[ga] Re: [ PFIR ] Google Phone "Heavy" Data Users May be Throttled

["Jeffrey A. Williams" <jwkckid1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Lauren et., al.,

  I am not at all surprised that some carriers/cell providers, such
as my company are desiring to Throttle Google's new HTC G1
when AT&T has it's own product along with Apples Extraneous
non displayable data generated as a result of HTC G1 per transmission
may be one of the many reasons.  Another is likely related to peering
agreements/contracts as well as the host of security and privacy
related problems that have become a ever increasing concern to
multiple carriers post FISA compromise bill passage into now
present law, and the fact that Google's once secret agreement to
share personally and private information with USDOJ without a
warrant for same or even the prior knowledge of the person
or persons to which said data originated from or was received
by, and as such making Google's HTC G1 a less than viable
or usable tool for IT professionals and many non professional
users, which is adding Google's growing reputation of being
far less than "User Friendly", despite their marketing jargon to
the contrary.

  So perhaps a redesign of HTC G1, a serious revision of Google's
TOS'es, and a much greater interest in the "Greater Good" and
"User Friendly" policy by which individual Google users can feel
secure that their PII information isn't spread all over the place without
their expressed and written permission in advance.  However to date,
Google has not seen fit to respect users privacy to the extent that
the law provides, and/or IT security professionals are willing to
consider reasonable, as well as in stark violation of UN privacy
provisions accordingly.

pfir@xxxxxxxx wrote:

>                 Google Phone "Heavy" Data Users May be Throttled
>
>                    http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000433.html
>
> Greetings.  With today's official announcement of the HTC G1
> smartphone running Google's long-awaited Android OS -- sure to
> inspire significant data usage by many adopters -- a particular
> section in the fine print of T-Mobile's 3G data information page
> ( http://www.t-mobileg1.com/3G.aspx ) was brought to my attention by
> several alert observers.  To wit:
>
>    "If your total data usage in any billing cycle is more than 1GB,
>     your data throughput for the remainder of that cycle may be reduced
>     to 50 kbps or less. Your data session, plan, or service may be
>     suspended, terminated, or restricted for significant roaming or if
>     you use your service in a way that interferes with our network or
>     ability to provide quality service to other users."
>
> I'm actually rather disinclined to pass judgment on this policy just
> yet.  Given the special characteristics and limitations of cellular
> data networks that are certainly different from non-wireless
> systems, true "data hogs" on the former can be a genuine problem.
>
> However, there are a couple of concerns.  First, a powerful phone
> like the G1 is, as I suggested above, going to encourage data usage
> to an extent not usually seen for other phones in standalone usage.
> The wide open Google Android development and applications
> distribution environments are likely to encourage a vast range of
> attractive data-hungry programs for the G1 -- perhaps far exceeding
> those of Apple's relatively closed-environment iPhone.
>
> This means that reaching 1 GB of data in a month might not be a
> particularly difficult feat with the G1 (or later Android phones
> that will appear).  We're talking about a bit more than 30 MB per
> day data usage -- and that's just not the same sort of "big" number
> that it used to be.  If data throttling kicks in, you're likely to
> really notice the drop from 3G speeds down to 50 Kbps or less
> (hmm -- just how much less? Inquiring minds want to know ...)
>
> I must admit that I'm certainly interested in putting a G1 Android
> phone through its paces and reporting the results, though I'm not
> prepared at this point to jump over to a 2-year T-Mobile contract
> for the privilege.  I continue to wonder how much longer T-Mobile
> will continue without an attempt made to merge it with one of the
> other U.S. wireless carriers, and some of possibilities in that
> regard are rather depressing.
>
> G1 manufacturer HTC builds great phones.  My Cingular 8125 (HTC
> Wizard) has provided excellent service for several years within its
> design capabilities, but there's no way getting around that fact
> that its getting rather long in the tooth, and going out for lunch
> waiting for MS WM5 to boot does get a bit boring after a while.
>
> So I freely admit that if an unlocked G1 Android suddenly appeared
> here, the SIM card in my Wizard would fly into the G1 faster than
> you can say PageRank.  I won't hold my breath for this to transpire,
> however.
>
> We could potentially be heading for the bizarre and unfortunate
> situation, in both the cellular wireless and wired Internet
> environments, where uber-powerful consumer devices of various sorts
> may routinely outstrip the capabilities of commonly used Internet
> access facilities (and/or easily run afoul of ISP terms-of-service
> agreements).
>
> Such circumstances would certainly not be expected to inspire
> consumer confidence nor enthusiasm, to be sure.
>
> --Lauren--
> Lauren Weinstein
> lauren@xxxxxxxxxx or lauren@xxxxxxxx
> Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
> http://www.pfir.org/lauren
> Co-Founder, PFIR
>    - People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
> Co-Founder, NNSquad
>    - Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
> Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
> Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
> Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
>
> _______________________________________________
> pfir mailing list
> http://lists.pfir.org/mailman/listinfo/pfir

Regards,

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