Well, most (but not all) Comcast customers knew it was coming: notification of Comcast’s new bandwidth restriction policy. I got my email notification late last week and while I understood the technical aspect of the email I questioned whether the same could be said for the average Comcast customer.

What does the official email from Comcast say?

Tech savvy readers, take a moment and forget all that you know about computers and read the official Comcast policy change email as if you were an average computer user:

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.

Upon first glance the email doesn’t seem too bad. The average Comcast broadband customer probably reads the email and quickly assumes they have nothing to fear; however, regardless of technical expertise any reader can quickly spot the “smoke and mirror” tactics litter throughout this email if they just take a closer look.

Comcast tries to calm fears with statistics

Going through the letter from top to bottom the first thing you’ll notice is Comcast’s attempt to brush the new policy under the rug with the claim that a “fraction of 1% use a disproportionate amount of bandwidth.” With odds like those, I must be safe. Right?

For the time being the average Comcast customer probably won’t be affected by this new limit, but it’s hard to say if that cap will be enough as customers add more computers and other bandwidth consuming devices to their home network. While the statistic is meant to make the customer believe the change won’t affect them, the statistic probably makes most customers (tech savvy or not) ask the obvious question:

“If a disproportionate amount of bandwidth is consumed by a fraction of 1% of Comcast’s customers, then why doesn’t Comcast deal directly with those customers? Why is everyone being restricted for a problem caused by a fraction of 1%?”

Short answer, this new policy has nothing to do with bandwidth consumption (more about this answer later in the article).

Comcast defines what 250 GB of bandwidth means in terms that don’t apply to everyone

Moving further down the letter we see Comcast take a stab at defining in “real world terms” what it take to consume 250 GB of bandwidth? According to Comcast it’s any one of the following:

• 50 million emails sent (what about emails received?)
• Downloading 62,500 4 MB songs (everyone downloads their music — right?)
• Downloading 125 standard definition movies at 2 GB per movie (nothing like stifling competition from services such as Netflix and Amazon Unbox)

Any reader quicky notices the one most important statistic is missing:

“How many web pages can someone view with 250 GB of bandwidth per month?”

While I don’t believe a 250 GB cap doesn’t pose a problem for general web surfing, the average Comcast customer wants to see what 250 GB means in relation to what the probably do the most: view web pages. The typical customer probably doesn’t send 50 million emails, doesn’t download music (their kids do), and they still rent movies from Blockbuster. Again, Comcast misdirects the reader with statistics that don’t necessarily apply to their daily usage. Technically astute or not, anyone can see the “smoke and mirrors” in this section of the email.

It’s not about what Comcast says but what they don’t say?

Probably the most concerning thing about this email notification is what isn’t included. The email fails to provide any guidance on how to measure or monitor monthly usage, and when you read the Comcast FAQs you quickly find Comcast has no solution. They claim they are working on a solution but in the meantime suggest using their free version of McAfee as a means to monitor usage. Again, it’s “smoke and mirror” time. McAfee isn’t an option for someone that uses a different security suite so those customers are out of luck until Comcast creates their own solution. Of course in an attempt to appear “customer focused” Comcast has this advice for monitoring usage:

“There are many online tools customers can download and use to measure their consumption. Customers can find such tools by simply doing a Web search.”

Bottom line, Comcast knows that if they don’t finish their version of a bandwidth monitoring tool by October 1, 2008, customer lawsuits will follow.

3 Things the average Comcast customer should know about the new bandwidth policy

The average Comcast customer might not understand exactly what this new policy means, but misdirection litter throughout the email is clear. So what should the average take away from the Comcast email?

• The cap kills competition. Aside from broadband Internet access Comcast also offers cable television and phone service. In terms of cable television Comcast is starting to see competition emerge from the growing popularity of YouTube, IP telelvision sites, and “a la carte” television viewing and downloads from the major networks web sites, iTunes, and Amazon Unboxed. As for phone service Comcast’s offering is in direct competition with services such as Vonage that use a customer’s Internet connection to place local and long distance phone calls. Simply put, and this addresses the question of why not directly with disproportionate bandwidth consumers, the Comcast bandwidth cap is a competition killer.
• The cap also kills innovation. “Cloud computing” is a term that refers to variety of computer services that use the Internet as a central storage location for various applications. Online data backup services such as Carbonite and Jungle Disk allow customers to backup their data to a safe and secure location in the Internet “cloud.” Offerings such as Google Docs allow people to store documents on Google servers and access them from anywhere they have a connection to the Internet (a.k.a the cloud). Advancement for services that use the Internet as a hub for storage critical to the application will slow down as customers start to think about how these applications will impact their bandwidth consumption.
• Usage caps are a dying business model. Putting a cap on usage is like taking a step back in time. AOL used to charge customers by the hour. They don’t do that anymore. Cell phone carriers still charge by the minute but all 3 of the major cell providers now offer unlimited usage plans. Customers don’t like services that restrict how long or how much they can use something. The bandwidth cap is step down the wrong road for Comcast.

I have to admit, I was a happy Comcast customer. My Internet connection was quick and reliable. When Verizon Fios became available, I thought about switching but decided to stay with Comcast because I was happy with my service. Happy no longer, it’s time to start shopping around.

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