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irotsoma ,
@irotsoma@lemmy.world avatar

Laptops have large screens and windows software isn't designed to be data efficient. Unlimited data doesn't mean at full speed infinitely. They sell way more than they can support otherwise it would be impossible to support more than a few users at one time on a cell tower.

stembolts ,

"They sell more than they can support"

At that point is where mine and your opinion diverge. In what sustainable business does one sell more of anything than they can maintain responsibility over?

Of course, there are many examples, but why?

Greed is why. Don't sell something you cannot sustain, or you have misled your customer.

I hope the user finds a way around this and burns all of the data they rightfully purchased. Plan says unlimited. Rename the plan if its a lie.

Finally, and not directed at the user to which I am replying, what concerns me the most is that this quote I took from your post would be glossed over by most because it is what we've come to expect from fucky corps. We don't have to take it, change your expectations, question the system.

SaltySalamander ,
@SaltySalamander@fedia.io avatar

At that point is where mine and your opinion diverge. In what sustainable business does one sell more of anything than they can maintain responsibility over?

What they're talking about is the mobile provider overselling service. Because they know that for the vast majority of the time, everyone isn't going to be demanding huge amounts of bandwidth all at the same time. Cable/GPON fiber ISPs do the same thing.

BallsandBayonets ,

Doesn't change anything. If I go to a sandwich shop that advertises sandwiches with meat, but I go during the lunch rush, they don't get to sell me two slices of plain bread just because it's busy. Even if their advertising includes in microscopic text the words "up to".

And the legality of these practices is irrelevant. We're making the argument that it's morally wrong and therefore should not be tolerated.

stembolts ,

Good addition, I guess I am making a moral argument. I was coming at it from an ethics POV but yeah. Also good sandwich analogy.

irotsoma ,
@irotsoma@lemmy.world avatar

Problem is that shared infrastructure shouldn't be operated for profit. But American conservatives seem to think that's the way to go. If infrastructure is shared, then there's every incentive for a business to sell even if the infrastructure can't handle it.

That being said, it's a required thing. This is why we have society in the first place. If every customer had to have their own cell infrastructure, it would be a mess and a waste. I mean you are sold unlimited bandwidth at let's say 1Gbps on 5G. There are about 1 cell tower node for every 1000 people in the US across the country. If we build enough infrastructure for everyone to use it at full speed each tower node would then need to be able to handle 1,000Gbps. That's just not possible with current technology. So should we build one tower node per person plus all of the cabling and routers to handle that much traffic? Does everyone really need to be able to download a gigabit of data every second of every day? What would you do with that data?

What internet infrastructure is designed for is peaks of up to that speed for short bursts. Not sustained speeds. And then sharing that infrastructure. Just like if everyone were to turn on their water at the same time, no one would get more than a drip, but does that ever actually happen in real usage?

The difference is that water infrastructure is owned collectively, so it is more equitably developed to make it available to all as equally as possible, rather than just to those who pay more for it.

Raiderkev ,

It's because at&t also sells home Internet. If you have unlimited hotspot, then you wouldn't want that sweet sweet DSL or whatever shit Internet ATT sells

popemichael ,
@popemichael@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Companies even do this if you have a 5g modem.

There is a 2 hour window at the end of the month in which I am miserable.

I'm at the tip of the US's Wang and have zero access to wired internet, so I am stuck. 😞

bonn2 ,

I was in the same situation, but luckily, Starlink became available. Not as good as a wire, and rather expensive, but damn is it a night and day difference.

hellothere ,

How do they know if the source of data is hotspot? I'd imagine there is a way to stop your phone grassing on you.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

You have to turn that feature on.

hellothere ,

Could you install a different OS like suggested here https://dubvee.org/comment/1855949 / by Admiral Patrick below?

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Maybe, but it's not worth it just for a few days, which is all I'll need it for. I just forked over $15 for another 10 gb.

warm ,

$15 for 10GB?! USA phone bills are extortionate!

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Yeah, it really sucks, but at least there aren't roaming charges anymore.

TWeaK ,

Lol when I travel to the US I get 12GB roaming per month included for no extra charge.

Socsa ,

I just have unlimited data in 200 countries on Fi in the US.

shortwavesurfer ,

You think our phone bills are extortionate? Try Canada. They're worse. Which is really saying something.

TWeaK ,

It's worth it for more than a few days, custom ROMs ftw.

Personally my minimum features are:

  • Long press back button to force close and kill an app.
  • Call recording.

