Shocked onlookers moments after the earthquake struck downtown Christchurch

A major magnitude 6.3 earthquake has devastated the Canterbury region of southeast New Zealand, particularly the central business district of the city of Christchurch, knocking out power, water, sewer, and several telecommunications networks across the region.  The wireless networks that remain have been so overburdened, government officials have declared use of those networks limited to emergency use only.

Two aftershocks — one magnitude 5.6 and another 5.5 — shook Christchurch within hours of the initial 6.3 earthquake, causing damaged buildings to crumble, including parts of the 130-year-old Christchurch Cathedral. Its spire toppled into the city square, falling onto throngs of tourists who ran from the building in terror as the temblor struck.

Dozens are dead, with scores more injured, particularly in the Christchurch city center, where the quake struck just after lunch.  Shocking raw video has appeared on national television showing bloody bodies strewn amongst the rubble, and hearts are broken over stories such as the death of nine month old toddler who survived the quake, but not the large flat panel television that toppled down on him during an aftershock.

Telecommunications services were reduced to a state of virtual unusability following the quake because of cable cuts and congestion, as Prime Minister John Key informed Parliament the government was forced to initially rely on a sketchy satellite link to speak with civil defense officials in the city of 376,000.

The city’s local television station — CTV, was reduced to rubble as the seven-story building pancaked, tossing some employees working on the fifth floor into the middle of Madras Street below.  They were the lucky ones, surviving as astonished onlookers ran up to help.

National media has described the Canterbury earthquake as “New Zealand’s darkest day,” and most radio and television stations still on the air have ceased regular programming to relay the country’s National service from Radio/TV New Zealand, or the country’s national news-talk network Newstalk ZB.

New Zealand’s Internet services are functioning, but sporadic in many locations.  The national public broadcaster, Radio/TV New Zealand, is relying on its international shortwave radio service Radio New Zealand International to get its signal out to the rest of the world as its live Internet streams initially failed.  Many other broadcasters in Christchurch have lost their links to transmitters, or temporarily lacked power to stay on the air.

The region’s landline telephone network remains functional where cable cuts have not interrupted service, but since many New Zealanders rely on cell phones, the country’s wireless networks quickly were overwhelmed with worried callers.  Large parts of New Zealand’s cell phone network in the south is now completely reliant on battery backup power, due to widespread power disruptions.  Keeping those sites operational is critical, as scores of office workers in Christchurch are texting messages indicating they are still alive, but trapped in damaged or collapsed buildings.

Emergency generators are being pressed into service as providers recognize their wireless networks are often the only reliable link residents now have with the rest of the country. Some cell sites operated by Telecom New Zealand (TNZ), Vodafone and 2Degrees equipped with solar or battery backup systems began to fail last night.

“We’re asking our customers in Christchurch to have patience if they lose service. Although we can’t identify which sites will lose battery power or when, we know that they are generally in good shape so can be placed back in service once power becomes available,” says 2degrees CEO Eric Hertz.

TNZ and their biggest competitor Vodafone have set aside their rivalry and are coordinating efforts to keep the country’s networks up and running.  Staff of both companies have been largely ordered to remain home, as technicians on duty at the time of the quake pull overtime duty.  Emergency 111 service, today answered by operators in Wellington 190 miles away, is now prioritized and customers have been told by government officials that cell phone use in the affected region should be limited for emergency calls only.

All public payphones in Christchurch discontinued paid service as of this morning — all calls are now free.

Vodafone reports SMS text messaging service between networks is not functioning at this time.  That means Vodafone customers cannot send or receive text messages to anyone outside of Vodafone’s own network for the time being.

All three carriers are recommending wireless customers across the entire country use text messaging rather than calling to keep congestion to a minimum.  Text messages rarely overload wireless networks.  Most providers are also waiving contract cancellation penalties for customers whose homes or businesses were heavily damaged or destroyed, and will forward calls to functioning phone numbers at no charge.

Cable modem service in Christchurch is disrupted wherever cable cuts exist.  DSL from TNZ is also sporadic for the same reasons.

While power is expected to return across Canterbury as daybreak now arrives, officials warn outages in essential services will persist for days, if not weeks, in some particularly hard-hit areas.

