Houston DSL users File Lawsuit Against SBC 252
cprincipe writes "According to this story on Yahoo, Houston DSL customers of SBC Communications have filed a lawsuit alleging that SBC has intentionally lowered connection speeds to its customers. " SBC, it should be noted, is the parent of Southwestern Bell, and recently acquired Ameritech.
Re:Don't know if this is relevant, but... (Score:1)
Re:An exception to many rules (Score:1)
Re:PPPoE (Score:1)
With the advent of IPMASQ, trying to limit to a single IP address is a loosing proposition.
Don't even have it yet (Score:1)
Re:An exception to many rules (Score:1)
Ameritech plays bad? (Score:1)
So, is Ameritech/SBC really a Microsoft company?
Re:128kb (Score:2)
Really? (Score:1)
sulli
Re:doesn't surprise me (Score:1)
However, my area (I'm in northwest Houston) has experienced frequent (at best (least) once a month, usually more), unexplained outages. This isn't just me and my line integrity, it's everyone within a 5 mile radius that I know has RR.
These last two days it has been on and off every 5-15 minutes. The cable light has gone off twice^H^H^H^Hhree times since I started this post. And all I can get is "let's restart your modem" or "Well, we're not showing an outage in your area" or whatever. It sucks. The tech support is pointless but, thankfully, pretty friendly and willing (if you bitch, of course) to give you some sort of refund on your bill.
Getting DSL here now is impossible. We've tried at work to get some sort of broadband solution but we can't get anyone to get us service in a timely manner. So I guess SBC is a little overloaded...
My whole feel on broadband providers is they don't care too much about the customer, just the customer's money. They're way too willing to take your money, but not very willing to back their claims up. I wish my internet connection was
-tsunake
Aha. (Score:1)
On the suit, though, did they ever advertise guaranteed throughput for news?
sulli
Re:ought to sue Bell Atlantic too (Score:1)
Re:128kb (Score:1)
To DSL or not to DSL (Score:1)
Vote [dragonswest.com] Naked 2000
Re:troll alert (Score:1)
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file transfer test (Score:5)
get linux-2.4.0-test6.tar.bz2
local: linux-2.4.0-test6.tar.bz2 remote: linux-2.4.0-test6.tar.bz2
200 PORT command successful.
150 Opening BINARY mode data connection for linux-2.4.0-test6.tar.bz2 (18106527 bytes).
226 Transfer complete.
18106527 bytes received in 122 secs (1.5e+02 Kbytes/sec)
That's what I expect 1.2Mbps download speed, so as you can see it's not an all 128k cap on everything.
Re:STUPID MODERATORS - CHECK YOUR LINKS! (Score:1)
Nice caps though... they're really, uh... big!
Re:PPPoE (Score:1)
Not necessarily. Some gateway routers (e.g. Redback) can be configured to only allow one IP per location. I think PPPoE is really for authentication of another sort (more accountability for abuse) but I've always thought that the user experience is too much of a pain. Authentication is useful, but if a customer is abusing the service, you can always kill their line at the gateway.
sulli
/30 (Score:1)
sulli
Re:Really? (Score:1)
sulli
Truth in advertising. (Score:2)
SWBell is advertising "up to 384 Kbps rates," but if you are never capable of achieving the advertised rates, then that is illegal, just as if SWBell advertised "up to 150 Mbps transfer." If you advertise a something, there must be a reasonable expectation of being able to achieve that.
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Ben Kosse
ATM (Score:1)
Yes, but it is much more difficult to distinguish by TCP application at the ATM client device, typically a dumb bridge. You can, and some carriers do, prioritize "business" over "individual" traffic, but this is by PVC, not by application (NNTP/SMTP/HTTP/Napster).
sulli
Re:One day this has to be sorted out.. (Score:2)
Re:128kb (Score:1)
Here's what their Chairman, Iain Vallance has to say about it all, as recently as November '99, from a speech to the TMA reported by ZDNet [zdnet.co.uk]:
You'll forgive me for swearing. Words fail me.
how many more? (Score:1)
The article lacked detail. It'd be useful to know how many people were affected, for how long and the impact.
It does beg the question - how many telcos are covertly operating a sub-standard service, hoping nobody will notice?
Perhaps all telcos should provide open source, impartial network monitoring software in order to self-regulate the quality of service. In Britain we have a telco watchdog that would stomp all over this thing.
Rob.
bad analogy (Score:1)
Rate lowers on servers, not line (Score:1)
No surprise (Score:2)
Southwestern Bell has always sucked, sucks, and will always suck barring saturation atomic bombing of their corporate headquarters.
They suck worst in Oklahoma, where they are deliberately punishing the state for Bob Kerr rolling them over to the FBI for attempting to bribe him. The forms this punishment takes includes things like $150 a month ISDN BRI, $4700+ a month ISDN PRI, etc. (ISDN rates in urban areas are lower, but still unreasonable.)
So now they suck on DSL too? Gee, imagine that.
Every home I ever lived in in SBC territory, I had to rip out all their wiring and redo it myself if I wanted more than 16,800 baud on my connections.
They suck.
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Real bandwidth costs real money. (Score:2)
Right now I am pricing the options to offer DSL service to members, and having a difficult time finding DSL circuit providers that are not overselling their own internal (ATM/FR) bandwidth from the central offices themselves.
