Using my Slingbox and streaming other content to myself at work, and remotely controlling my home computer. All three of these will use more data. The remote desktop will likely be negligible, but streaming to myself will now use 2.5 times more.
The tradeoff for me is that the quality/experience will be improved by the same amount, which I'm obviously in favour of, but it will definitely eat up more.
I understand the other side of the argument, however. Just because my Netflix movie will be fully buffered to full HD in the middle of the opening credits and not the end of the credits, I'm not suddenly going to be able to watch more movies than I did previously. Not today, anyway. But the move to internet-delivered media isn't going to suddenly halt, which is why traditional businesses like cable TV and broadcasting are worried. Again, not today, but they see the writing on the wall.
My skepticism comes from the fact that Shaw was making the UBB argument that their network couldn't cope with all of this new traffic and that it was necessary to keep the current level of service. UBB is a revenue generator for shareholders and a protector of Shaw's other businesses, full stop. Network congestion gets solved by building a bigger and better network, not by financially discouraging its use. The entire concept of UBB only exists because the market is protected from competition, which is why neutering (or attempting, at least) the independent ISPs was the first step taken by the big players so that consumers wouldn't have a viable option to move to.
|