Seems reasonable. I don't think many people really need more than 250gig per month do they? Even doing music services, p2p, and watching a lot of online video shouldn't get the number that high.

But maybe it's a play for the future... as usage and capacity rises, I suspect that the cap will rise more slowly, meaning that they have built in a future way to start charging more, even for reasonable usage. In the future, with things like streaming HD, and constant use, I suspect 300gig will seem like nothing. But we might find that the cap still brings extra fees.

All comes down to intent. Are they trying to set it up for a future sneak soaking of customers like the way mobile service providers try to nickle and dime you to death with semi-hidden fees, or are they genuinely trying to find a reasonable way to cap usage?

But if they were trying to make it reasonable, wouldn't the extra usage fee be more in line with the original cost. E.g. a customer paying $50/mo for 250gig is at a rate of $2 for 10gig. At 100gig/mo, it's still only $5 for 10gig. They are charging overage at the rates people pay who are only using 50gig per month.

Okay, I take it back. Maybe that's not so unreasonable after all... for the time being. But I'm still suspicious. Sometimes you have to make something unreasonable possible by presenting it first in a very reasonable and palatable form. Then there is very little resistance when you tweak it to be onerous in the future.

What we need is competition to keep things in line...

I think this is a play for video on demand. Just as Verizon and AT&T do not want users to run Shoppe over their system Comcast does not want users to run applets or the videos - including pirated ones - over thiers, rather than buy the video from Comcast. If this goes ahead, then congumers need to have Comcast end alI the other cable companies Treated like phone Company utilities, with the right to have other service companies use the monopoly cables.

Paul