Unfortunately, real bandwidth costs real money, a true T1 connection without any artificial restrictions will run you around $1,500.00 in most major US cities, not counting the cost of the circuit itself. When you pay a DSL provider $49.95 a month, you aren't going to be getting dedicated access to $1,500 worth of bandwidth!
A for-profit ISP has to keep their average customer happy (Slashdot readers are not their average customer), pay the monthly recurring cost for the support personnel, rent, DSL and T1/T3 circuits and bandwidth to the Internet, pay off the initial capital expense, and eventually turn a profit. They have no choice but to cut corners and oversell bandwidth.
At most, you get what you pay for.
Only the Line Speed is Guaranteed (Score:2)
Former customer, Burden of proof (Score:2)
When you call to complain, all they say is that they can only guarantee your DSL line speed, not the speed of another site. They repeat that when you say that your friend with a T1 (well, works at an ISP with one) can download at 140 KB/sec give or take, while I get 12 KB/sec.
At any rate, the suit appears to be over the fact that they signed you into a contract, then changed their side while offering no compensation. In my opinion, this lawsuit is well justified and overdue.
Re:I used to work on DSL for SBC... (Score:2)
Its about time these idots learn that if they advertise "internet access" that means full tcp/ip including server. They can limit bandwidth to servers on shared media like cable but they can't simply say "no servers" because that isn't "Internet Access".
Re:128kb (Score:2)
Broadband Monopolies (Score:2)
Even if they could, though, and there was good competition, you'd probably get raked over the coals for setup fees if you switched. I got nailed pretty hard when Covad ran their line to my house (They may have had to run copper though, since I'm out in the middle of nowhere.) If those setup fees are the norm, I wouldn't want to switch DSL providers on a regular basis.
Fortunately I'm happy with Covad/Speakeasy and don't plan to switch anytime soon.
Newsgroups ... (Score:4)
Finally, a reporter who understands why people need DSL. :-)
Attempt to dodge off-topicness: 128k is pathetic for DSL, isn't it? I doubt they can win a suit, but good luck to them.
Re:I used to work on DSL for SBC... (Score:4)
Also, instead of lining their pockets, the executives might want to spend money buying another T3. It would be good for their business in the long run.
Houston DSL users should play this fun game! (Score:2)
It's not the marketing, but the Tarrif (Score:3)
The problem is most Public Utility Commisions (PUCs) which are charged with keeping the phone company in line really have to look at what the tarrif says. They really aren't charged with looking at marketing.
For instance, U S WEST, now QWEST, originally filed DSL as being 640K down and 256K up (Note, this was at a state level, with the FCC they filed 256K both ways). However, read closely this is an UP TO speed. The actual minium rate is 1K.
The phone company may be able to say these are the public documents defining the service. We fulfilled the tarrif in full.
And even at that, that's still speeds only between the customer and the ISP. Once you're outside the ISP it's hard to sue based on internet speeds. At the very least it's not hard ot confuse the issue.
It seems to me that it's going to come down to laws in the state. For instance, if the PUC already voted against taking action on this issue the laws in the state may allow the case to be thrown out.
Even if they lose the only people who will make anything will be the lawyers.
Re:Legal validity (Score:4)
If a company offers you a service and they say they are going to GUARANTEE 384kbit/s to email, they kindof have to abide by that, it's simple contract law. If at any time that speed goes under 384kbit/s, regardless of cause (act of god notwithstanding), they can be held liable.
If people aren't happy with their DSL service, why can't they just switch providers?
In many cases there is only one high speed provider in the area, a "virtual monopoly" if you will. Sure, you can switch providers... but it'll be dialup.
-- iCEBaLM
Re:I used to work on DSL for SBC... (Score:2)
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Re:Cablevision (Score:2)
Diagnostic Mode for Alcatel Modems (Score:2)
Included is maximum possible speed (actual, not theoretical) to/from the CO and actual speed to the CO. Bellsouth's max uplink was around 800Kb/s, but was throttled to 256Kb. That was a definite hard throttle. The maximum possible downstream was very close to 1.5Mb/s, but the actual rate seemed to hover around 1Mb/s, but never went above that. I literally lived across the street from the CO (both as the crow flies and the coppier lies), so I don't see how I could *not* get better connection speeds. Anybody else try this?
hymie
Default NNTP servers suck anyway (Score:2)
What I want to know is, do any of these people use third party news services like newsfeeds or newscene? If they are still getting throttled then I would be inclined to bitch about it. I always thought it was a basic ISP rule to provide a "bare-minimum" newsfeed, and if you really wanted the gigs and gigs of kitty pr0n you would shell out the cash for a real server.
rosie_bhjp
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:2)
Re:Legal validity (Score:2)
Coincidentally, this is about the time that a lot of 1-year ADSL contracts are expiring.
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:2)
Slow server rather than slow DSL? (Score:2)
The article makes it sound like the DSL actually works perfectly, but that there's a slow NNTP server, or the server is on a slow link or something. Considering the [lack of] accuracy in the reporter's description of newsgroups, though, I wonder if maybe the problem is poorly described.
Hmm... If you're an ISP that supplies news, and the news is sucking all the bandwidth, and you can afford to piss off your customers, then just use a 286 with a really slow disk for your news server. More request latency -> less traffic. Problem solved. :-)
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Re:Don't even have it yet (Score:2)
One thing that a lot of people don't seem to know about DSL is that your provider doesn't necessarily have to be your phone company. I chose a relatively small provider in my area that got lots of great reviews. They have to deal with the telco regarding line issues, not me. And they've been great with service, much better than the telco itself. But I don't know if such providers exist in your area or if the local laws allow the telco to have a monopoly on DSL service...
