I’m an unfortunate captive of the oligopoly of the internet industry in the USA. In many places, you have 2-3 choices of internet, and all of them suck ass. I’m in this situation. All internet providers in my area have a 1-1.5 terabyte data cap. So when I download Call of Duty for 250 gb and it fails and has to update or reinstall, I’ve wasted 500 gb, and have now reached 50% of my data cap in just 1 day. There are crazy fees, for example, Cox Cable says:

If you go over, we’ll automatically add 50 gigabytes of data for $10 to your next bill. That’s enough for about 15 hours of streaming HD video. If you use that 50 gigabytes, we automatically add another 50 gigabytes for $10 and so on until you reach our $100 limit of data overage charges or until your next usage cycle begins.

So your $90 a month internet can easily become $190 a month, which is fuckin criminal, like that is so scummy and asinine how that can even be legal. But it is perfectly legal. The FCC is also looking into these data caps but now that we have a new anti-federal government president elect… This is probably toast… Nothing will change now that most federal agencies are about to be deleted.

From a technology standpoint too, nothing is really getting better

Comcast is still using Coax instead of Fiber Optic and desperately trying to convince people that somehow, someway coax can be just as good. Do with that info what you will, I have no opinions on it. There was a Federal program started recently to expand rural internet access, which will probably be gutted in 2025 leaving many without suitable internet again. Fiber Optic is fast, but still, not new technology, and doesn’t solve a critical issue… It doesn’t matter if you have 2 Gigabit internet if no one in the world is uploading even half that fast. A single download on Steam is like 450 Mbps, Epic Games launcher is horrifically slow. I get like 120 Mbps max when downloading Fortnite updates even with 1500 Mbps internet hard wired to my router with top tier hardware

It’s just sad to think about the future of internet in the USA, and knowing we’ll be imprisoned by these data caps for the foreseeable future.

  • object [Object]@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    23·
    6 days ago

    1.5Tb data cap, jeez. I regularly push 6tb of monthly traffic by myself. This feels like mobile internet all over again, but now with wired…

  • ohlaph@lemmy.worldEnglish
    43·
    7 days ago

    No, once the FTC is gutted, the isps will resume their stronghold. Data caps, overages, slower speeds, etc.

  • zephorah@lemm.eeEnglish
    22·
    7 days ago

    No. And I’m sorry to say, this administration is coming for social media as well. I hate watching the orange potato talk, and I dislike the individual who posted this, but unless you want to sit through a double long “reaction” vid by a youtuber who makes their living “reacting”, this is the shortest one.

    He wants to gut moderation and make it so it requires a court order to remove any account from social media. There’s a lot to unpack here. It’s a scripted speech, illustrating the thinkers behind his administration this go. It talks about 1A, says everything in the speech is for 1A, including dumping the Hatch Act (keeps us safe at polling sites and makes buying votes illegal), but you should really listen to what he says about moderation of social media.

    To me, it reads as a way of removing any anti-establishment, anti-MAGA spaces to talk without actually removing the spaces.

    Echo chambering helps no one folks, I hate hearing him speak too, but you need to hear this one. https://youtu.be/xJfUXVOoFBo?si=pqphBah-_0YwW11V

  • Treczoks@lemmy.worldEnglish
    14·
    6 days ago

    They probably kill off any agency who would protect your consumer rights, anyway. And redefine “broadband” as “you’ve got modem access, so stop whining”. And let the companies keep the subsidies they got for making the former broadband definition happen.

    • TwitchingCheese@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      6 days ago

      Based on Ajit Pai last time, there will be a significant rollback on consumer rights and protections. You can bet Starlink will get greenlit for anything they want though.

  • TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyzEnglish
    12·
    6 days ago

    Things are getting better. A new fiber-only network provider is expanding across my region so I got it installed a few months ago. No data caps, 500 Mbps up+down for $50/month.

    • Jolteon@lemmy.zipEnglish
      10·
      6 days ago

      Speaking of fiber and things that are not fiber, asymmetric connections are one of the most predatory internet practices in existence, only a small distance behind data caps. Oh, you want our super expensive 1gbps plan? How about 3mbps upload?

      • Hackworth@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        6 days ago

        There used to be very real hardware reasons that upload had much lower bandwidth. I have no idea if there still are.

        • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          4·
          6 days ago

          Probably because they don’t need to as we are used to it and also more bandwidth to multiplex for other residens/clients to offer.

  • AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.worldEnglish
    19·
    7 days ago

    It’s totally possible! I live in CO and Comcast had a legal monopoly per state law. Nobody else is allowed to compete with their cable service. But you know what isn’t cable? Fiber! A local broadband company just installed fiber in my neighborhood this spring. I signed up for $89/mo gigabit service, no data cap, no installation fees at all. Between when I signed up and when they turned on service, they upgraded my service to 1.2 gigabit, same monthly price, no cap, no commitment, no upsell (their only other service is rural satellite Internet).

