However, Virgin Media boss also says that copyright holders and ISPs should work together to create viable content platform alternatives to illegal file-sharing.
Sometime during the middle of next year UK ISP Virgin Media plans to introduce application-based restrictions that will mean that BitTorrent and other P2P users will see their connection speeds throttled to make way for its new 50Mbit/s broadband package.
Why? "I think it’s an issue of fairness," said Virgin Media boss Neil Berkett.
"Broadband has become integral to delivering home entertainment services and with data consumption growing rapidly, we are exploring new ways to enhance our product offering," said a company spokesman. "Part of this involves intelligent monitoring and understanding the way people use our broadband service."
After announcing the launch of its new 50Mb/s broadband package, Berkett said it’s "naive" for any ISP to think that it can continue increasing connection speeds without addressing illegal file-sharing by its customers.
He said that it was part of an emerging "digital conscience" within the Telecom industry.
"I think it is naive, to say the least, for a network provider on one hand to be talking about leading in next generation broadband and creating intelligence across their networks that ultimately they can monetise, and then (to be) sticking their head in the sand and saying they have no obligation to help in terms of (protecting) intellectual property," he said.
"Ultimately I think creating the right partnership between content providers and the platform (ISP) is going to be critical. You can’t legislate for this, for Christ’s sake."
Berkett is opposed to mandatory content filtering by ISPs as has been proposed in France and the UK, correctly observing that instead copyright holders and ISPs should work together to create content delivery platforms "where the customer says, yes, that’s value for money, I will change my behaviour as a result of that."
I agree with Berkett’s stance on creating alternatives, but why, as a paying customer, am I to be penalized for merely using that bandwidth which I have already paid for? I understand that network congestion is an issue, yet I think the real problem is overselling a finite amount of bandwidth and then penalizing those who dare to use their fair share.
jared@zeropaid.com
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This will end up in the courts….of that I have no doubt.
The most unintelligent people on this planet period!
How amusing and sad. They want to sell the speed but not let the customer use it. Sure you could use your blazing fast connection to check your email or watch a video of some retard lipsyncing to Numa Numa on Youtube…. but most people buy fast connections to download movies and music. Whenever a corporation stops serving the customer and attempts to change the customer… the result will be FAIL. Yes fail is my favorite word of late