Saying that approximately 5 percent of its customer base accounts for about 50 percent of its network capacity, Time Warner Cable (TWC) announced today that it would be rolling out testing on a new tier level Internet access pricing structure later in 2008.
The launch of the experiment will be in Beaumont, Texas, where only new subscribers will be sold the new service at different price points. Existing customers won't be affected said company spokesman Alex Dudley.
Dudley added that at this time the decision on what the tiers for pricing would be, and its download limits, haven't been made.
What this means, is starting in Beaumont, fixed-price packages with unlimited access will be eliminated with new customers, and pricing based on the amount of data downloaded during a monthly period.
While this doesn't bother me, as there has to be some type of balance put in the market as rich media continues to grow in being uploaded to and downloaded from the Internet, and networks start to slow down and get other users frustrated. That has already started to happen.
At the same time, does this mean users that only search the web and do little downloading are going to get better prices? Why shouldn't they? That hasn't been addressed yet as far as it being a possibility.
Concerning the exact time the new initiative will begin, Dudley said a specific date hasn't been set, but it will probably be in the second quarter of 2008.
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