Is Vonage "Stealing Bandwidth"?

Posts: 91 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Mar 08, 2005 Posts: 91

Two recent incidents with Time-Warner indicate the mantra they tell too their customers.

One door-to-door salesman kept on pumping up their $39 unlimited plan, and was dissing Vonage. I asked him to leave as he characterized Vonage as a bunch of leeches, stealing bandwidth.

I thought that was an uninformed sales rep spouting off until yesterday. A tech came, and found the problem, crimped wires (right).

When I thought the problem was the surfboard 4100, he said that it was the latest and best. I caught him in the lie, by saying that it was not doxsis 2.2 compatible

Then he went on to tell me how Conage crimps on the TW bandwidth, but their telephone service would not.

Now, I have established a pattern that TW tells their people to tell to unsuspectting, and non-technical customers. I wander if other cable companies tell similar lies.

Posts: 1424 · Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2006 10:30 am Post subject:

Stealing requires that bandwidth was used without your permission. Leeching is a closer description as it more closely describes the parasitic relationship between Vonage and your ISP, however unless you have a low bandwidth broadband connection then Vonage does not consume all of it as is implied by leeching. Utilizes is the most appropriate term. The cable company doesn't like that you found a use for your Internet connection, they would really prefer if it remained idle. However, cable systems typically do not use your Internet connection for their voice products and so they can make a distinction between themselves and Vonage on this point.

Skimping on bandwidth? That depends on your point of view. How much bandwidth is required for acceptable voice quality. Vonage could use more, as cable companies do, but I for one have voice quality that is as good or better than most analog lines.

Your rebuttal to these arguments should not be that they are lies, even if they are half truths. Instead focus on the services and features that Vonage offers and the better price for what you consider equivalent service.

Posts: 91 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Mar 08, 2005 Posts: 91

Quote:

Your rebuttal to these arguments should not be that they are lies, even if they are half truths. Instead focus on the services and features that Vonage offers and the better price for what you consider equivalent service.

That was what made him stutter. I told him that since 2003, my highest bill was $33. (I have the $14.99 basic plan) That is due to heavy 866 calls,and heavy calling to England.

He tried to "top" that, and I countered with email notification of messages, and being able to play them on my computer.

BTW, I am nice, (mostly) unless someone is insisting on telling me things I know is not true. Then I do not argue with them, but call their supervisor.

Posts: 2257 · Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2006 10:52 am Post subject:

A couple of minor technical points:

1. There is no such thing as "doxsis 2.2" The standard is "DOCSIS" and the latest revision I know of is 2.0. This is not meant as a criticism, just as a correction for future conversations.

In fact, if you ask someone if their modem is "DOCSIS 4.0 compliant" and they instantly say "yes" rather than "what in tarnation are you talking about?" or "ummm. let me check", that's a good way to test them for honesty.

2. You are absolutely correct that the SurfBoard 4100 is not the "latest and greatest", in fact it's rather old. Of course, I am using a Linksys BEFCMU10 hardware version 2.0, which is only DOCSIS 1.0 compliant, and it works wonderfully with Vonage.

Now, as to "stealing" bandwidth.

I am a customer of my local cable company. They offer me unmetered service, with caps on available bandwidth, at a fixed price per month. I am allowed 256k upstream and 3,000k downstream, which I have measured at 190k up and ~2400k down.

The terms of service say that I may not:
- Run publically accessible servers like web servers.
- Do anything illegal.
- Alter or hack my equipment to take more bandwidth than I am paying for.

I am doing nothing to increase those numbers, as that would be a violation of my Terms of Service. However, within those numbers I am running a fairly sophisticated router/firewall with QoS that makes sure that I am using at least 90% of that upstream 24/7. I use it for VoIP, BitTorrent, and of course email, FTP, and web surfing. All of the files I access over BitTorrent are legal files, no MP3 or movies.

Vonage is not a publically accessible server. It is not illegal. And I am using it inside my capped bandwidth allocation.

So, my use of Vonage is not, in any way, "stealing" bandwidth. It is using bandwidth which I have a legitimate agreement to use, and have purchased.

Should my cable company deccide to meter my usage, then I would be paying for any bandwidth Vonage consumed. Again, not "stealing", though it would start costing me some serious coin. Or, more likely, I'd stop using BitTorrent, switch back to a POTS phone line, and expect a MUCH lower bill from my cable company or contact the PUC about the one-sided change of terms from a local monopoly.