Award Winning Blog

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

TMobile’s 480p Video Delivery Gambit: Tiering, or Throttling?

Predictably, and perhaps appropriately, broadband carriers are spending sleepless afternoons crafting new ways to diversify service without violating the FCC’s Open Internet Order restrictions on traffic blocking, throttling and paid prioritization.

TMobile has opted to give with one hand and somewhat furtively take with the other.  The carrier will offer “unlimited” data, subject to quality of service limitations, including delivery of video at 480 p regardless of what format it received from an upstream content provider or distributor. See, e.g., http://variety.com/2016/digital/news/t-mobile-unlimited-data-plan-video-caps-1201840422/.  TMobile will retain a higher screen resolution provided a subscriber pays a $25 upcharge.

Is TMobile throttling service by deliberately downgrading quality, or is the carrier simply using screen resolution as a tiering option and proxy for bit transmission speed? 

Bear in mind that many wireless carriers have offered “unlimited” data, subject to throttling to 2G or 3G speeds after a subscriber exceeds a stated allowance.  Perhaps a carrier does not throttle if it does so on a nondiscriminatory basis.  The carrier does not single out traffic from a specific content provider or carrier.  Every content source faces service degradation if the subscriber exceeds a still enforceable cap.

So one person’s tiering may be another’s throttling and the FCC places itself in the middle as an awkward judge, jury executioner. 

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