Live Coverage

• NewstalkZB – broadcasting on all FM frequencies in Christchurch controlled by “RadioNetwork”
• Radio Live
• Radio New Zealand (streaming is sporadic/non-functional at this time)
• TV New Zealand (Choose “Live International Stream” when available)

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/TVNZ Quake Damage 2-22-11.flv[/flv]

TV New Zealand presented coverage moments after the quake occurred.  Some of these reports and raw video contain extremely graphic and disturbing imagery.  (30 minutes)

Slaterville Springs is a hamlet in the town of Caroline, N.Y.

Frontier Communications issues press releases promoting the expansion of low speed DSL service into new areas, but for many existing customers, extended service outages ruin their broadband experience.

Just ask Stop the Cap! reader Paul from Slaterville Springs, just outside of Ithaca, N.Y.  Much of his hamlet was without Frontier’s DSL service for more than two weeks, leaving dozens of families with poor-to-non-existent access to broadband for the better part of January.

It Was Supposed to Be Restored in Two Days — But Three Weeks Was More Like It

“It was supposed to be restored in two days, but after repeated calls, they told me it was a “common cause” failure impacting a large number of subscribers,” Paul told us. “Later, we were told Frontier was waiting for parts to fix some equipment at the central office.”

Paul heard the same excuse a week later, as he and other local residents remained cut off from the Internet.

Paul has been underwhelmed by the attention Frontier has given to the town of Caroline, which includes Slaterville Springs.  He has complained to the town supervisor and the New York Public Service Commission.  Frontier has already offered him a refund for the extended interruption in service, but Paul would really like a stable Internet connection that performs well with today’s bandwidth-intensive Internet.

“Before the outage, I got about two-thirds of the promised 3Mbps speed from Frontier, which means any interactive applications can be difficult, and YouTube videos require lengthy buffering before one can watch,” Paul says.  “I think being able to watch YouTube without painful slowdowns should be a key metric for today’s broadband.”

At the end of January, Paul reached out to Ann Burr, Frontier’s regional president of operations.  She called up Claudia Maroney,  the general manager of Frontier’s Central New York division.

“I was told right away that I’d get a service credit for two months and that the problem would be dealt with quickly,” Paul said. “The technician in the central office contacted us and said the solution was to further reduce my speed, because he thought we were too far away from the central office to sustain even the slow speed we had before.”

That turned out not to solve the problem either.

Finally, Frontier brought Paul a new DSL modem which, in concert with repairs in the central office, finally resolved his problems.

Frontier claims it will also increase capacity in his area, which apparently also suffers from evening congestion.

Poor Internet service is not just limited to Caroline.  The entire Southern Tier region between Corning and Binghamton is hard-pressed to access high-speed service.

Eleven towns in Tompkins and Cayuga County have jointly applied for a federal grant to create the infrastructure needed to make high speed wireless or fiber optic-to-the-home service available throughout the area.

The Case of Proctor Creek and Coffield Ridge, W.V.

Wetzel County, W.V.

One of the most challenging areas to provide DSL service is in the Panhandle section of West Virginia.  Hilly terrain and large distances between neighbors assure a challenging broadband environment.  Cable television is out of the question in many areas, and Verizon’s legacy network was in decrepit condition before selling operations to Frontier and fleeing the state.

So it was with great excitement Frontier announced incremental progress in expanding DSL service to two small sections of Wetzel County.  Proctor Creek, close to the West Virginia-Ohio state line, and the relentlessly hilly Coffield Ridge area was finally getting DSL from Frontier — three years after Verizon promised to make the service available.

Wetzel County EMS President Jim Colvin and Del. Dave Pethtel joined Frontier’s Bill Moon at the Grandview EMS Squad station on Jan. 4, to learn more about Frontier’s expansion plans, as the Wetzel Chronicle reported.

Moon informed customers that DSL was now available in both areas and it’s only the beginning of Frontier’s plans to deliver expanded broadband service across West Virginia.  He said Frontier aims to “do things right the first time,” taking more time to establish service in efforts to prevent customers from dealing with the inconveniences of repeat visits from technicians.

“We want to bring the feel of a local company with the advantages of a big company,” Moon said. He went on to say that being a manager specifically for one region meant day-to-day decisions could be made at the local and personal level. “A lot of the red tape is gone,” he told the Chronicle. “We can make things happen directly and get things resolved quickly.”