Check out DSL Reports [dslreports.com] for more info on your area, and post a bad review of the company if you're sick of 'em!
He appears to be a business user (Score:2)
Most DSL companies I've looked at will, in fact, offer you higher (and guaranteed) bandwidth, but you have to pay through the nose (because otherwise you end up competing for their T1 services)
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Ben Kosse
Not suprising, but it is important (Score:2)
Given that the ISP in question here is the phone company, I'm not at all suprised at their "We're the phone company and we'll give it to you any way we like it, and not even provide a reacharound" management philosophy. It's even more tempting for them to do this when many of their customers are normal end-lusers who don't have the skills to adequately measure throughput in any meaningful way. To most people, it either works or doesn't work and chopping throughput by 1/3 is transparent to most people.
The outcome to this is important. Even if it they don't win the civil suit, it's really important that these companies get shamed for pulling these kinds of shenanigans and that they put the capital investment in maintaining their infrastructure. Let's be honest -- they're too profit-hungry to keep their servers up to snuff so instead they're shafting the customers. Let's hope the plaintiffs win AND humiliate SBC at the same time.
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:3)
The difference between bits and bytes is probably what causes the confusion, which is why ISP's resorted to using megabits and kilobits in their ads instead: the numbers look bigger to customers, who think they're getting a better deal.
The woods are lovely (Score:2)
I'm not sure I see this case as much of a precedent setter. The issue boils down to a rather simple one of contract law - did SBC (ASI) guarantee a link speed that it subsequently did not deliver? if it was a failure, did it occur outside of ASI's reasonable ability to control?
Not dissimilar to the law relating to cartage and freight hauling.
On the other hand, the many responses here point out a more interesting telecommunications issue which very few people are tracking - That "deregulation" of the local loop has, in fact, created 4 or 5 new layers of federal and state beuracracy, in a vain attempt to promote "competition".
The DSL issue in Houston is a perfect case in point. But to understand it, you have to know a little history about it.
In 1996, Congress passed the "Telecom Act", which purported to do, among other things, "de-regulate and open the local loop to competition".
Loosely translated, that means the wise denizens of Congress saw fit to repeal various provisions of the existing regulatory code that governed the RBOC's, and replace it with a new and "better" model. Essentially, they decreed that the RBOC's would henceforth become wholesalers of telecom parts (called UNE's, or un-bundled network elements). The idea being, that "CLEC's" (Competitive Local Exchange Carriers" could buy loops from the RBOC's at a wholesale price, and resell them to customers at a profit. Congress vested the responsibility for implementing this new law with the FCC - an agency of lawyers, led by commissioners who got the job out of political patronage.
At the time, DSL was just a promising new idea, and the broadband boom hadn't started yet. So it was understood, that the loops were going to be sold as voice circuits (POTS), or dedicated DS lines (T1's, T3's, etc.)
Congress was happy (since they could proclaim that they had brought a new age of competition), the RBOC's were happy (they still controlled their nets, and they got to get into long distance too), and the FCC was happy (lots of new regulations for the lawyers to write and argue over) and the CLECS were happy (hey! all I have to do is pass around orders in computers, and I get a nice 17% profit). Life was good.
Of course, it took 3 years for the lawyers at the FCC to write the new rules (they have families to feed too), and in the meantime, along comes this DSL business.
Don't kid yourself, the RBOC's hate DSL. When DSL first appeared, the RBOCs hemmed and hawed and tested the bejesus out of it, and generally kept it on the shelf, until the damned cable companies spoiled the fun, and began to sell cable modem service. Suddenly, dark clouds appeared on the RBOC horizon - the upstart cable companies were offering speeds which began to compare, and even exceed the speeds the RBOC's provided with their T1 business - a very, very lucrative portion of their business to boot. Suddenly, that $1400/mo. T1 line begins to look like a serious ripoff in the face of $40 cable connections.
Imagine, if you will, the collective sound of the rectums of 10,000 telephone company exec's slamming shut, in one gigantic sucking motion.
And, curse the luck, DSL companies like Covad wanted to place DSLAMs at local CO's, so they could begin selling DSL service to customers. Their own equipment!
Try to bear in mind, that several broadband technologies now exist, using the same sort of high-frequency transmission encoding DSL does, that can send and receive data at speeds approaching 60Mbps. Kinda puts a whole new perspective on what DSL could be, doesn't it?
The wiley RBOC's retaliated though, and began to install DSL systems in their headends just as fast as they possibly could. Way faster, in fact, than their CSR and installers could possibly keep up with.
Now why would they do that?
Well, I'll tell you. What you don't know, is that the FCC punted a considerable portion of the regulatory burden onto states - including certifying that the RBOC's had done all the things necessary to "enable competition" so that the RBOC's would be allowed to sell long distance service (read: make mega bucks). So, the smarty men at the baby bells took their fight to preserve T1 service to the local PUC's - in Texas, and in all the other 49 states. They required rulemakings to tell them just exactly what they needed to do to make it possible for them to "help" the CLECs connect their DSL service. And yes, i really mean *exactly*. So the PUC's all over the country are currently embroiled in proceedings to define exactly what the Bells had to do, to allow the Covads of the world to resell their local loops for DSL service. Oh, and did I mention that they installed equipment, lots of it, that ultimately limits the throughput of subscriber premises equipment to 1.5 Mbps or so?
