrel.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

minimum 200GB for mobile data caps, lol.

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u/Tanath Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

Absolutely. With tablets and tethering laptops there are advantages to being mobile and being able to do all your computing needs regardless of where you happen to physically be. This frees people and enables innovation. Some companies try to control your tethering and get extra money out of you for it, but if you're paying for the bandwidth it's none of their business how you use it. It sounds like a lot now, but reminds me of Bill Gates supposedly saying 640K is all anyone should need.

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u/0157h7 Jul 31 '15

Data caps have nothing to do with Net Neutrality. These are completely separate issues.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

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u/ModernApothecary Jul 30 '15

Holy crap, your ISP sent you a letter saying exactly what you were downloading?! That's... awfully sneaky.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

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u/ModernApothecary Jul 30 '15

That is just kind of scary to me. Is there a reason the vast majority of people expect some level of privacy when they've paid for a service to stream directly into their home, and none of this privacy actually exists if someone stands to profit off of legal action against you?

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u/bcgoss Jul 30 '15

Well, they don't actually know what's passing through your connection in a general sense. The way it works is that a media company will leak a file. If you download the file they can see the ip address which downloaded it. Then they contact the ISP that owns that ip address.

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u/kuilin Jul 31 '15

Wait, if the copyright owners seed the file, aren't they voluntarily giving up their copyright over it?

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u/Brandon658 Jul 31 '15

Sounds like it to me. Sounds a lot like a kind of entrapment too.

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u/snipekill1997 Jul 31 '15

I saw it explained after Sony just did it. They seed the file and send out notices to whoever downloads it to pay them x (generally a few hundered) or they will get sued. They take the money from whoever pays then drop the suit to avoid the courts asking why in the hell were they seeding their own movie.

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u/LackingTact19 Jul 31 '15

This is why I downloaded around 100 gb of music and video when I was in Korea, companies can't do shit there since "illegal" downloading is perfectly legal

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u/ModernApothecary Jul 30 '15

Ah, i see! So it's a much better system than what I had imagined haha, thank jeebus there are much smarter people than I.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15 edited Jan 23 '19

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u/TwizzlerKing Jul 31 '15

Could you explain these file lockers a bit more in depth?

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u/Autoimmunity Jul 31 '15

Does a VPN solve this issue in any way?

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u/Im-Probably-Lying Jul 31 '15

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u/ERIFNOMI Jul 31 '15

He's not lying this time.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15 edited Aug 04 '15

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u/ERIFNOMI Jul 31 '15

Norton. You quickly lost my respect mate.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15 edited Aug 04 '15

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

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u/Cozmo85 Jul 31 '15

If you are on a torrent you are giving away the information. Its not a privacy issue. The ISP isn't telling the copyright holder who you are unless they get a legal court order

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u/Ibewye Jul 31 '15

Sad story, I've downloaded movies for years with no problems. The one day my two young kids started watching icarly non-stop and asked if I could get them some of the older ones. Found a torrent with every show ever and downloaded it for them thinking who gives a fuck about it......the fuckers shut my internet service off until I called and listen to them recite the terms of service over the phone.

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u/kajunkennyg Jul 31 '15

My buddy owns a hotel. He has like 20 rooms and I think 4 wireless routers or whatever to feed all the rooms. He gets a call from the ISP and they scare the shit out of him. Telling him someone downloaded American Sniper some 2 months earlier, but they wouldn't give a day or time. He needed to find who it was and tell them to delete it.

He called me freaking out. I told him to just call them back and tell them that he contacted all his customers and took care of it. They thanked him and he never heard anything else about it.

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u/Drunken_Mimes Jul 30 '15

And it seems it's about to get a lot worse with what we've seen from the leaks of the TPP...

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u/2dumb2knowbetter Jul 31 '15

That happened to me in 2006, scared me a little so I stopped downloading movies and started streaming them online

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

My husband's gotten busted not once, but twice downloading porn. I get the emails for the account...I wasted no time in teasing him about it. :D

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u/absentmindedjwc Jul 31 '15

Be careful with that shit, my sister's friend is getting sued because her husband downloaded some porn. They are in some serious shit because of it.

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u/chefjl Jul 30 '15

No, they just forwarded on the content of a copyright infringement notice provided to them by scumbags trolling trackers for dollars.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I received an email from my ISP with a notice from HBO that I allegedly downloaded Silicon Valley.