“There is nothing quick or personal about Frontier Communications,” Shirley tells Stop the Cap! from her home in Proctor.  Her sister signed up for Frontier’s broadband service Jan. 15, and it has worked for exactly three days.  “She has never dealt with a more disorganized company.”

Shirley says nobody from Frontier ever marketed DSL to her sister’s family.

“I read the story in the Chronicle and called her right away, because they have been waiting for broadband for at least 10 years,” Shirley says.  “Calling Frontier was the first mistake — the company couldn’t bring up her account for 15 minutes.”

Shirley says her sister finally succeeded in ordering the service after her line was “qualified.”  She specifically told Frontier “no thanks” to a heavily pushed big package of services from the company, and she did not want to get into a term contract.  But Frontier signed her to one anyway.

“Installation turned out to take almost two weeks because the installer never showed up and she actually got her first bill with DSL charges on it before they installed the service,” Shirley says.  “She called me right away — they signed her up for a calling plan she didn’t want, a hard drive backup service she never ordered, and a one year contract she won’t accept.”

Frontier took all of the extra services off her bill without a fight, even as she still waited for the installer to show up.

“It worked for three days — three days,” Shirley reports.  “Ever since the last heavy rain, the modem lights just blink and Frontier tells her it must be a line problem, but she’s still waiting for someone to come fix it.”

Frontier is charging Shirley, and her neighbors, nearly $40 a month for 1.5Mbps DSL service.  It was supposed to be 3Mbps, but Moon admitted to residents the farther a customer is from a hub, the slower the connection will be.

Common Congestion Symptoms?  Frontier Promises Relief

National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank

Meanwhile, residents in Pocahontas and Webster counties in eastern West Virginia have DSL service, but intolerable congestion has made it practically unusable since last Thanksgiving.

Nate in Marlinton has had DSL service since Verizon ran it, and believes Frontier has successfully run DSL straight into the ground in the state.

“Frontier actually managed to achieve slower speeds than my neighbor’s satellite Internet service, which is simply amazing,” Nate tells Stop the Cap! “He had Frontier DSL as well, but he went back to the satellite because it was actually better in the evenings.”

Nate’s in a good position to know he has a good quality line to Frontier’s central office — he can see the building from his house.

“When Verizon ran DSL, I actually got better speeds than they promised because you can count the line length between me and the central office in yards, not tens of thousands of feet,” Nate says.  “Now the problem is with Frontier’s own pipeline to the rest of the Internet, which has become hopelessly congested.”

Nate criticizes Frontier for claiming their network has loads of fiber optics for their broadband service.

“Not for ordinary West Virginians they sure don’t,” Nate says.

The Pocahontas Times covered Frontier’s molasses-slow broadband speeds, getting promises that better broadband was on the way late last week.

“But you have to read further down in the story to find the company is spending its time, attention, and money on a fiber network connecting the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank with West Virginia University in Morgantown,” Nate complains. “Although that fiber travels down the same phone poles and streets our phone lines do, that sure doesn’t mean we’ll be able to access it.”

Reed Nelson, Frontier’s Director of Engineering for West Virginia, vaguely offered the $5.9 million, 66-mile fiber project will indirectly benefit consumers through fiber loops installed along the way.  He was joined by an apologetic Dana Waldo, Frontier’s senior vice president for West Virginia.

“We know we’ve had some bumps in the road,” Waldo said at the outset of the meeting.

“This is very much like being on the Interstate highway at rush-hour,” he said. “It gets congested. What we’re trying to do is look for paths where we can reduce that congestion. That’s the short-term fix.”

Nate remains unimpressed.

“This is a residential broadband improvement project through osmosis — somehow Frontier’s congested network problems in the area will be resolved by an institutional network we cannot access,” Nate says. “The fact the company turned up at the Observatory to make these announcements before an audience of NRAO technical and executive staff, Pocahontas County Commissioners and representatives of the local schools and libraries, tells you all you need to know — this is an institutional, not residential network.”

Pocahontas County's Cranberry Glades: Go for Nature's Mountain Playground, but don't stay for Frontier's broadband.