Smarty men indeed. they gained a couple of years, while the lawyers argue, and in the meantime protect their T1 business, while selling DSL service mostly un-molested.
And when the dust clears, they will have a network in place that "won't support" the ultra-high bitrates of the newer HFC technology. Smart, eh?
Of course, the DSL companies cried foul, and immediately sought to force the RBOC's to sell the "platform" (AKA UNE-P) instead of just the conditioned loops. They are currently demanding the right to install their own DLC cards at the big chassis in the local CO's, so they can offer the higher speeds now made possible, and better compete with cable, and Bell itself. Of course, Bell disagrees. Surprise! More fights.
And that's where we are today. Our new 'de-regulated" market, is being done at the Federal, State, and local level, and the lawyers are having a feeding frenzy. In the end, who knows what we will get. Depends on who ends up out-maneuvering whom. Oh, and your DSL service will be a mere shadow of what it could be, until the dust clears.
In the meantime, all the "exactness" the Bells wanted in determining how to allow the CLECs to resell their service has resulted in an amazing blizzard of order forms, line certifications, engineer conditioning checks, etc. etc. ad nauseum being passed between the LECs and the CLECs. That's why it takes 6 months to get your DSL hooked up. heh. -Tap
Re:128kb (Score:2)
By the time that the internet pr0n picture got downloaded completely, we had plenty of napkins to.. ..agh.. "enjoy" the picture with.
Hate to admit it, but RoadRunner Rocks! (Score:2)
I have now been using RoadRunner for several months, and honestly, have no real complaints.
I originally thought DSL would be better because the provision for CLOC's in the telecomunications "de"regulation act of 96, while cable would remain a monopoly and thus be less efficient... But I wonder now if perhaps the opening of the door for anyone to colocate at the neighborhood switch to hook up to the termination of your POTS [copper] wires if you agreed to it, has prevented the assorted bells from rolling out the necessary infrastructure as would be needed to get backbone bandwith to the neighborhoods. After all, why invest in tech that is free to be used at near cost by others? Just a thought.
No Merit (Score:2)
It ain't the technology, it's the PIPES... (Score:2)
Cable, however, has very fat pipes with almost unlimited capability for growth and carrying more bandwidth--any wires that can deliver 120 channels of full NTSC cryastal clear to my house can handle major internet bandwidth. Granted, a cable connection often offers instabilities in its bandwidth, but fluctuating between 0.75Mbps and 1.5Mbps beats the hell out of getting a steady 0.375 or 0.5Mbps. Plus, there's room for expansion in the future with cable--there's a lot of future-proofness in those fat pipes, whereas copper phone lines have to be reaching their limits sooner. It's just simple math.
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:2)
Opinion from a Network Engineer standpoint... (Score:4)
Are you sure that they are capping bandwidth or are they congested? In the telco industry to oversubscribe (I've seen rates from 1/2 to 1/512) a service is a common practice (You usually take into account the bandwidth you have and assign a worst case scenario in which a percentage of all subscribers transmit and receive simultaneously). The bad part is that most network engineers don't take several factors into account like exactly what applications are being used. It's a lot different to oversubscribe if the final app is web browsing (Where you know that most users go to only five or six pages and you have proxies around) or Napster/FTP (Where you're going to have your bandwidth maxed for periods of time).
Another issue, how good is their connection to the Internet backbone? How many NAP points do they have? Usually having one huge pipe to one provider (as in bbn, uunet or digex) is not enough, you need two or three in order to have some traffic balancing. Also most IEX points are congested and unfortunately most of the content seems to be placed in 2-3 major providers.
So IMNHO I think this is a sign of poor network design as much as malice from their marketing dept.
ZoeSch
Re:doesn't surprise me (Score:2)
I live in the Albany area, and have used Road Runner for a while now. I live in a house with three roommates, two of whom are hardcore geeks. We have recently subscribed to DSL, from a local provider, Speakeasy [speakeasy.net], and are comparing the services before deciding to unsubscribe from either service.
Road Runner has been decent, in the sense that it has been alternately horrible and wondeful. When it's working, it runs 200kBps-300kBps. (note, that's bytes, not bits. Meaning 5 seconds per MB, tops) This beats the pants off the DSL, which for a comparable price gives us exactly 60kBps all the time. However, RoadRunner has gone down rather frequently (I can't say for sure it was network outages vs. line problems, but it fixed itself after a couple hours, and regardless of the cause it was still a problem) and has recently been very unreliable, as far as speed is concerned. For the past week or two I've been getting mostly around the 5-25 kBps range.
I'm not going to say one is better or worse, but they serve different needs. The DSL has provided us with a much more reliable connection, and allowed us 4 static IP Addresses, as well as giving us access to functons like reverse DNS. This is much better for the hardcore geeks and businesses who want to run their own email, web, ftp, etc... servers. RoadRunner, on the other hand, is much faster. It is a beautiful solution to the home recreational surfer who wants to fetch web pages and files at high speeds, but who doesn't need reliability or advanced functions, like static IPs.