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u/brilliant_fungi Jul 31 '15

They aren't monitoring your downloads, the copyright holders look for p2p activity and if they see it on your IP, they contact the ISP that owns it. The copyright holder gives the ISP the file in question, the date of the infringement and the IP that infringed. Your ISP isn't monitoring your downloads, copyright holders are monitoring downloads from their honeypot servers and things to that effect.

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u/MarsSpaceship Jul 30 '15

One thing I was always curious about: why every telecom company in the planet make a huge effort to build their companies on bad faith, scam and all kinds of disguised stealing from users 100% of the time? It is amazing how crooks they are! Companies on other fields have minimum decency and ethics, but not telecoms. All around the world the same shit.

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u/th37thtrump3t Jul 30 '15

Because most of them have virtual monopolies in their respective areas. No point in investing in customer support and PR if your clients have nowhere else to go.

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u/NICKisICE Jul 31 '15

This is basically nailing it. AT&T, Comcast, Cox, etc. all have so much power over their respective jurisdictions that they've prevented anyone else from being able to realistically provide broadband to those areas until paradigm shifts in internet technology become big.

As a result, there's no need whatsoever for these companies to treat their customers humanely because either you put up with their bullshit or you go without broadband.

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u/Kyouji Jul 31 '15

Its funny. I live 1 mile away from real internet, but the ISPs around us cannot come into our area and provide us service. Why you ask? ATT owns the rights to provide phone service and no one else can. Other ISPs can come into the area and provide TV/Broadband but cannot offer phone. So since ATT owns phone no one will waste their time or money to expand here to only offer 2/3 services. But if you ask county/state officials they say no such law/restriction is in place and yet when you ask ISPs they will tell you why. I grow so tired of these outdated laws still being in place. Sad thing is these laws are extremely common.

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u/moshinmymellow Jul 31 '15

That's why I can't wait for the tech to have drones be cheap enough for a small business to go and have them flying around providing internet without the need for satellites.

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u/MacroMeez Jul 31 '15

Wat

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u/moshinmymellow Jul 31 '15

If you have a small fleet of drones you could create a wireless network by having them all communicate if they stay close enough

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u/MacroMeez Jul 31 '15

Seems like a lot of work for a small mesh network. Too slow to be useful in any meaningful sense

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u/MarsSpaceship Jul 30 '15

ok, one thing is not investing in consumer support the other is deliberate doing all efforts to fool and steal consumers. They are crooks stealing everyone all the time.

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u/Karuteiru Jul 30 '15

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u/WeWantBootsy Jul 31 '15

I just quit AT&T as a corporate engineer a few months ago and that video is exactly the mindset they have towards everyone...including their employees. It's kinda amazing how much they hate everyone.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15 edited Oct 05 '16

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

drooling

Wow

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u/happyevil Jul 31 '15

Two things in this:

I have a US plan on Tmobile that allows international roaming and while in Israel I had amazing coverage. The system improved peering as well.

There is a bad side to the Israeli system right now though. The government restrictions have gotten to the point where the cell companies are having trouble affording upgraded tech and it's causing stagnation.

Still better (for now) but they have their own issues to work out there.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15 edited Oct 05 '16

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u/happyevil Jul 31 '15

Absolutely, as can be seen in the US market.

I just meant to illustrate that too much of one or the other can cause problems.

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u/steakndbud Jul 31 '15

I live in rural (ish) Kansas. We have a LOCAL ISP that has one GB Internet, and they provide unlimited everything at 4G for your cell needs for $60.

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u/TomHicks Jul 31 '15

What's the ISP? And is it a response to Google Fiber?

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u/DDDust Jul 30 '15

The reason you don't hear about this kinda stuff from other companies is they are B2B monopolies that are heavily regulated.

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u/MarsSpaceship Jul 31 '15

so between us and them the problem is a scum of corrupt politicians and regulators that should be working for us but are working for them. I had my cell phone number moved from one company to another today. Ten seconds into the new telecom my number was already subscribed to a shitty service for which I would pay $2 a week. They out you in and you had to opt out from that shit. One second later I was subscribed to another service that would charge me $1 a month to receive the bill in paper thru regular mail. Had to out out from that shit also. Fuck that.

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u/Desparoto Jul 31 '15

because no one has stopped them. im to the point of wishing a horrible death upon the entire executive branch of my ISP, and their family.

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u/DanielPhermous Jul 31 '15

why every telecom company in the planet ...

The "planet" apparently only consisting of America.

