This is what happens when you have a monopoly like Comcast does. You get to screw up NBC News television by making MSNBC a conservative wasteland in the image of Fox News, and you get to gouge your customers for going over the data cap in certain markets.
It’s a slippery slope. As Comcast goes, so will Verizon and AT&T and the rest of them. Wait and see.
Get ready for your home Internet to feel like your smartphone — bound by data caps, a large overage fee waiting to happen. Comcast gave some users the bad news Thursday. Consumers who exceed 300 GB in a month will have to pay for overages at $10 per 50 GB tier.
Not surprisingly, they have the option to pay an extra $30 to get the service they have currently, without caps.
Internet service providers like Comcast have been chomping at the bit to change their business model and charge consumers by the bit the way wireless providers do. Comcast’s initial allowance seems generous — some notes sent to users say it’s unlikely they will hit the cap based on their prior usage — but it’s easy to imagine that’s temporary. The Internet keeps birthing high-bandwidth applications like streaming HD video. Users may ultimately run into these caps. And there’s nothing to prevent Comcast from lowering the limit going forward.
[ahem] FUCK COMCAST.