I used to work on DSL for SBC... (Score:5)
Don't know if this is relevant, but... (Score:2)
I have my DSL (silver) loop through Verizon, but I'm using a large Texas based ISP (also one of the largest commercial usenet providers) through it. With DSL, it is possible in many areas to get a loop through a ILEC (Ma Bell) and get a different ISP. As long as the ISP has the FR or ATM link to the ILEC that is possible. Most ISPs these days market their DSL with CLEC loops such as Covad or Northpoint, even though many are able to provide service with ILEC loops also.
SBC, the San Antonio based company is currently phasing out their DHCP service in favor of PPPoE. I have heard that it has affected some current SWBell customers already (SWBell mailing out current customers with new PPPoE modems). I do not know if this affects PacBell. Because of this phase out, many ISPs are no longer able to sign up new customers to use a SWBell loop. IIRC, many ISPs provide service via NAT, static, or DHCP IP assignments. SWBell has changed their COs VPI's to a way that it will only work with PPPoE, it does not affect current SWBell loop customers running through another ISP though. Now why will it not affect current customers but not allow new customers to be signed up I don't know. SWBell.net are signing up new customers to use the damned PPPoE and are no longer doing DHCP. Other ISPs which do offer service in PPPoE (I don't know if FreeDSL counts, but thats one of them) are able to use SWBell's loop though. The bottom line is that but doing this, SWBell effectively forces people who are unable to get a CLEC service, to get SWBell's loop AND their ISP (there aren't many PPPoE capable ISPs).
This practice has made a lot of people (ie: friends I know) quite upset because they can only get PPPoE and mate it with a PPPoE ISP. I don't know if the lawsuit covers this side of the issue, but it would be nice if it does. As to the ranting about the speeds, IMO, they are whining too much. IIRC SWBell does not have minimum loop guarantees, don't know about ISP though. At least with Verizon, with Silver and up, you get minimum gurantees. Most of the people I know who have SWBell loops are very happy with their speeds, they get 1.2+Mbps most of the time. The slow speeds maybe caused by a overloaded usenet server, but I don't know. The only capping I know is the upstream, 128k for the 1.5/128 and 384k for the 6M/384 service respectively. Also another thing about SBC is the nature of their ATM network; in a congested CO, a lot of packets from the ISP will be marked DE (discard enable) and get dropped in favor for someone who is paying more for their loop who get packet priority. This will result in very poor speeds due to packet retransmission until the loop is capped to a slower speed. With Verizon's FR network, they have BECNs which will be sent to the ISP telling them to throttle back and to prevent as much packet loss as possible. The nature of cable and telcos these days is to oversubscribe their service. You are paying around 40 dollars of service, and thats what you get. The "slow" speeds you get are usually still better than a dialup. The reason for this oversubcription is mostly because telcos have to cover the costs for running the network and that they want people to get a T1 from them, thats where they make the big bucks.
|TheMAN
Re:Burden of proof (Score:2)
Basically, the jury/judge has to decide who is _more_ right, not decide whether the plaintiffs have proven that some wrongdoing occurred.
the Nutshell (Score:3)
I suspect however, that the Houston co won't be able to prove anything, because there are 500 factors that COULD be responsible for the slow speed, and their case will fail.
Downtime on PacBell DSL Services. (Score:2)
I've no comment on Houston's problems, but my big bugbear at the moment is PacBell's Bay Area DSL operation (also run by SBC).
Always up is a complete joke. Maybe once a week I cannot connect at all and maybe twice a week their DNS servers are down. Luckily I know several friendly and fast DNS servers. If I was a novice users I'd be locked out half the time.
PPPoE is also a piece of sh*t....(apologies if it isnt the protocols fault...)
Support contact is very difficult to obtain as well.
If they start cutting the speeds up here that would be the end of my relationship with them.
Winton
Re:A very important case. (Score:2)
SBC isp with PacBell DSL capped my downlink. (Score:5)
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:2)
PacBell DSL has really disappointed me, I top out around 150KB downstream and 13.5KB upstream. I'm pretty close to the telecom too. The bandwidth and service limitations that @home imposes in the Silicon Valley area make cable a non-starter, even worse than DSL. I suppose everything, even bandwidth, is more expensive out here though
Re:128kb (Score:2)
This will be the first of many... (Score:2)
Take my install with Fastpoint (ISP), COVAD (DSL) and Verizon (Telco). It is rapidly approaching 6 months since I originally ordered my ADSL and I have yet to get a synch up. Its not that I live in an area where DSL is impossible (at least 2 others in my neighborhood have it through COVAD). Its not the fact that Verizon is now on strike (you'd have to chop 5 months off the current install time for that to be the problem.) It definately seems to be the fact however, that a) my ISP doesn't push hard enough with installs, b) COVAD has no power over the lines they install DSL on, and c) Verizon has absolutely -zero- clue and -zero- interest in making a loop DSL ready.
So, I certainly doubt this will be the last of the law suites we see against DSL providers. They are all making claims they can't live up to and preaching their own special versions of the truths of DSL installation (average 21 day install time my ass.)
Anyone that is thinking about getting DSL certainly owes it to themselves to check out http://www.dslreports.com [dslreports.com]. I certainly wish I had before I signed up for the install hell I've been put through. I've already completed round 1 of my complaints to both the FCC and BBB. It felt good to do it, even though I doubt it will have any real impact.