All the other stuff and customisation is just tasty gravy.

bigMouthCommie ,
@bigMouthCommie@kolektiva.social avatar

negotiate. i called my last carrier from my new carriers retail store front. they practically begged me to stay and said they'd give me everything i asked for.

ptz , (edited )
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Yeah, installing a new OS on a phone isn't something you do easily like on a PC.

You have to unlock the bootloader, which requires an unlock code from the manufacturer, then you have to factory reset it, and that's even if your phone/carrier allows it. Many don't (which is why it's so hard for me to replace my phone...grrr).

So yeah, installing a new OS on your phone is typically going to require quite a bit of effort and some level of commitment as well as a device that's bootloader unlockable and supported by an alternate OS (each device and model requires a custom build).

It's....a whole thing. It really shouldn't be, but it is :(

FartsWithAnAccent ,
@FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io avatar

I haven't done it in a while, but it kinda depends on the phone, some were very easy to flash in the earlier days of Android.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Yeah, my old Moto Play G4 was a breeze. Wasn't quite "Press any key to continue" but not much more difficult.

My OnePlus was a little more work, but that was mostly because of the OP website acting up and refusing to generate my bootloader unlock key. Also had to do things differently since it didn't have an SD card to hold my install stuff like the Moto Play did.

FartsWithAnAccent ,
@FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io avatar

I had one where you could literally run an app on the phone, no ADB or anything. Can't remember what phone it was now but it might've actually been a Moto Droid

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

One one hand, that sounds extremely convenient. On the other, I shudder thinking what a malicious app could do with that 😆

Edit: Unless you're talking about doing it through TWRP. I had to flash that over fastboot, but once installed to the recovery partition, I could boot into that and install the rest of Lineage and extra packages straight from the SD card. Updating the system was just downloading the new Lineage .zip to the SD card, booting into TWRP, and clicking install.

FartsWithAnAccent ,
@FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io avatar

Exploits go BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!

No, but I did use TWRP on my Droid 3 I think, and as I recall it was pretty nice.

TWeaK ,

and that’s even if your phone/carrier allows it.

This is why you should buy the phone outright yourself then get a SIM only deal, rather than paying for your phone in contract.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

Yeah I do, but SIM unlocked and bootloader unlockable are two different things. Sadly, not every phone (or even the same phones made for different carriers) are allowed to be bootloader unlocked; I have no idea why, but it is and sucks.

TWeaK ,

Yeah it's definitely true, even with the same manufacturer it can be hit and miss. You gotta do your research before you buy.

ptz ,
@ptz@dubvee.org avatar

There's different internal network configs (APNs), and hotspot uses a different one than regular mobile data. ( or at least it used to). Those can be configured and metered separately from the carrier's end.

LineageOS, and maybe some other custom ROMs, wouldn't do that and would put the hotspot and mobile data on the same APN to get around that.

wesker ,
@wesker@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Can confirm, switching to Graphene solved this problem for me a long while ago.

Chronographs ,

Doesn’t unlocking the bootloader break Google Pay?

silent_squirrel ,

You can lock the bootloader again after the flashing process is done(because it will add the signing key of the new OS), but unfortunately the NFC Payments in Google Pay still won't work because Google only allows it on 'certified' Android systems (aka only the preinstalled OS)

squid_slime ,
@squid_slime@lemmy.world avatar

Isn't this dependent on the ROM, like lineage shouldn't be locked where as calyx is locked likewise for graphine os

silent_squirrel ,

Yes, afaik LineageOS shouldn't be locked, but I was talking about GrapheneOS specifically because @wesker was talking about that.

wesker ,
@wesker@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Don't know, wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole.

hopesfall ,

What's wrong with Google Pay?

person ,

the Google part

ReallyActuallyFrankenstein ,

You can in theory still use Google Pay with a Magisk module called Play Integrity Fix and using a fingerprint from a different phone to pass Basic and Device integrity. I'm currently doing it on my Pixel 7 Pro.

But it has a steep learning curve and is a temporary solution that will disappear in roughly a year once Google sunsets legacy integrity methods and starts requiring Strong integrity, which can't be faked under known methods. Google is also actively disabling fingerprints that are being spoofed, making the whole thing frustrating and even more temporary even when it works.

Just let us use our devices, sheesh.