Our regular reader DJ, also in the affected area, says speeds have been downright terrible since Thanksgiving, and despite Frontier’s “new capacity” coming online last week, his service is as slow as ever.

“I’m getting anywhere between 0.5Mbps – 2Mbps if I’m lucky,” he shares.

For most customers in eastern West Virginia, Frontier’s ironically-named High Speed Max service delivers a whopping 1Mbps broadband experience.

“Customers have been paying for value not received,” Pocahontas County Commissioner Martin Saffer told Nelson.

Constituents in both counties regularly complain to elected officials about the dreadful broadband service Frontier delivers.

“This company got more than one hundred million in broadband stimulus funding and it sure isn’t helping people in eastern West Virginia,” Nate says.

Another part of Frontier’s problems is an overcongested access point in Bluefield, where Frontier exchanges traffic with the Internet’s national backbone.  Sending the majority of the state’s traffic through one data center has proved untenable, so the company plans additional access points in Charles Town, Charleston, and Clarksburg.

Frontier promises speed boosts are forthcoming, bringing 5Mbps service in the days ahead, according to the Times.

John Mutscheller, Frontier’s Technical Supervisor in Marlinton, told the Times local crews are working to increase capacity whenever they go out to service equipment in Pocahontas County.

“When we put in a new site or we augment an existing site, if they’re at one meg–we have some at three–we’re jumping them up to 5 megs,” he said. “That’s the company policy.”

An installation at Thornwood will be the first 5 Mbps site to come online in Pocahontas County, Mutscheller said. Eventually, all sites in the county will be upgraded to that level, he said.

But as the newspaper points out, not everyone will get those speeds. Generally, with the copper lines that connect customers to Frontier’s equipment, connection speeds drop off as the distance from the equipment increases. Nelson said advances in modems, like those Frontier provides customers for connecting to its network, could fix that in coming years.

Frontier continues to navigate political minefields in the state with the help of employees hired from county governments. Reta Griffith, a former county commissioner today is Frontier’s General Manager for the territory that includes Pocahontas County.

Reporters pressed Griffith on the question of refunds for beleaguered customers experiencing very un-broadband speeds from Frontier:

“We will take those concerns into consideration,” Griffith responded.

Frontier’s service agreements with customers state that speeds received are not guaranteed, but rather will be ‘up to’ the specified speed, she added.

Frontier’s own marketing materials have added to the billing headaches of the company and its customers.

“‘High Speed Max’ doesn’t mean the same thing every place,” Griffith explained.

Bell is pulling out all the stops trying to defend its justification for Internet Overcharging through so-called usage-based billing.  In a published debate between the telecom giant and TekSavvy — a small independent ISP trying to preserve flat rate broadband service in Canada, Bell claims Canadian broadband is the third best in the world, ahead of the United States, all of Europe, and just barely trailing Japan and Korea:

At the same time, Canada has increasingly become a world leader when it comes to broadband. When it comes to actual download speeds, Canada ranks third in the G20, behind only densely populated Korea and Japan. And prices are low — in fact, for higher-speed services, lower than in both the U.S. and Japan.

Michael Geist, a popular columnist fighting against Canadian Internet Overcharging, scoffs at the notion:

I’m not sure where these claims come from – Canada does not appear in the top 10 on Akamai’s latest State of the Internet report for Internet speed and no Canadian city makes Akamai’s top 100 for peak speed. The OECD report ranks Canada well back in terms of speed and price as does the Berkman report.  The NetIndex report ranks Canada 36th in the world for residential speed. Moreover, the shift away from the OECD to the G20 has the effect of excluding many developed countries with faster and cheaper broadband than Canada (while bringing in large, developing world economies that unsurprisingly rank below Canada on these issues). While there is probably a report somewhere that validates the claim, the consensus is that Canada is not a leader.

Bell’s Magic Pony-stories are at best exaggerated and at worst, phoney-baloney from the telco’s government relations department.

Stop the Cap! compared prices across several providers and found no value for money in broadband plans from all of the country’s major phone and cable companies.  Without fail, all were heavily usage limited, most throttled broadband speeds for peer-to-peer applications, engaged in overlimit fees the credit card industry would be proud to charge, and simply were almost always behind their counterparts to the south — in the United States.  In fact, some consumers are importing their broadband from the USA when they can manage it.