I agree. (Score:2)
I think you know which of the 2 connections is getting cancelled and which one I'm keeping
Ha! Let's sue Sprint Local, too... (Score:2)
Re:My disgust with DSL providers (Score:2)
I helped set up multiple locations for friends when I was at school in upstate NY as well. RR there has dropped that asinine login system, and furthermore, provide up to 3 free IP addresses per modem. All you need to do to activate them is to call, and tell them that you have multiple machines. the buggers are active within a minute, and it was great.
However, the story changes dramatically in Saint Louis area. DSL Reports [dslreports.com] has information on DSL in the area, and reports that DSL may be available in my area. The reality, however, is that coverage is spotty at best, and DSL is not truly available in my area. Instead, companies such as Primary Networks and other CLECs rely upon SBC to determine whether they should even send a technician out to the customer sites. It seems that these companies are spending more money on advertising DSL than implementing DSL. The site is full of horror stories regarding the slow speed in which the installation takes place, and spotty at best service record of the various ISP's and SBC.
My coworker, who lives in Maryland Heights, MO, states that CableAmerica's cable modem service installed quickly, and he is now enjoying 500kbps downstream/128kbps upstream bandwith. This service was installed within a few days of ordering, and it went without a hitch.
Of course, AT&T Cable does not offer a Cable Modem service where I live, so I'm pretty much SOL for broadband. Get me back to NY. PLEASE.
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Cablevision (Score:2)
I've managed to pull 3MB/sec down quite easily so far, but the upload speed is limited to 1MB/sec. We'll see...
With the recent forced upgrade to the customer cable modems they've also closed the door on having multiple machines get IPs with DHCP. Now it's only one IP per modem - so they can charge you another $19.95 per month, PLUS another modem for each additional machine. I used a Netgear RT311 gateway router to get around that little SNAFU. For $100 it was a great investment.
You can use multiple computers on RR (Score:2)
Knew this kind of thing would happen... (Score:2)
A very important case. (Score:3)
Normally, I would say shut up and get another ISP. But that's not really possible, because phone companies and cable providers have monopolies on broadband home access. And because of this, I think such a lawsuit is greatly justified.
Although I would question how they know that their access is being slowed by the ISP. It would seem to me that it'd be very difficult to prove such a thing.
Because things like DSL and Cable are in the infancy, this case will determine how much control an ISP actually has. This will also further determine ISP's relation as telecommunications providers.
Re:Just Disgust (Score:2)
But you have to buy a monthly or yearly package from them.
Later
Erik Z
Re:Legal validity (Score:2)
Now, I don't have PacBell DSL, so I'm not certain of their terms and conditions, but I can pretty much guarantee that the CIR (committed information rate) of 384kbps is to the DSLAM.
The article states:
SBC guarantees a minimum access rate of 384 kilobits per second for its DSL service but not for newsgroups, which are provided by SBC's Internet subsidiaries, which include Southwestern Bell, said SBC spokesman Michael Coe. Newsgroups are Internet sites where individuals can exchange and download material such as large graphic files.
However, e-mail access is guaranteed at a minimum of 384 kilobits per second, he said.
-- iCEBaLM
Silly, but not surprising (Score:2)
Being a control-freak power-user myself, I'd be upset especially since many of these regions don't have any alternative to DSL. People in my neck of the woods could get cable, but this is another example of corporate strong-arming for the bottom line earnings-per-share and shareholder equity rather than customer service and quality. It's a shame.
It's about time! (Score:2)
He's been ordered by the company to cap people well under what they're paying for. Apperently if a user suspects this based on their upload/download speed Tech Support is to tell the customer that it's most likely because of the line quality inside the houes which PacBell is not responsible for.
Apperently the only way you can accurately mesaure the speed is with a special tool the DSL installers have.
Unfortunately my friend would not speak up since the job pays quite a lot and he's new, so he didn't want to mess with a good thing.
My advice would be for users to actually see the measured speed the tool is reporting before signing off that the work was completed. Either way I think the lawsuit will flesh it all out.
Re:Only the Line Speed is Guaranteed (Score:2)
If they intentionally slowed down service then these factors can obviously be controlled by SBC and are not subject to that agreement.
Re:Former customer, Burden of proof (Score:2)
It is one thing for them to be capped by equipment limitations - it is something entirely else for them to put an arbitrary announced cap on speeds.
Can you provide a better link to what they said?
Re:@home (Score:2)
Mark Duell
It's not the size of the bandwidth that matters... (Score:4)
Really, though. This article doesn't explore in-depth the 'tests' he ran to determine he was being cheated for bandwidth.
Since SBC uses an ATM fabric all the way out to their DSL modems, it is possible to assign priority to different types of traffic. SO, it
is not a question of COULD SBC be doing this, but ARE they doing it?
The question to me is a matter of physical bandwidth vs. logical bandwidth. After all, the customer can still pass 384K of traffic, but there's nothing in the guarantee that says SBC's news servers must be able to support twenty-thousand users hitting them at 384K at the same time.
Good customer service would dictate that they attempt to keep up and provide servers which can handle the traffic. However, I think it would be terribly hard to PROVE that news bandwidth was being intentionally limited at the customer end. I'm not saying it COULDN'T be limited there, just that it could be limited elsewhere without technically violating the agreement. I would really appreciate more detailed information about the supposed 'tests' that have determined this.