CanadaPlus ,

Ugh. I was dumb and got a Samsung that was offered to me for cheap on the spot. If I had done any research I would have learned that there's no alternative OS options. Now I'm stuck with it, because I'm poor, so I just try to avoid using it. I should keep an eye out for something used that's compatible.

eco_game ,

While it's not at the same level as Graphene OS, Samsung is pretty well supported by Lineage OS.
AFAIK at least in Europe Samsung phones have an unlockable bootloader, but YMMV.

CanadaPlus , (edited )

Nah. Nobody's figured out how to access the ROM on my specific model, unfortunately, and I'm 900% sure Canadian telecom oligopolists will not be cool about unlocking like that.

In my defense, if it was a laptop it would have been much less foolhardy.

Chainweasel ,

I'm still hoping for LineageOS on the Nord N30 but I can't Even find a stock ROM to root it.

Socsa ,

Even on my unlocked, non vendor phone it seems to not recognize hotspot data as different for some reason.

Gullible ,

Back when they just began recognizing it, they noted peculiar traffic. Desktop websites, batch downloads normally unavailable to that system. This assumes that you utilized the internal hotspot system and didn’t create a separate one. Now? Not sure whether their system is more robust but it should, theoretically, be possible to obfuscate your traffic using third party hotspot software. No clue where to look for that anymore.

sparky1337 ,

I used to routinely use 100gb of data on my jailbroken sprint iPhone. Did that for almost 3 years. Never heard a peep from them. But this was forever ago.

Gullible ,

If you used the package I think you did, that’s not unusual. Absolutely will not remember the name but there were numerous tweaks that just flipped the hotspot switch but a couple that allowed you to use a hotspot without directly using the inbuilt function. One was free and broadly used.

brbposting ,

That was great, and you didn’t have to pay some extra tethering fee every month either (or something like that, it was so long ago for me).

sandalbucket ,

TTL in the packet header is 29 instead of 30

CanadaPlus ,

Well that's an easy fix.

ColeSloth ,

If you root your phone and install a custom rom, you can get around it and they can't tell.

If you're factory, it sends that hotspot info to them.

LaFinlandia , (edited )
@LaFinlandia@sopuli.xyz avatar

I know this is going to sound like an ad. Visible has unlimited 5G, and 5Mbps* hotspot, for $25/mo. It's owned by Verizon.

p1mrx ,

Worth noting: "Visible includes mobile hotspot with unlimited data at speeds up to 5Mbps."

AA5B ,

Wow, the 5g had me excited there for a moment

phoneymouse ,

Yeah if you pay for the $45/plan it’s 10Mbps speed

IamAnonymous ,

It’s to stop people from abusing unlimited data on their cellphone for all their WiFi devices at home. I know a person who did not have WiFi at home and only used their cellphone data.
You are using more than a typical cellphone user and also you are cutting them from an opportunity to sell you a WiFi plan for your home.
It’s annoying, but as I understand it, this is the reason.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

The concept of abusing unlimited data makes no sense.

IamAnonymous , (edited )

It’s unlimited data for your phone and not for all the devices you can connect to.
I agree with your sentiment. Just trying to point what the companies have in their ToS. I will be glad to hotspot to all my devices from my phone and not pay for WiFi.

whoreticulture ,

This might not apply everywhere, but I live in a rural area and actually most of my Internet used is through cell networks. When there are a lot of people in the area for some reason, I'm much more likely to lose service completely for web and calls.

I don't think that a reliable network is the reason why communications companies are limiting people's data, I think they're doing it for profit, but it could be a rationale to do so. It's not unreasonable to think that there can't be "unlimited" anything without some kind of impact.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

But isn't limiting an unlimited service a form of false advertising? I'm sure they'd argue that a ToS was signed, but I don't know that you can legally bind people to accept a false advertisement.

whoreticulture ,

Yeah you don't have to make that point to me. I'm just saying there could be a legitimate reason to want to make service limits. Obviously, if they really wanted to limit service to prevent network outages, I wouldn't be getting network outages 😂😭

PriorityMotif ,
@PriorityMotif@lemmy.world avatar

"all you can eat"

starman2112 ,
@starman2112@sh.itjust.works avatar

You are using more than a typical cell phone user

But it still costs the ISP effectively nothing to send those 1s and 0s. This is like complaining about someone having a bunch of fans on because they're using more air than the average person.

