A Solution For Comcast’s Network Capacity Problems

Richard Bennett from The Register recently published an article that stated,

It’s acceptable for Comcast, as a matter of reasonable network management, to employ TCP Resets to prevent BitTorrent doing harm to the web browsing, standard file downloading, and VoIP sessions that are the typical behavior of the Comcast customer

Ernesto from TorretFreak responded with, “this is of course a non argument.” How right he is.

Comcast customers using BitTorrent technology are not to blame, nor are they the ones causing problems. The idea of, “we’ll do what’s necessary to provide quality service to our customers” shouldn’t involve terminating downloads by spoofing packets. That in itself is crossing ethical boundaries.

The problem stems from false poor marketing tactics. Why advertise unlimited Internet usage and then go back on your claim? Infrastructure engineers obviously didn’t anticipate people using their services to the maximum capability. Not everyone checks their email, myspace, looks at porn, and signs off. How could Comcast honestly believe that people wouldn’t take advantage of what they thought they were buying? Could you imagine a cell phone company offering a package of unlimited minutes, then just terminating your phone calls because you’ve exceeded some mysterious limit?

Instead of really tackling the problem by upgrading network load capacity, Comcast continues depriving customers of the services they advertise. As nations outside of the US are upgrading their Internet delivery capabilities, Comcast is ruining their already depressing service. Japan offers 50 megabit dedicated connections to the majority of their residents, while the U.S. is stuck with measly 8 megabit connections that sometimes work.

Here’s a potential temporary solution. Offer a discounted service for your not so savvy customers that only check email, look at yahoo, surf the Interwebs, etc. “$19.99 a month for X amount of bandwidth - this lets you blah blah, blah blah, and blah! Sign up today!” Then leave your current “unlimited” packages available for the big boys that actually use the Internet for what it’s designed for.

Comcast - stop bullshitting and get with the program. The United States is falling behind in yet another area thanks to you. Stop being cheap assess and upgrade your network’s capacity. Foreign countries are dominating the US when it comes to not only economics, but now bandwidth.