I think we all know what is going on here... (Score:2)
Does anyone out there believe that any of the Bell companies will give the service they prove? Does anyone need proof anymore to prove what these people are up to?
In Portland, OR there is a system where if a police officer suspects someone is selling drugs, he can ban him from the area where he is suspected of selling drugs with absolutly no proof . Now, some people might think this is a bad idea, but what I really think is that it needs to be expanded.
Everyone knows that the telephone companies cheat their customers every chance they get. It's accepted and agreed upon that this is the normal state of affairs. So why even go through the legal formalities of it. What we need is a law that anytime a Bell Company is accused of cheating their customers, the lawsuit is automatically found in favor of the plaintiffs, without legal formalities.
Re:doesn't surprise me (Score:2)
Northeast Ohio (NEO) Roadrunner is notorious for inconsistent performance, overselling bandwidth, and poor support.
The USENET server is usually either slower than a one-legged man in a marathon, or up and down more than a Catholic at Mass. Recently they changed the local roadrunner.* news hierarchy to roadrunner.neo.*, and didn't bother to tell their customers until a week later. These things usually prompt serious USENET users to subscribe to a third-party service, which adds $10-$15 a month to the old internet(re: crack) habit.
The mail-server goes through spells of can't send, can't receive, or speed that makes you feel that you could fetch the mail faster if you ran to the server and personally carried each byte home separately.
They have a network status page that they never use. I guess whoever created it didn't want to mess up their pretty new web page with things like system and service outages.
The no-help desk is broken into 3 groups. You must pass through each group sequentially.
Local: Can ask 3 questions:
1. Is your cable light on the modem on?
2. Is your pc light on the modem on?
3. Would you like hot, tasty beverage?
(Actually I can't remember #3. But it's just as inane)
National:
Doesn't have access to our local network, so they can't verify any problems. They know a lot more questions, but only have 1 answer: Let's remove your TCP/IP stack and re-install it.
Local w/Intelligence Upgrade:
This group actually knows WTF is going on. The problem is, it took 3 to 5 days to get to this group.
Don't ask how much packet loss we've been enduring lately. I'm to the point now that I've given up on-line gaming.
All these things from a service that has been running for 4 years. That's right, to my knowledge, NEO RoadRunner was the first commercial rollout of cable-modem broadband internet access in the USA. I believe the beta-test was in Ithaca, NY.
Time-Warner Cable at it's best.
Re:DSL Choices / Architecture Note (Score:2)
Here in Silicon Valley, I've had my DSL for about 1.5yrs. When I first signed up, everything was through PacBell, both the line and the ISP. Then a couple months ago I got a letter saying that my DSL service had been taken over by SBC communications. Three weeks after that letter I got another one saying that access to mail servers and newsgroups would be limited to 128k. So it's not really a matter of congestion [other than that's why they are limiting it]. They are really throttling it.
So does the suit have merit? Unclear. Unless SBC advertised a guaranteed service speed for the mail and news services, I would doubt it
I'd have to say no, the suit doesn't have merit. The DSL company guarantees X-bandwidth between your house and their 'house'. They don't [and CANNOT] guarantee connection speeds to specific internet servers.They never guaranteed speed to their mail or news servers, only the speed of the line to the CO.
On that note, I'm a bit pissed at SBC already. For the 1+ years I had the DSL handled by PacBell, I got 1+Mb down/128 up. [I pay for only 384 down/128 up]... As soon as they switched to SBC, my downlink dropped to 800Kb... yeah I know thats still alot, and more than I'm guaranteed but after a year of near T1 speeds it still sucks.
They also have screwed up my billing. They credited me for 1 month of service then billed me for 4 months of service that I had already paid for. My last bill was $250, without long distance [DSL charges just come in on my phone bill]. I'm still trying to get that one taken care of.
Ender
Re:Cable Modem vs DSL varies by region (Score:2)
One day this has to be sorted out.. (Score:2)
Do they only guarantee their bandwidth to the local central office or router?
For example, my university gives 10mbit access to all students, but the students eventually share the same pipe(s) that go out to the internet.
I can get 10mbit/second internally, but if the university guarantees (money back of course) that i can get 10mbit outside of the network, then i *want* it.
If they don't guarantee 10mbit outside the university network, then so be it..
Back to the real world: if you guarantee everyone gets 384kb/sec to the central office, so what. Any provider can do that and still not have enough to go *outside* the central office.
I wish @home would guarantee a rate as well, since inside the @home network (same city for example) I get worse rates than fast sites such as wuarchive, sunsite, etc.
DSL bandwidth (Score:2)
It is possible to use the SBC DSL link and use another ISP as the link to the internet. Often this will result in higher effective bandwidth.
Most likely the email rate the complainant measured was the result of server load - rather than a bandwidth limitation. (It also makes a difference what time of day speeds are measured; the heavier the traffic the slower the shared connection runs.
Burden of proof (Score:2)
For those of you who don't know.... (Score:3)
at least in this case.
doesn't surprise me (Score:2)
so i guess it would not be that odd to find that SBC is having rate problems and that in some managers short-sightedness they might have capped the rates. as i understand it, breaking out the line at the router is expensive and time consuming, of course, SBC is a big ass Co.
IMHO - if you can get it, go RoadRunner [rr.com] - i have yet to have problems and it has been three months on CounterStrike bliss!
Legal validity (Score:3)
Re:the Nutshell (Score:2)
(did you leave out news on purpose ?)