IamAnonymous ,

I never implied that. Ask the ISP why they have separate hotspot / tablet / watch plans.

solrize ,

If it's an android phone, enable dev mode, install adb on your laptop, run an sshd under termux on the phone, and you should be able to set up iptables to forward packets from the laptop through the phone. The phone won't know that it's being used for tethering. Although I hadn't seen the stuff about packet TTL before. Maybe it's as simple as just adjusting that.

fne8w2ah ,

Back in the day PDANet was the app to go to enable unlimited tethering.

Zikeji ,
@Zikeji@programming.dev avatar

Still works for me as of last year. Now I use rooted android with ttlfix.

Armageddon ,

This is what I've been using and it works for the most part other than the connection just dropping with too much use, only other thing I've used is PairVPN which had the same problem but was 100x worse. Is there something better around nowadays? I have a carrier locked phone and can't ROM or root

owenfromcanada ,
@owenfromcanada@lemmy.world avatar

A less complicated method that I used for years:

  • Install SimpleSSHD on your phone
  • If you're running Windows, install PuTTY on your PC
  • Connect to SimpleSSHD through PuTTY/ssh and set a parameter for dynamic forwarding (CLI option is -D 8888)
  • Set your web browser or application to use SOCKS5 proxy at localhost port 8888

It doesn't redirect all traffic (you'd want to avoid system updates, for example) but might be easier than messing with iptables.

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

It may be easier to just run a VPN on the phone and route the traffic through it? WireGuard runs on Android. I've never tried configuring it to forward data through it though, but it should work.

owenfromcanada ,
@owenfromcanada@lemmy.world avatar

I tried that, the carrier could still differentiate it from local traffic (or at least my speed test results were vastly different).

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

It's possible they've gotten smarter these days.

I don't know how ISPs are allowed to do this when it's a very obvious violation of net neutrality.

owenfromcanada ,
@owenfromcanada@lemmy.world avatar

If I recall correctly, they justify it by claiming they need to do deep packet inspection to balance traffic. There's a fuzzy line between them needing to optimize their network equipment and respecting privacy, and the rulings seem to favor the former.

michael_palmer ,

There is an app that can change TTL value through iptables. It requires root.

Maggoty ,

Well that's because, fuck you pay me those are special data packets.

skuzz ,

Ahahaha, are you in marketing?

Maggoty ,

No, I'm far worse. I studied politics in college.

skuzz ,

My condolences.

MonkderZweite ,

They can detect you using your phone as hotspot? Creepy.

jkrtn ,

The phone reports it, yeah, it is creepy. Should be illegal to even have the knowledge to differentiate.

michael_palmer ,

TTL is a part of TCP/IP.

kent_eh ,

It's not hard to detect when the standard includes the phone indicating what it's doing to the carrier.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Very creepy.

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

Sometimes it's based on the TTL of packets. TTL for hotspot clients will be one less than TTL for directly using data on the phone, since the phone is acting as a router, which adds an extra hop.

I think running a HTTP proxy or VPN server on the phone would mask it (since the connections would then be made by the phone directly), but I've never tried.

michael_palmer ,

Android phones don't share VPN connections through the hotspot

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

Ahh - that's unfortunate. A HTTP proxy should work though.

humbletightband ,

My provider used MTU as a reference. I simply changed it in hotspot settings and was happy about that

tal ,
@tal@lemmy.today avatar

max 128kbps

TMobile doesn't have a hard throttle, but they'll cut priority under congestion so that if wherever you are has someone else vying for the bandwidth, they get first shot.

Frankly, given that the limited resource is the cell bandwidth, that seems like a more reasonable way to go. It doesn't hurt them much if someone wants available bandwidth and there's no contention for it from others.

pantherfarber ,

For hotspot T-Mobile does have a hard throttle. Once you reach your cap you get limited to 128 kbps. It's only phone data that has the soft cap.

psycho_driver ,

I thought T-Mobile's throttle was 600kbps now?

pantherfarber ,

It may depend on the plan. Mine limits it to 128 kbps after I reach the 3gb cap for hotspot.

You've used 100% of Smartphone Mobile Hotspot high speed data on your T-Mobile plan. Your Smartphone Mobile Hotspot speed will now be limited to 128 kbps until 03/05/2024. Data on your smartphone will still be at full speeds. Buy more at

zip ,

Mine is the same way and I get the exact same messages.

ysjet ,

I can assure you, the multi-million dollar organization does not need your defense of them.

bartolomeo ,
@bartolomeo@suppo.fi avatar

I think companies call that "innovation" these days.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Anything that makes more profits is "innovation."

If they could profit from rape, they'd do so and call it innovative.