    I talked to the technician installing it and he said they aren’t getting any subsidies from anyone. Not the city, state, or fed. It’s simply economically viable to run new gigabit fiber for $89/mo. All it takes is a company that can make the initial infrastructure investment.

  • dan@upvote.auEnglish
    11·
    6 days ago

    Comcast is still using Coax instead of Fiber Optic and desperately trying to convince people that somehow, someway coax can be just as good.

    Comcast are starting to offer 2Gbps symmetric (same speed up and down) via DOCSIS 4.0 in some areas.

    • blakemiller@lemmy.worldEnglish
      11·
      6 days ago

      Yep. It’s pretty nuts how much they can push over copper. And remember that just having a coax cable at your house doesn’t mean it’s copper the whole way back to the ISP.

      • dan@upvote.auEnglish
        5·
        6 days ago

        You’re right - upstream connections are usually fiber. In fact there’s a name for this type of network: HFC (hybrid fiber + coax)

      • dan@upvote.auEnglish
        2·
        6 days ago

        The 2Gbps symmetric though Comcast is still cable. In theory, DOCSIS 4.0 supports up to 10Gbps down and 6Gbps up over cable, although real-world speeds are always lower than theoretical speeds.

        You share bandwidth with your neighbours regardless of whether it’s coax or fiber. A common contention ratio for residential connections is between 40:1 and 50:1, meaning the bandwidth is shared between 40 and 50 people (i.e. 1Gbps of upstream bandwidth per 40-50 people with a 1Gbps connection). This is usually fine as it’s very unlikely that every customer will be using the full bandwidth at the same time. Residential usage is usually very spiky with only brief periods of high speed usage.

          • dan@upvote.auEnglish
            1·
            6 days ago

            The bandwidth is still shared… It’d be prohibitively expensive to have dedicated bandwidth just for your connection, and most customers don’t need anywhere near that. Unlimited, dedicated 1Gbps is around 320TB of data per month.

            A business-grade connection has fewer people sharing it, but it’s still shared. The only fully-dedicated connections are enterprise-grade connections (like in a data center), and even then it’s an upgrade that costs quite a bit. :)

            • Valmond@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              6 days ago

              Well it isn’t shared before the upstream server, that’s what FTTH is.

              I’m seriosly interested in information supporting your claims, not because they are wrong (of course we share at a certain level, that’s the whole idea of the internet itself is) but because they are quite vague.

              BTW for 40€ I get 10Gb/s symmetrical. I’m not in the US.

              • dan@upvote.auEnglish
                1·
                6 days ago

                Well it isn’t shared before the upstream server, that’s what FTTH is.

                FTTH just means that there’s fiber going into your house.

                Most residential fiber internet connections use a technology called PON (GPON for gigabit or XGS-PON for 10Gbps). My understanding is that the fiber from your house goes into a splitter box in the street, which takes fiber connections from many customers (usually either 32 or 64 customers) and multiplexes them into a single fiber by either using different wavelengths of light or by time multiplexing. Upstream from this, bandwidth is shared.

                • Valmond@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  1·
                  6 days ago

                  Upstream from this is the internet, so it’s no longer shared (it goes wherever it wants to and it is the servers that are “shared” by users). So there might be a bottleneck in the “splitter box” but that’s it.

  • Zetta@mander.xyzEnglish
    8·
    6 days ago

    I feel your pain, I was stuck with Cox for many years and was paying $170 a month for one gig down, 30 megs up. Unlimited data. But the unlimited data was a lie because they called and threatened me once because I was uploading too much, apparently uploading doesn’t count for the unlimited data. Stupid assholes.

    I was fortunate enough to move recently to a house that actually had fiber. My fiber provider just raised the price of their lowest plan, which is the one I’m on, 500 Mbps symmetrical for $65 a month. It used to be $50 a month. However, they lowered the price of all their faster plans. If I wanted, I could get 8 gigs symmetrical for $150 a month. That’s less than I was paying for Cox just a year ago for 1 gig fake unlimited.

    At my current provider, all their plans are truly unlimited, even the lowest tier one like the one I’m on.

      • Zetta@mander.xyzEnglish
        1·
        6 days ago

        Ya their top tier plan was $150 for 1 Gig down 30 Mbps up, 1.25 TB data cap. You could pay an extra $20 a month for"unlimited " but they only allowed you to pay for “unlimited” on their top speed plan. Like I said their unlimited was also a straight up lie.

        To be fair at that house I had roomates so we were all splitting it 4 ways.

  • CheeseNoodle@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    6 days ago

    “I get like 120 Mbps max” Literally 5-10x faster than most internet in the UK, no datacaps here though.