Uhmm. Are you THIS naive ? Yes, I dont care how much DELAY I have on my eMail connection (up to a point -- 1500ms is my pers. max), but 128kbps just doesnt cut it. Even if you DONT have a business, 128kbps can be very restricting.
If a friend sends me his birthday pictures in eMail (and he makes LOTS of those), and I get a neat array of 20 mails 2meg each, I EXPECT to be served faster than 128kbps if my pipe allows it. This is one extreme. Another would be that youre subscribed to a few high volume mailinglists (say, securityfocus.*, and a few groups on onelist or egroups)
Who
As for news being low bandwidth -- uhm. Please. They may be high latency and low priority, but theyre not low throughput. Right now Im getting fed news 24/7. If I had more bandwidth, Id still be fed news 24/7. Even if you only subscribe to a few binary groups you can get that much -- let alone a few high volume groups. And no, not only pr0n, although thats why many people get DSL these days
Being a business has nothing to do with the need of bandwidth, though. I could saturate a T3 without being a business if I wanted to. If I pay for 384kbit/sec, I damn well know why I pay for it -- otherwise an ISDN link or even an analog link would just be fine for me.
Re:ought to sue Bell Atlantic too (Score:2)
Re:128kb (Score:2)
Me too!
Sun God, Sun God, Ra! Ra! Ra!
He likes that one.
They're reaching... (Score:3)
Note this is the guaranteed rate from your premesis to the local SWBell CO. There, you get patched onto SWBell's local ATM service, which connects you to the "ISP" part of their business.
It sounds like these people are complaining specifically that they are only getting 128kb/s mail and newsgroup access. They don't complain about web access speed. This definitely would be feasible- SWBell could run newsgroup and mail access over different ATM virtual circuits, which would enable them to easily throttle bandwidth to different services they please.
I doubt they'll win the case- I'm guessing the SBC / SWBell service agreement doesn't make any guarantee about newsgroup or mail access speed. It seems a little nitpicky to me- you'd have to be doing some serious binary newsgroup stuff to have 128kb/s be an issue. Given how much more easily available pron is on the web, I'm not sure there there are many people would notice or care about this.
However, I'm not going to defend SBC's exploitation of vagueness in their terms of service... they need to be up-front about what they're doing. I judge this kind of thing by the "principal of least suprise"- you need to be explicit about things that are contrary to the natural assumptions people are likely to make. Given unspecified service terms, I don't think very many people would assume that newsgroups or e-mail would be bandwidth-limited.
BTW- I was an SBC ADSL customer for a year prior to moving to another city, and frankly I miss it. They were early on their install date (this was 18 months ago) and I was getting consistent 1 Mb/s, right on the fringe of the 12,000 ft ADSL limit. I'm not aware of any outages during the time I used it, and I was hosting a mailing list server on it full-time. I'm now in a neighborhood in Atlanta where my only choices are Northpoint (expensive, lower bandwidth) or Bell South (crappy service). Sigh...
Class action suits (Score:2)
I fired SBC/NBI for non-performance in March (Score:3)
I was the first paying customer of DSL in Northern Nevada. I'm happy with the final-mile portion. Words cannot describe my dissatisfaction with the ISP portion of the service -- I was overpaying at $10/month. Further, when I disconnected from the ISP I got a larger bill from them. I'm taking action, though, as described at the end of this screed.
I didn't wait for the lawsuits to start before I decided to do something about the problem. When several local ISPs got their ATM connections up and running here in Northern Nevada, I switched.
Oh, the complaint list is a long one:
I switch services on March 6, 2000, to an outfit called Pyramid.Net -- and I've been happy with the switch. Things haven't been perfect, but when I call things get fixed. Period.
SBC isn't finished with me yet!I used to be billed $39 for the DSL service and $10 for ISP service. When the total charges went up I took a closer look at my phone bill. There was the DSL charge of $39, which was correct. What wasn't correct was a charge by "Nevada Bell Internet Services" of just under $29.95 for ISP service I wasn't receiving. I never had a dial-up account, yet when I fired NBIS they "converted" my account to a dial-up account...without authorization. I reported the problem in June and again in July. Nevada Bell (the telephone company) says they can't do anything about it because NBIS is a separate company.
Indeed it is a separate company! It isn't listed anywhere -- not in directory service for California, Nevada, or Texas, not in the telephone books, not even on Switchboard.com! I even called the main customer numbers for Pacific Bell (CA) and Nevada Bell (NV) and they had no record of an address or phone number other than the 800 number that I had already unsuccessfully dealt with. When I spent a day tracking down exactly what was going on, I found that all four Internet Service companies in SBC-land are serviced from a single office in San Francisco! And the dispute resolution? That's with Pacific Bell. In San Francisco. California. WHERE I DON'T LIVE.
Now, it's almost the end of August, and the bill dispute is still unresolved.
But that's all right. Because of electrical deregulation here in Nevada, there is a PUCN docket item investigating utility billing and payment practices for all utilities here in the State of Nevada. I am registered on that docket. My input, based on this experience, is simple:any utility that places a charge on a bill needs to be responsible for the charge, have authority to take action on the charge including reversal instantly, and be accountable for the charge. When a charge is disputed, it is removed and the third-party billing company has to deal directly with the customer.
Re:One day this has to be sorted out.. (Score:2)