Tlaloc_Temporal ,

Legislation basically specifing such has been passed for some reason, and I bet that reason is money.

skuzz ,

It's a really weird and very American problem. Our home broadband either doesn't exist or is really expensive in any given market, and tends to have clauses, conditions, etc. Like Comcrap limiting people to 1TB/mon (very easy to burn through quickly by just watching some television programs) unless they pay more for "unlimited". People, as taught by Capitalism, hunt for the best deals. Paying one bill instead of two saves money. Some have light enough home Internet requirements that they don't need expensive home broadband.

Then the companies get pissed that we're doing what we are supposed to do, find the best deal for our needs, so they set up false gates to make sure we follow the path they want us to follow. Then they pay off the regulatory agencies to allow terms like "unlimited" mean not unlimited, 3G HSPA+ being known as 4G. 4G being known as LTE, 4GLTE or 5Ge. 5G being known as 5G, 5G+, 5GUW, 5GUC, (even though, with the exception of T-Mobile in many markets, that 5G will actually be non-standalone and anchored to an LTE packet core, not 5G SA) and all the other damn arbitrary marketing buzzwords. All of which really mean nothing because the 5G spec allows a carrier to flip on the 5G availability flag on a phone even if 5G doesn't exist in your market.

Most of this, AT&T is the biggest perpetrator of by far. Especially the lying about 5G.

The rules are all made up, nothing is real. Time for the arbitrary monthly bill increase for no reason! Pay up, chump!

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Yep, lack of broadband in this AirBnB I'm staying in is the only reason I was using it as a hotspot in the first place. The speed here is about the speed they'd throttle it at. I kind of had to fork over the $15 or deal with slow internet one way or the other.

skuzz ,

It always blows my mind going to a rental and the rental has no or lacking Internet. Yes, I'm probably on vacation, but it's the future and life requires a few megabits. Years back I made it standard procedure to prep some kind of mobile broadband for my destination (buying a month of prepaid for a hotspot or whatever) fully expecting it to just always suck, it's annoying that this is still a necessary procedure in 2024.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Unfortunately, I didn't pick it. My mother is paying. And when I asked my mother if she looked to see on the AirBnB ad if this place had high speed internet, she said, "other ads did, but this one didn't." Sigh.

starman2112 ,
@starman2112@sh.itjust.works avatar

I still feel like I should be able to sue AT&T for claiming my hotspot is "unlimited," but after 15 gb it drops to double digit kbps. Seems like that's a pretty hard limit

skuzz ,

Especially given:

  • Limited to 15GB
  • Then limited to 128kbps

The 15GB is going to be variable based on the link speed available. If full 5G, that can be erased with 15 speed tests in a few minutes.

From there, it's 128kbps * 3600 (to hours) * 24 (to days) * 30 (to month) = 331,776,000 kilobits -> 41.472GB + the original 15GB -> 56.472GB is the limit each month for "unlimited", roughly. A hard limited number.

starman2112 ,
@starman2112@sh.itjust.works avatar

And some douchebag could come in and say "um, actually, it's always going to be limited because the internet speed isn't infinite" as if the 3TB my mobile data is capable of downloading at full speed is at all comparable to the 0.05TB I can get after they rate limit me

istanbullu ,

How can they tell if you are tethering?

Michal ,

They must be sniffing traffic

orangeboats , (edited )

Not sure if it's still the case today, but back then cellular ISPs could tell you are tethering by looking at the TTL (time to live) value of your packets.

Basically, a packet starts with a TTL of 64 usually. After each hop (e.g. from your phone to the ISP's devices) the TTL is decremented, becoming 63, then 62, and so on. The main purpose of TTL is to prevent packets from lingering in the network forever, by dropping the packet if its TTL reaches zero. Most packets reach their destinations within 20 hops anyway, so a TTL of 64 is plenty enough.

Back to the topic. What happens when the ISP receives a packet with a TTL value less than expected, like 61 instead of 62? It realizes that your packet must have gone through an additional hop, for example when it hopped from your laptop onto your phone, hence the data must be tethered.

orangeboats ,

This also explains why VPN is a possible workaround to this issue.

Your VPN will encapsulate any packets that your phone will send out inside a new packet (its contents encrypted), and this new packet is the one actually being sent out to the internet. What TTL does this new packet have? You guessed it, 64. From the ISP's perspective, this packet is no different than any other packets sent directly from your phone.