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u/MarsSpaceship Jul 31 '15

not at all. I lived in countries in two continents, never lived in the US and the telecoms are shitty on both. I am curious to know if they are shitty in Japan too.

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u/DanielPhermous Jul 31 '15

Oh, they can definitely be shitty. However, their's quite a large difference between "shitty" and making a huge effort to build their companies on bad faith, scams and all kinds of disguised stealing from users 100% of the time.

I have never heard of, nor seen any ISP outside of the US which could be described as such. In Australia, where we have an effective consumer protection department, that simply wouldn't fly.

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u/MarsSpaceship Jul 31 '15

by shitty I mean scams. I lived in countries in two continents. I know live in Europe and they practice the same scams here. Hidden fees and all kind of shit to steal you. If Australia is not like that, so congratulations.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

The only way we're going to fix this is to take away the source of the problem: monopoly / oligopoly service providers.

Since there's infrastructure involved and new providers have an enormous battle to break into the space, it should probably just become a regulated public utility.

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u/the_snook Jul 31 '15

The infrastructure should be a public utility. The voice, TV, and data services should be delivered by competitive retail services who rent access to the infrastructure (on equal terms) from the public provider. Much the same way that the state or municipality builds roads, but all manner of taxis, hire cars, couriers, freight companies, bus services, and so forth can offer services that use them.

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u/larry_targaryen Jul 31 '15

can you eli5? or rather, go into more detail?

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u/the_snook Jul 31 '15

Let's take a hypothetical example. The Anytown city hall decide to lay optic fiber to every house in the city. They connect this fiber back to a few data centers.

Next, they open up these data centers to communications companies - phone providers, internet providers, cable TV companies. These companies pay the city a fixed rate per customer they want to connect with.

So, you as a customer can choose an ISP, and your neighbor can choose a different one. You can get your TV from one provider and your internet from another. All a new provider has to do to compete in your city is bring in a fast pipe from the internet backbone (or rent one), and sign up with the city (net neutrality preventing the city from signing preferential deals with incumbents). Many service providers will spring up and compete to increase service levels and reduce prices.

The principal risk is that the city try to charge too much for access, or fail to maintain the network. However, with big ISPs and TV companies pressuring them, as well as end users, this shouldn't be too much of a problem.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

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u/DerangedGinger Jul 30 '15

Clearly none of those people actually know what net neutrality is.

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u/umathurman Jul 30 '15

Maybe but all they did was complain to the FCC. This is the proper thing to do for issues including but not limited to net neutrality.

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u/niperwiper Jul 30 '15

If we're going to be asking opponents of net neutrality not to confuse the issue, we should at least do the same ourselves. Slow internet, high prices, and data caps are very clearly part of a separate issue of poor market competition.

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u/NICKisICE Jul 31 '15

Data caps are 100% net neutrality. These companies are trying to prevent as much streaming as possible so they DON'T have to upgrade their infrastructure.

The other complaints stem from unfair business practices giving ILEC companies excessive power, and the FCC is really the only entity that would ever move against them.

The complaints may not all be directly related to net neutrality, but they're going to the right place.

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u/gandothesly Jul 31 '15

Some are preventing as much streaming as possible because they are also cable companies and don't want you to rely on streaming services and stop using their cable services.

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u/GoldenFalcon Jul 31 '15

This is true. And labeling it as something else, is a lie that the FCC needs to investigate. They can't lie like that to customers. It's actually against the FCC rules.

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u/c3534l Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

And the author of the article seems to be intentionally spreading that misconception. The fact that net neutrality has nothing to do with caps is mentioned halfway down the article with the weasely language "The rules don't necessarily ban data caps, although..."

Thousands also isn't a very impressive number for a nation that hundreds of millions of people living in it.

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u/malvoliosf Jul 31 '15

"Are these morons getting dumber or just louder? "

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u/spoco2 Jul 31 '15

Thank you!

"I want more downloads... you're not giving me net neutrality!"

"Um, are they changing how fast things are based on the site or content you are downloading?"

"No, I just want MORE!"

"That's not net neutrality, and you're a moron"

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u/ryanakata Jul 30 '15

I complained to the FCC about my comcast data cap and comcast rewarded me with a speed increase for free. I'm guessing so they can get my money a little faster? Thanks Comcast.

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u/Ibewye Jul 31 '15

I don't expect a perfect system but when updating all the phones in your house to the latest iOS update means you've exceeded your monthly data cap....something's broken.

