Musings About The Internet
stargrace 
There have been a number of large internet debates here in Canada over the last little while. There is the discussion going on currently about having user caps (as low as 25 gigs a month) and charging $2+ every gig over the cap. There are also continuous debates over throttling, and the monopoly that Rogers has over the market (although it does share that market with Bell Canada). The latest news bit is about how Rogers is throttling World of Warcraft players because WoW uses peer-to-peer to transfer game files. Rogers has throttled peer-to-peer for as long as I can remember, and that was one major reason why I stopped using their service. As not only a gamer, but a gamer writing about games it was next-to impossible for me to download a game (especially a free to play game) in time for an article because I would be throttled every inch of the way. I very literally could not do my job using Rogers internet service. I have since switched, and while my service is actually slower the fact that I’m not throttled is a blessing.
For a country that is considered to be ‘free’ in many aspects (healthcare, etc) we sure do have a lot of issues when it comes to technology. Every time I see a commercial for AT&T High Speed Internet my stomach does flip flops – the prices are noticeably lower for the services provided compared to what I see up here. Jealous? Of course I am – a little bit.
These days just about everything is on the internet, not just my video games. I subscribe and pay to use Netflix to stream tv shows and movies – and they actually had to lower their video quality in order to cater to Canadians who have low internet usage caps put in place by their ISP. It would seem that Netflix is afraid of losing customers who may worry about the rate that their data transfers. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Shouldn’t we be increasing the quality and performance (at a lower cost) of internet usage instead?
I truly love where I live and appreciate the comforts that we’re given on a daily basis, but I hate to see that we’re falling so far behind the curve in this matter.
In other news! My bard has completed her 1.5 epic and it looks amazing. I also spent a little time in Rift last night, participating in the world wide event that has taken over. My cleric is still hanging out at level 21, but it was nice to peek in and see how the server was doing population wise. I hope everyone else has a delightful Thursday (this is my Friday, woohoo for three day weekends) and happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!