For the past few years, many broadband ISPs have been frank in saying that file-swapping services such as Napster and Kazaa have been among the most popular activities on their networks. This has led to a small proportion of dedicated file swappers, known as “bandwidth hogs” within the industry, who account for a hugely disproportionate amount of network traffic.
Now many of the biggest high-speed ISPs are considering capping the amount of bandwidth that their subscribers can use per month, a move that could undermine subscribers’ free swapping ways–something that many lawsuits have not yet been able to achieve. If people know they have a limited amount of bandwidth available, the thinking goes, they’ll be less likely to download voraciously or allow people to upload songs and music from their computers.