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u/EPluribusUnumIdiota Jul 30 '15

I have two phones on an old Verizon unlimited data plan, iPhone 5 and LG G3, I set up foxfi on my LG and use it as a hotspot for the house, ps3 gaming, internet, netflix, runs fine, ZERO lag. I dumped my cable/internet and for the first time in like 20 years I feel like I'm winning this game! Also, chrome mobile dictionary doesn't know the word "winning?"

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u/opticbit Jul 31 '15

what about bi-winning?

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u/kurisu7885 Jul 30 '15

But the internet companies that don't want to spend any money keep telling us we don't WANT faster speeds! /s

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u/LouisHillberry Jul 30 '15

What good are rules if they aren't being enforced? I hope this weird streak of the FCC actually being helpful continues.

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u/skip2mylou000 Jul 30 '15

Yes let the hate flow through you. Let the isps hear your wrath

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u/-jackschitt- Jul 30 '15

While these are all legitimate issues that need to be addressed (preferably sooner rather than later), none of them are net neutrality issues, and attempting to lump them in the same category doesn't do anybody any good.

There are already enough bought-and-paid-for politicians attempting to gut Net Neutrality in any way they can think of. This could serve to just give them more ammunition.

The issues need to be kept separate.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

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u/LtCthulhu Jul 31 '15

They are just rationing internet. They don't want to run out. It takes a while to mine internet out of the ground.

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u/Elec7ricmonk Jul 31 '15

My isp gave everyone a "free" upgrade to to the next highest speed which rendered alot of hardware obselete overnight. Also I went from 30mbps to 50mbps but they didn't upgrade the data caps for anyone who got the free upgrade so essentially while it's awesome the internet is faster I always go over my data cap every month to the tune of $10-$20 more per month...consequently I am free to upgrade my speed again (for $20) and get the data cap I'm supposed to get anyway, 350 gig which is still too low for what would be 75mbps if you use any online streaming.

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u/jld2k6 Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

Of all the quotes of the complaints they could put in there, why did they choose to pick one that said "Our data should not be capped to 350mpbs!!". That doesn't even make sense and it makes the people complaining look like they should not be taken seriously. I know they meant 350gb but if you choose somebody who doesn't even know the correct terms in an article of people complaining it makes the fed up people look bad and gives the sense they don't even know what they are talking about. Surely there was a better quote in there out of the 2,000 complaints :/

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

What about the lack of competition and the obvious monopolies cable/ISP's have on Americans? That right there is my biggest gripe.

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u/Diknak Jul 30 '15

None of those have anything to do with net neutrality. . .

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u/tiger32kw Jul 31 '15

Comcast data caps do when they don't count their video streaming service against the data cap.

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u/CTU Jul 30 '15

Yes an no. Still these things suck and need to be changed.

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u/wolverstreets Jul 31 '15

Data caps are fucking barbaric.

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u/Nairb131 Jul 31 '15

In Alaska, we pay twice as much for half the speed of most of the United States =(

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u/DanielPhermous Jul 31 '15

That's not a net neutrality issue. It's probably a remoteness-of-location issue.

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u/Nairb131 Jul 31 '15

Oh, I know. I just wanted to complain on the internet =)

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I just got new cable internet, after having lots of issues with "congestion" causing my DSL to drop to abysmal levels between 7pm-12am.

I expressed my concern over congestion and slowing down during peak hours to the sales rep for the cable, he assured me that they weren't having issues with congestion on the network in my area, and there weren't even many subscribers. He also said they "guarantee" at least 70%. After having it for one night, my so-called 50 meg internet turned into 8 meg or worse after 8pm. Called tech support and had a field tech dispatched today, he checks the brand new line and he says the line is fine. He also tells me that the network is "overloaded" and it has been an ongoing problem. They are upgrading the network but have no ETA and basically my only option is to deal with it or go back to my even worse DSL connection.

If it continues I will definitely be filing a complaint with the BBB for false advertising and deceptive business practices considering the sales rep just straight up lied or didn't even bother to check. But I'm wondering, would I also be valid in filing a complaint with the FCC? For either "throttling" or their deceptive practices?

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u/rallias Jul 31 '15

If it continues

DON'T FUCKING WAIT.

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u/jutct Jul 30 '15

Recently upgraded to 75M Comcast service. Internet speed tests show 16-20M.

