T-Mobile And MetroPCS Go All In On The Horrible Precedent Of Zero Rating
from the setting-the-stage-for-disaster dept
Last year we noted that for being such a supposedly cool CEO, T-Mobile's John Legere seemed utterly clueless on the subject of net neutrality. Not only did the CEO claim that Title II and new net neutrality rules would "kill innovation" (tip: that didn't happen), he seemed totally oblivious to the bad precedent set by the company's zero rating efforts. Those efforts began with T-Mobile's decision to let some music services bypass user usage caps, which as we've discussed at great length puts smaller companies and non-profits at a distinct disadvantage.But since our regulators (and much of the press and public) seem clueless to the harm of zero rating so far, T-Mobile has decided to expand these efforts. Last week the company started cap-exempting video services, and now the company has announced it's bringing zero rating to the company's prepaid wireless brand (MetroPCS) as well. Now the company's prepaid and postpaid (monthly billed) customers both will find that thirty-three of the biggest music stream services no longer count against their usage caps (yeah, sorry, small independent radio streaming stations too little to get on T-Mobile's whitelisted radar).
As usual, the move was framed as a huge boon to consumers:
“Once again we are setting MetroPCS apart from the rest of the pack in ways that no one else will,” said John Legere, president and CEO of T-Mobile US. “MetroPCS is the #1 brand in prepaid because we keep giving customers more of what they want, and today that means adding Music Unlimited and Data Maximizer to the list! Their data will last longer than ever before without ridiculous penalty fees or trickery!"And like regulators, most of the telecom beat covering T-Mobile has been oblivious to the bad precedent set. They don't quite yet understand that letting a wireless carrier suddenly decide what traffic gets whitelisted from already-arbitrary usage restrictions sets the stage for a total upheaval of how the Internet works now. They also don't understand that if it's ok for T-Mobile to do this, it's ok for a company like AT&T to do something similar -- and AT&T's version is going to be notably worse. The Los Angeles Times, for example, struggles to see where the problem lies:
"Besides, there's nothing in the FCC's neutrality rules that bars data caps, which enable carriers to segment the market and charge higher prices to those who put a higher value on bandwidth. Binge On represents another reduction in the pain caused by data caps, which seems like an unalloyed good thing for consumers."But you're not reducing a "pain point" by creating an arbitrary data cap, then letting some content bypass that cap -- you're just getting in the way of a healthy Internet ecosystem. And just because the FCC lacked the foresight to prohibit zero rating in our net neutrality rules (unlike Chile, Norway, Netherlands, Finland, Iceland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta and Japan, which all bar zero rating), that doesn't mean this isn't a potentially horrible idea that's going to change the face of the Internet. It's very clear that the perils of zero rating are something we're eager to experience first hand here in the States, applauding our own "great fortune" all the way.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: john legere, music unlimited, net neutrality, wireless, zero rating
Companies: metropcs, t-mobile
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
I can't setup my own server to string audio/video to my phone... and have it be cap-exempt. I have even emailed T-mobile to find out what they recommend for people who have collections of music that aren't on itunes or other "approved" streaming sites, and they had no response.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
What if i'm using a VPN? In order for them to zero rate content, they have to know what it is. And your viewing history will sold to multiple big data and ad companies.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Why would *any* totally arbitrary cap be ok?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
So, arguably, it is related to network management.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
It's like a 3rd-party paywall
That would be fine if it were the sites themselves that choose whether to put up the paywall or not, but it's problem when it's somebody else doing so.
The difficulty is that they started off with "Your first few visits are free, but then it's pay-per-view" and then added "you can visit these sites for free" afterwards, so it's not nearly as obvious.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
http://adage.com/article/datadriven-marketing/24-billion-data-business-telcos-discuss/301058/
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Is T-Mobile using the BingeOn and MusicFreedom programs to collect customer listening/watching habits and reselling that information?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Really?
So if it doesn't happen immediately, it will never happen? Is that your contention?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Curing congestion...
Data caps are completely arbitrary, with the sole purpose of bilking every last dollar from customers. As I've said elsewhere, lauding T-Mobile for these moves is like thanking someone for only punching you once. Yeah, he could have punched you twice, but that's not really a good deed.
There's a better way to deal with congestion (fairly) if the telcos actually cared. You just need to throttle the heavier users on towers approaching capacity. Bandwidth not used is wasted. There's no reason to place a cap on data transferred when what you're trying to balance is bandwidth.
T-Mobile already has mechanisms in place to throttle certain users. They just need to make it dynamic in response to current load. When load is light, everyone gets full speed without arbitrary caps. When load approaches capacity, those users who have historically added the most load get throttled down.
Solves congestion, no arbitrary caps, and fairly allocates bandwidth between heavy/light users.
Oh, one other thing. The Binge On program lowers the quality of any zero-rated video. So claiming that it's an improvement for customers is rather disingenuous. It's a trade-off, at best. (And only because customers can opt-out.)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
How is this network neutral?
Just to be fair, we'll set a baseline to overcharge for everything. So we're neutral, see? Oh, but then we'll exempt our "friends". But don't worry, we'll still be "fair". Almost anyone can become our friend for the right amount of money. What could be more fair and neutral that that?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Umm well...
This means there are also privacy implications attached to zero-ratings.
While they might not have to go full DPI yet in this day and age on the internet they still have to do a lot of data-analysis to come up with your monthly bill.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]