“Bell can’t win the argument on the merits, so it is making things up,” writes London, Ontario resident Hugh MacDonald.  “I have had Bell DSL for years now, and there isn’t anything fast or cheap about it.”

MacDonald’s broadband service from Bell tops out at around 4Mbps.

Mirko Bibic, senior vice-president for regulatory and government affairs at Bell claims consumers have to pay more to fund infrastructure expansion, and even challenges our long-standing assertion that telephone network comparisons don’t apply:

Bell provides all our customers with the best possible Internet experience available — the result of heavy and ongoing investment to expand our network capacity both to meet fast-growing demand and to manage the congestion that threatens everyone’s Internet experience.

Internet congestion is a fact and it cannot be wished away. Network providers like Bell must, like hydro utilities, build our networks to handle the heaviest usage times, not just an average of usage over time. At 8:30 in the evening, demand is at its absolute peak. And we have to deliver based on the volume at that time.

Keeping up with growing volume obviously means these network investments are not one-time costs. Between 2006 and 2009, Internet usage more than doubled, and Bell has invested more than $8-billion in the last five years in network growth and enhancement to keep pace. Yet at the same time, the CRTC has found that the average price per gigabyte downloaded has actually declined by 20%.

That’s why the long distance analogy, so often used by those with an interest in confusing the issue, is fundamentally misleading. In the case of long distance, it’s the simple transmission of voice over long-established legacy networks.

But Bibic ignores several important facts and doesn’t disclose others:

What broadband network does not have to make regular investments to expand to meet demand?  Cable and telephone company DSL business models, in place for at least a decade, priced network expansion, infrastructure return on investment, and data transmission into pricing formulas.  While data demands are increasing, the costs to meet those demands are, as Bell openly admits, declining.

What amount of revenue and profit has been earned from selling broadband service to Canadian consumers and the wholesale market and how does that compare to the dollar amount invested?  Bell Canada’s financial report for the third quarter of 2010 shows the company will earn an estimated $3.5 billion in revenue from its broadband Internet division alone.  Bell’s capital spending numbers also include network investments for its fiber to the neighborhood service, Fibe.  Bell’s revenue from selling the video side of that service were on track to deliver an additional $1.5 billion in revenue in 2010.  Not including the enormous wholesale broadband market, Bell will earn at least $5 billion a year from its broadband division.

In fact, Bell’s financial report also openly admits much of its capital spending increases have been spent on deploying its IPTV network Fibe in Ontario and Quebec, not on Internet backbone traffic management.

What are some of Bell’s biggest risks to a happy-clappy shareholder report for investors next quarter?  To quote:

• “Our ability to implement our strategies and plans in order to produce the expected benefits;
• Our ability to continue to implement our cost reduction initiatives and contain capital intensity;
• The potential adverse effects on our Internet and wireless businesses of the significant increase in broadband demand;
• Our ability to discontinue certain traditional services as necessary to improve capital and operating efficiencies;
• Regulatory initiatives or proceedings, litigation and changes in laws or regulations.”

Bibic

As for Bell’s claims about the “long distance analogy,” it’s only slightly ironic that a telecommunications company considers today’s voice networks radically different from data networks.  Analog transmission of voice calls went the way of the telegraph around a decade ago, with the last analog, step-by-step telephone switch in North America in Nantes, Quebec switched off in late 2001.  Today, telephone traffic is digital data, no different than any other kind of data transported across the country.

Bell cannot afford to have comparisons made between the telephone company’s move towards flat rate billing for phone calls and their broadband service moving away from it, because it torpedoes their entire argument.

Bibic then argues UBB is the right way to go because… major providers already charge it:

UBB has been the established framework for Internet services in Canada for years. Bell, for example, offers standard Internet service packages ranging from 25 gigabytes up to 75 gigabytes per month. As well, customers can sign up for 40 GB more for $5 per month, 80 GB for $10 or a whopping 120 GB more for $15. Keep in mind that 120 GB will get you 600 hours of standard definition video streaming or 100 hours of HD video streaming.

Not a bad deal when you consider average usage on our network is 16 GB per month and half of our customer base uses just five GB a month.