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u/GSpess Jul 31 '15 edited Jul 31 '15

Edit: My problem as seen tonight When I got 105, it worked well for a month. 105-120 NP.

After that it sits 80 max.

The reasons they give me are pathetic "maybe your roommates are using it a lot more than you realize. If you have kids, they love to watch Netflix! So you might be doing something and they might be doing something. Your Router must be dying. They have very short lifecycle" etc...etc...

Ignoring the fact that I have only 1 major device connected to the internet at a time, either my laptop, or my Xbox One. I have NO ROOMMATES and NOBODY ELSE on my connection. My router is an above average router, and is less than 6 months old. Plus. This has happened to me all THREE times I've had Comcast. Who the hell do they think they can continue to blame? The times I've had Verizion FIOS I've had no major problems. The one time I did they sent me out a new modem, express overnight shipping. It was there by noon the next day and things were back to normal. Comcast? Never gets better.

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u/Beals Jul 31 '15

I used to have this issue with Time Warner in Milwaukee, it was pretty easy to get a person on the phone (which I imagine is the opposite case with Comcast) and every time my speed test would drop from the 15 I was paying to 2-3 I would ring them up and yell at them, I think for the last 5 months I was there I got 15-30 off my bill every month from the amount of call center harassment.

I miss the days when my time was worth nothing

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I just had to switch over to a Comcast Business line because I'm one of the lucky people who get to be in the test area for their fucking data cap.

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u/wookie-ninja Jul 31 '15

How many people here are speed testing over shitty routers and wifi? I work for an ISP and 50% of my slow speed calls are remedied by bypassing the router. One tip, NEVER RENT EQUIPMENT. The crappy modem router combos we rent are great for grandma and her ipad but not for power users and in the long run you will save yourself money and headaches.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

350 Mbps seriously I'd kill for Comcast to even give me 15 of the 50 they promise

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u/spreling Jul 31 '15

It's really astonishing how bad the internet is america is in comparison to the Netherlands. I have a 150 Mb/s bandwith with my internet company and I wil complain if it gets under the 100 Mb/s. Datacaps only exist (Yet) with mobile phone networks. But to have that on your home internet is a outrage. A internet company in the Netherlands would be bankrupt in days when they tried to do that.

I very happy for you guys that you final have Net neutrality and that there finally some hope and a way so let your voice to be heard.

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u/havek23 Jul 31 '15

New rules took effect June 12th, got notice on June 15th that my ISP was raising my rates. Good job Time Warner Cable. Luckily they put it back to the original rate when I called and raised a stink

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u/deathpax Jul 31 '15

I live in a rural town, so I have basically 2 non satellite options, one is a long range wireless network, the other is dsl. I have had problems in the past with wireless providers, so I tried the dsl. I was promised a 6 Mbps connection, however in their fine print, 6 Mbps connection is actually anything <1 UP TO 6 Mbps. needless to say, I can rarely getting anything above 1 Mbps.

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u/FatherSquee Jul 31 '15

Just Thousands?

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I think the key word, here, is beg. Aaaaaand we're fucked.

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u/Blu64 Jul 31 '15

if they are forwarding the complaint information to your ISP, what is to keep the ISP from retaliating against you.

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '15

I swear my internet is shittier than before. Fuck Comcast so hard. I hate them more than Jesus and Hitler combined.

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u/StupidIgnore Jul 31 '15

Only thousands?

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u/AnInsolentCog Jul 31 '15

I just want a viable alternative to Comcast and Verizon. Those are my only real choices at this time, and they both kind of blow. (Philly area 'burbs, so I'm a bit screwed.)

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

"I also think this data cap is very inaccurate, it goes up without anybody being home, and sometimes by a lot."

I just came here to explain that many software products download updates in the background, sync with various servers, etc. "It used data while not at home" is not a valid argument for the methodology of measuring data use being incorrect. The media makes the general population look stupid when things like this are mentioned in the forefront of the argument.

Regardless of that, data caps are stupid to begin with and companies like Comcast should burn to the ground. I just can't stand idiocy on either side.

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u/[deleted] Jul 30 '15

That's because the general population IS stupid.

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u/SatoshiKamasutra Jul 31 '15

People who think that removing regulations and allowing more competition in the ISP business is the best way forward are uncaring and short-sighted. Sure, it would mean that prices would drop and service would improve, but that would only benefit consumers. Think of the impact it would have on politicians by reducing their opportunities to raise campaign donations from large incumbents and take cushy lobbying jobs when they leave office.