BUT, not all phones will pass tethered packets to the VPN client -- they directly send those out to the internet. Mine does this! In this case, TTL-based tracking will still work. And some phones seem to have other methods to inform the ISP that the data is tethered, in which case the VPN workaround may possibly fail.

mhz ,
@mhz@lemm.ee avatar

That was a good read, thank you

southernbrewer ,

You can also just increase your laptop's initial TTL by one and then they can't tell.

Couldbealeotard ,
@Couldbealeotard@lemmy.world avatar

How do you do this?

southernbrewer , (edited )

On MacOS this will do it:

printf 'net.inet.ip.ttl=65\nnet.inet6.ip6.hlim=65\n' | sudo tee /etc/sysctl.conf

Can't personally speak for other OSes at present. Here's a SO post about Ubuntu: https://askubuntu.com/a/670276

mhz ,
@mhz@lemm.ee avatar

That was a good read, thanks

bhamlin ,

If you're using the built-in unmodified hotspot on pretty much all phones these days, mobile data for the hotspot goes through a different apn. Your phone requests data on one channel, while hotspot data goes through another.

VeganCheesecake ,
@VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

My ISP's a dick, but to my knowledge, unlimited has to mean unlimited around here. There where months where we had Problems with our fibre, so I did everything over a hotspot from my phone. Used 100's of GB's no one ever complained.

Get proper consumer protection laws, people.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

*Cries in American.*

intensely_human ,

Where are you?

YeetPics ,
@YeetPics@mander.xyz avatar

Get proper consumer protection laws, people.

And if you're homeless, just buy a house 🫶

Rodeo ,

It really is the same energy

VeganCheesecake ,
@VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

It wasn't supposed to be quite serious, but yeah, depending on where you live it's pretty much a lost cause, at least in the short-, or even mid-term.

perdvert ,

Bad comparison.

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

Get proper consumer protection laws, people.

California is trying its best, but I'm not sure the other US states will get onboard (except New York, and maybe Oregon and Washington state).

VeganCheesecake ,
@VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Yeah. I mean, the state I live in right now just passed a bill to forbid officers of the state from using gender neutral, but technically grammatically incorrect language, while the ruling party is campaigning on not being a party of bans, while claiming their rivals are, so things aren't all that green here either.

I say take the wins you can get.

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

unlimited has to mean unlimited around here.

This is the case in a lot of countries. In Australia, some ISPs got fined a lot of money (something like $300,000 I think?) because they advertised mobile phone plans as "unlimited" when in reality they slowed down the speed once you hit a limit.

VeganCheesecake ,
@VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Dunno if 300k is necessarily a lot for an ISP, but having rules and fining firms for non-compliance is pretty nice.

KillingTimeItself ,

it's not especially in the US, i've seen ISPs essentially break kneecaps forcing the consume to pay for the initial hook up, and then immediately rolling it out to every available house in the subdivision or neighborhood.

That shit should be illegal. If you do the math on how long it would take to profit from running it yourself it's only a few years given an ENTIRE neighborhood.

dan ,
@dan@upvote.au avatar

The maximum ISPs could be fined for misleading/deceptive conduct (including things like this) was $1.1 million at the time, and I don't think they considered this bad enough to hand out the maximum fine. They bumped the maximum to $10 million at some point afterwards though.

CosmicCleric ,
@CosmicCleric@lemmy.world avatar

What is the difference between cellular data being used on my phone and cellular data being used on my notebook?

The difference is the cellular company's profits amount.

Oneobi ,

They had this restriction in the UK where the networks would prevent hotspots from actually working. You had to buy a special additional package.

Restriction has now vanished and there are no such limits on usage. Not sure if the Regulator intervened but it was most certainly a cash grab.

These days they still manage to rip us off by annual contract increases of RPI+3.9%. That applies even during a 2 year contract.

Mr_Blott ,

Not sure if the Regulator intervened

It was an EU thing before....well you know what you did

Armand1 ,

I didn't ask for this. 😭

GroundedGator ,

I think this is also an archaic model from before smart phones and the early days of smart phones. In the early days of apps, most attempted to limit data usage because most network providers charged a premium for data and the networks were much slower and smaller.

While you could tether in these early days, even before smart phones, the computer was capable of much higher data usage than the phone. These limits were put in place to protect a network that wasn't really built for this level of load.

Old rules with good purpose turned into a way to charge more money.

CosmicCleric ,
@CosmicCleric@lemmy.world avatar

Fair enough. That describes the past, but not the present, or the future.

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