Most Canadians don’t see the “good deal” Bell says they will get from dramatically increased broadband prices. In fact, polls reveal the only groups in Canada that support such pricing are Big Telecom executives and the CRTC.

A new Angus Reid/Toronto Star poll illustrates what we’ve found to be true wherever ripoff “usage-based” pricing appears: people despise it, no matter how much Internet they use:

In the online survey of a representative national sample of 1,024 Canadian adults, three-in-four respondents (76%) disagree with the recent decision from the Canada Radio-television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), which set the stage to eliminate unlimited use plans.

Bibic can relax as long as the current panel of commissioners at the CRTC, largely drawn from telecommunications companies, remain in place.  They continue to agree with Bell’s point of view and ignore the citizens they are supposed to represent.

Verizon Wireless isn’t entirely rolling out the welcome mat for new iPhone customers.  PreventCAPS, one of our regular readers, dropped us a note indicating Verizon quietly added something new to the terms and conditions for new customers as of Feb. 3rd, which just so happens to coincide with the date the company started taking orders for the Apple iPhone — it reserves the right to throttle your speeds and “optimize” your browsing experience with caching and network management techniques that could reduce the quality of online videos and other bandwidth-intensive graphics.

Important Information about Verizon Wireless Data Plans and Features

As part of our continuing efforts to provide the best experience to our more than 94 million customers, Verizon Wireless is introducing two new network management practices.

We are implementing optimization and transcoding technologies in our network to transmit data files in a more efficient manner to allow available network capacity to benefit the greatest number of users. These techniques include caching less data, using less capacity, and sizing the video more appropriately for the device. The optimization process is agnostic to the content itself and to the website that provides it. While we invest much effort to avoid changing text, image, and video files in the compression process and while any change to the file is likely to be indiscernible, the optimization process may minimally impact the appearance of the file as displayed on your device. For a further, more detailed explanation of these techniques, please visit www.verizonwireless.com/vzwoptimization

If you subscribe to a Data Plan or Feature on February 3, 2011 or after, the following applies:

Verizon Wireless strives to provide customers the best experience when using our network, a shared resource among tens of millions of customers. To help achieve this, if you use an extraordinary amount of data and fall within the top 5% of Verizon Wireless data users we may reduce your data throughput speeds periodically for the remainder of your then current and immediately following billing cycle to ensure high quality network performance for other users at locations and times of peak demand. Our proactive management of the Verizon Wireless network is designed to ensure that the remaining 95% of data customers aren’t negatively affected by the inordinate data consumption of just a few users.

These kinds of “network management” techniques, which include speed throttles, reduced quality graphics, and caching (which can result in stale web pages being served to your mobile device), are all made possible by the Federal Communications Commission’s failure to implement Net Neutrality protections for wireless providers.  While Verizon stresses it will treat all content to the same network management techniques equally, the “improved” broadband experience Verizon claims to offer is more likely to improve the company’s bottom line from reduced spending on network upgrades.

Like most providers, Verizon isn’t willing to be specific about what amount of usage is likely to trigger the throttle, why it needs to be maintained for the remainder of the billing cycle even when network congestion is not a problem, and what speed customers will be stuck with for the rest of the month.

Broadband Reports reached out to Verizon for specifics and discovered the provider has not actually implemented these measures… yet:

“The notice yesterday simply reserves the right for new customers or renewing their contracts,” Verizon spokesman Jeffrey Nelson tells Broadband Reports. “We’re reserving the right to actively manage the network in specific ways should that need exist – and only for customers who are under contract that includes that provision,” he says. “Because this is down the road – if at all – it’s too early to tell what those triggers might be, or what throughput limitations would look like.”

Verizon may be concerned about the potential impact millions of data-craving iPhone customers will bring to its network in the coming weeks.  Existing customers with Android devices or Blackberry handsets are safe for now — the provision only impacts customers who sign new contracts as of last Thursday.

Verizon says it will retain its unlimited data option (with the right to throttle service) for a “limited time only.”

"It's like night and day."

Tim pays Time Warner Cable around $45 a month for 10/1Mbps service.  Jake pays Comcast $35 a month for 12/2Mbps service.  Neither reader of Stop the Cap! actually receives those speeds once the sun goes down, however.

