Comcast to Create "Excessive Use" Bandwith Limit

An Official Announcement by Comcast;

Dear Comcast High-Speed Internet Customer,

We appreciate your business and strive to provide you with the best online experience possible. One of the ways we do this is through our Acceptable Use Policy (AUP). The AUP outlines acceptable use of our service as well as steps we take to protect our customers from things that can negatively impact their experience online. This policy has been in place for many years and we update it periodically to keep it current with our customers' use of our service.

On October 1, 2008, we will post an updated AUP that will go into effect at that time.

In the updated AUP, we clarify that monthly data (or bandwidth) usage of more than 250 Gigabytes (GB) is the specific threshold that defines excessive use of our service. We have an excessive use policy because a fraction of one percent of our customers use such a disproportionate amount of bandwidth every month that they may degrade the online experience of other customers.

250 GB/month is an extremely large amount of bandwidth and it's very likely that your monthly data usage doesn't even come close to that amount. In fact, the threshold is approximately 100 times greater than the typical or median residential customer usage, which is 2 to 3 GB/month. To put it in perspective, to reach 250 GB of data usage in one month a customer would have to do any one of the following:

* Send more than 50 million plain text emails (at 5 KB/email);
* Download 62,500 songs (at 4 MB/song); or
* Download 125 standard definition movies (at 2 GB/movie).

And online gamers should know that even the heaviest multi- or single-player gaming activity would not typically come close to this threshold over the course of a month.

In addition to modifying the excessive use policy, the updated AUP contains other clarifications of terms concerning reporting violations, newsgroups, and network management. To read some helpful FAQs, please visit http://help.comcast.net/content/faq/Frequently-Asked-Questions-about-Excessive-Use.

Thank you again for choosing Comcast as your high-speed Internet provider.

If you don't have the patience to read all that, just know that Comcast will soon be capping service at 250 gb of bandwidth a month.

As they try to make clear, this is not to mess with the average customer. This is the mess with the "fraction of one percent of our customers [who] use such a disproportionate amount of bandwidth."

In other words, heavy torrent users.

Curse You Verizon Wireless, Foiled Again!

As none of you know, I recently got a cell phone. And as even less of you would know, it's on the Verizon Wireless network.

No, I will not post my phone number on the internet like a total idiot.

Anyways, I thought I could get a custom ringtone onto my phone, thus circumventing the need to pay money to Verizon to get a crappy non-obscure ringtone.

Apparently Verizon was to have the last laugh on this one.

So it would seem that while you can download "sounds" and "music" to your SD card, you cannot download "Ringtones."

Quite frankly, I don't see the different between "Sounds," "Music," and "Ringtones." But Verizon Wireless sees it.

So now I'm probably going to have to settle with buying some sort of ringtone.

Then again, Standard Ringtone 6 isn't all that bad...

It Happens Again!

So I log on to Google Analytics, thinking that I'll see just another number between 20 and 30.



Nope. 466 visits. Yes, I was floored.

This is only rivaled with that one time I got 50 or so visits that one time. It was exciting then. Same now.

Now, I just have to figure out what did it...

Spore Wins, Just Not How you Thought

Spore has been pegged as a massive failure ever since its release.

However, this little review on Sparknotes proves a point; that the common man will find Spore to be a fun game.

So who knows.

Firefox Unleashes "Private Browsing Mode"; But Google's Chrome Already Beat it

I found an announcement dated for today that Firefox is adding a private browsing feature.

Coincedentially, I'm sure, Google's browser Chrome was unleashed in beta a while ago and has a private mode too.

As far as I know, Internet Explorer does not have such a mode. But since I've switched to Chrome for most normal browsing, that's not really an issue.

Link Chain;
Monkey Bites -> Me

A Word we Need

From Futility Closet;

Mamihlapinatapais, from the Yaghan language of Tierra del Fuego, is considered the world's most succinct word — and the hardest to translate.

It means "a look shared by two people, each wishing that the other will initiate something that both desire but that neither one wants to start."

You might laugh at sheer nuance of the word, but it happens.

That's why we need a word for it in English. That way, when it happens we can mention the word, and we'd both laugh, and everything would be okay.

Initial Impression of Google Chrome

To start off, Google's new browserChrome is doing alright. I really like the look of the browser. So far, whole it's bear bones, it's getting the job done.

...Until I open something with flash. I tried opening Pandora Internet Radio, and Chrome spectacularly crashes. I tried it again, and another horrible crash.

But, on the bright side, it did figure out that Chrome closed unintentionally and offered to direct me back to Pandora.

Additionally, Chrome hates flash games.

As I'm coming from an Internet Explorer background, which handles flash very well, this is a giant disappointment. That's the thing that keeps me from using Chrome full time.

For now, I think I'll try using Internet Explorer for Pandora, and Chrome for everything non-flash.

Sheep Everywhere Win a Battle as "Domestic Sheep" is the Wikipedia Article of the Day

As few of you know, one of my favorite animals is the common sheep. So that's why I'm excited that today's Wikipedia article of the day is sheep.

My Thoughts on the PC Gamer's Bill of Rights

So if you haven't heard by now, those crazy folks up there at Stardock and Gas Powered games came up with a PC gamer's bill of rights.

1. Gamers shall have the right to return games that don't work with their computers for a full refund.


2. Gamers shall have the right to demand that games be released in a finished state.


3. Gamers shall have the right to expect meaningful updates after a game's release.


4. Gamers shall have the right to demand that download managers and updaters not force themselves to run or be forced to load in order to play a game.


5. Gamers shall have the right to expect that the minimum requirements for a game will mean that the game will adequately play on that computer.


6. Gamers shall have the right to expect that games won't install hidden drivers or other potentially harmful software without their express consent.


7. Gamers shall have the right to re-download the latest versions of the games they own at any time.


8. Gamers shall have the right to not be treated as potential criminals by developers or publishers.


9. Gamers shall have the right to demand that a single-player game not force them to be connected to the Internet every time they wish to play.


10. Gamers shall have the right that games which are installed to the hard drive shall not require a CD/DVD to remain in the drive to play.

Now, as a gesture, I can appreciate this. However, it's lacking the necessary details to make this immediately applicable.

Additionally, some of these list items sound more like demands than an actual bill of rights. Notably, 1 and 3.

The first one, the return for a refund one, sounds a little harsh. Granted, it's never fun to buy a game and realize it doesn't work. However, does that really need to be prevented by offering a refund? Why not just make a free program that will test to see if the game will run?

The third one, the meaningful update one, also gets me. So long as the game works, why should the consumer be entitled to more content? Making that content also distracts from other potential games or sequels that the company might be making. The consumer knew what they were getting when they bought the game, right?

Well, maybe that didn't. Having looked at the backs of many PC games, they're all somewhat misleading as to how much fun you'll have while playing the game. Perhaps instead of the demand for more content, the consumer should be protected against false advertising?

The fifth one, the minimum system requirements one, could be modified. It could require companies to post the absolute minimum to run the program, like they've been doing, along with the so called for adequate requirements. That way, there's no loss of important information, and one no longer has to guess whether it's a minimum or a suggested.

Again, while I appreciate the gesture of this, I think it needs a lot more refinement before it's finalized.

Link Chain;
Edge Online -> CRAVE -> Me