(European) ISPs want more cash for (American) data-intensive services
To ensure that the internet will remain a stable and well-functioning infrastructure, ISPs have an urgent need for higher rewards to cover their investemnts. Otherwise, internet might become “become unusable at peak times". That is the gist of the report “a Viable Future Model for the Internet”, a study by consultancy A.T. Kearney. The research was paid for by large European ISPs: France Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, Telecom Italia and Télefonica from Spain.
The main argument is hardly new: ISPs accuse data-intensive online services (like YouTube or Netflix) of reaping the rewards of fast and reliable networks, while all investments are made by ISPs. To prevent the entire internet from grinding to a halt, A.T. Kearney proposes four different remedies.
1. The price for internet connections rises with 6 euro per month on average.
2. Online service providers like Google and YouTube will have to pay for the traffic they generate. 0,05 euro per GB for fixed line traffic. For mobile traffic, this price lies 60(!) times higher, at 3,03.
3. The ISPs will offer paid prioritisation to the online services
4. Internet traffic will be managed more intensely in the “last mile”, meaning intensive internet use will be throttled when necessary.
In a reaction, posted by
, an Australian telco analyst sees friction between Europe and the US reflected in the study: it is mostly American rights holders and American content platforms like YouTube and Netflix that would pay the bill.
However, it aren’t the content providers that just ‘dump’ their traffic on the ‘net, it is users who generate the traffic by wanting to access these services. These data-intensive services enhance the demand for fast internet connections. If ISPs fail to profit from this, it has more to do with their own price setting than with the content services.
The European rules on net neutrality state that ISP’s are free to manage or shape their traffic, provided their open about it. Customers can then vote with their feet and choose an ISP with a policy to their liking. Following this reasoning, the ISPs funding the study are free to take this road. When customers do not appreciate their moves, the ISPs will lose custom.
In The Netherlands, mobile carrier T-Mobile has already
to pilot throttling data traffic during data peaks. Furthermore, mobile operators in this country do not
the possibility that big mobile data consumers will be charged more for their connection.
Comments(0)
Your comment