Jake, who lives in a neighborhood near Philadelphia populated by loads of college students watches his download speed plummet to 4Mbps in the evening, even lower on weekends.  Tim, a reader in the North Ponds Park region of Webster, N.Y., does even worse — 1.2Mbps evenings and weekends.

Neither reader is alone.  The disparity in marketed speeds vs. actual speeds reveals the truth about cable modem technology — if not properly managed, congestion can bring the broadband party to a sudden halt (or at least rebuffering.)

Both are examples of “overselling,” the practice of piling too many customers onto too small a broadband pipe.  If nobody is using the connection in the neighborhood, speeds are great.  But as students get out of class and mom and dad get home from work, everyone wants to be online.  Soon enough, the pipeline gets filled and speeds drop as the network tries to accommodate everyone.

Most cable companies use fiber optics to bring a limited amount of bandwidth into individual areas of their network.  Some might cover the better part of a town, others only a few city blocks.  Every customer in the area shares that bandwidth.  Cable companies monitor these connections looking for signs they are becoming overcongested during peak usage times.  When those alarms start sounding consistently, companies are supposed to upgrade the area (or divide it up) to keep broadband service working close to advertised speeds.

But some companies are waiting until broadband service becomes practically unusable before spending the money to upgrade their networks.

“I knew they were overselling this area when I noticed downloads speeds fell off the cliff, but the upload speed was near normal,” Jake writes. “The time of day also tells the story.  Starting after 4pm, speeds begin to drop and become downright terrible after dinner and on weekends.  Sunday night is always the worst.”

It’s a similar story in west Webster, near Lake Ontario, where neighborhoods several miles apart all watch their Road Runner speeds slow to a crawl.

“Browsing is slow, downloads are painfully slow, latency is very high and streaming any sort of video online is impossible,” Robert, another Webster resident, told Time Warner Cable (and us).  “I have been a customer since 1998 and for me to not even be able to download at a 1 Megabit speed when this service is supposed to be 10 megs (and more with PowerBoost) is inexcusable.”

The problem of overselling is also common in larger cities like New York and Philadelphia, where some neighborhoods endure “broadband” speeds that resemble “dial-up” when customers pile on the network.

“Comcast says they never see a problem and have repeated that to me over and over, even when they send a truck out,” Jake tells Stop the Cap! “Of course, their truck rolls in the daytime when there isn’t a problem.”

Time Warner customers in eastern Monroe County have been told the cable company is well aware of the congestion problems, and technicians dispatched to area homes candidly admit the company has not kept up with the growth of new housing developments.  Several customers have asked for, and won, several months of service credits for broadband they simply cannot use.

Tim says the entire affair has left him with doubts about Time Warner’s reputation to provide quality broadband service.

“At one time, I considered myself a candidate to upgrade to Time Warner wideband when it became available,” he tells us. “My thinking on that has changed and I am looking into viable alternatives to Time Warner. Money has become of less importance to me than principle, and I may end up with a higher cost solution than staying with Time Warner.”

Ground Zero Bandwidth: The impacted area of Webster, N.Y.

With our encouragement, these customers (among others) have filed complaints with the Better Business Bureau and have tried to get attention focused on their neighborhoods.

A broadband speed test in Webster, N.Y.

A representative of Time Warner today told Robert the company has confirmed Webster has a problem and it is being worked on, but no specific date has been offered when things will return to normal.  He received a credit for one month of service.

Jake wants answers about how a company the size of Comcast can ignore a problem of this magnitude.

“Is it really about the money,” he asks.  “This company just bought NBC and doesn’t have the resources to sell Internet service that at least comes close to the speeds they advertise?”

Stop the Cap! advises customers with speed problems to make your feelings known.  The squeaky wheel gets the upgrade.  Start with customer service and work your way up.  Demand service credits, an in-person repair visit to check your lines, and then escalate complaints to supervisors and social media networks like Twitter and Facebook.  Also consider contacting local media “consumer reporters,” and file complaints with the Better Business Bureau.  Sooner or later, a manager will escalate your case to a department that is empowered to authorize upgrades without red tape.

Considering the enormous amount of revenue earned from selling broadband service, it is only fair to expect you will have access to something close to the speeds offered when you signed up.