T-Mobile USA’s BingeOn is a smash hit. So what now?

T-Mobile USA's BingeOn gamble of removing video consumption from its subscribers' data bundles appears to be defying its critics, with large increases in mobile video viewing. The mobile network, a minnow in the US market that sees itself as the challenger brand, claims some users have doubled their usage, while one partner …

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite sure what your point is here.

Microsoft was immensely successful and is a convicted monopoly abuser. A blatant convicted monopoly abuser.

So, the fact that Microsoft's products were really popular means that they can do whatever they like?

Abuse of market position is not just about satisfying the consumer, it's about controlling what a natural monopoly can do with respect to other suppliers.

Congratulating T-Mobile for having a lot of happy customers is great for them. Not so much for everyone else.

[Anonymous Coward]

But T-Mobile is not a monopoly in US...

And has no chance of becoming one. Ever.

[Anonymous Coward]

There must be a victim somewhere...anywhere..anybody?

Not sure what your point is regarding "everyone else". How is anyone worse off?

Are you referring to customers of other carriers on long contracts that can't churn to such a wonderful offer? Other T-Mobile customers that choose not to "binge" and may have their own HD bandwidth-guzzling slightly impaired by the greater quantity but lower bit rate bingers? Or just the masses for whom the lack of a victim throws their moral compass into a spin?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: There must be a victim somewhere...anywhere..anybody?

> Not sure what your point is regarding "everyone else"

All other suppliers of video of course.

We tend to think entirely in terms of the consumer.

But video suppliers are "people" too.

Net neutrality is primarily about the business end and affects the consumer as a consequence if it affects their experience.

Everyone knows what is going on. Cable and wireless are seeing huge upheavals of business model.

All the current incumbent players are scrambling to see who will emerge as the next monopoly incumbents.

It's good for the monopolies to be shaken up once in a while, but let's not make the same mistakes from the past that lead us to this situation in the first place.

[Charles 9]

The main reason for the complaints has been that BingeOn picks winners. It says these servers are free while the rest eat into your data allowance. That's discrimination and against Net Neutrality.

[Andrew Orlowski]

"BingeOn picks winners"

Er, no. T-Mobile would be clobbered if it did, and refused access to good faith, credible video services. It's open to all. YouTube isn't being discriminated against - it just refuses to take part, therefore it is "discriminating" against itself.

Nice example of the FUD people seem to repeat, though.

[Charles 9]

Ever thought Google and YouTube refuse to participate because there are strings attached?

[Andrew Orlowski]

Like...?

Other than the downsampling trade off, I can't think of one. Perhaps you can name it?

Video services give up control over display resolution on mobile devices, on the 4th largest mobile network, in return for a shot at a larger market. Netflix and HBO are pretty happy to take up that deal. And Netflix is one of the biggest whiners about Net Neutrality, if not the biggest.

[Anonymous Coward]

> - it just refuses to take part, therefore it is "discriminating" against itself.

Well, connecting to the Internet and sending packets to a customer *is* taking part.

Didn't you get the memo? The Internet is a data pipe.

YouTube are being told, sign up or your packets get it.

It that's not blatent interference with TCP streams based on the source I don't know what is.

The naivety is really quite staggering.

We do have some interesting analogues in the UK actually.

For just the same reasons, you can't offer rebates for cash while advertising zero-rate credit, because everyone knows what it really means.

[frank ly]

Free is good?

If many people on the same mobile network are getting 'free' mobile video, isn't that a strain on the network, giving poor quality for the video and poor delivery for other applications? Does anyone have experience of this service?

[brainbone]

Clarity

"Tech blogs took up the cry - although it wasn’t clear exactly why"

You damn well know why: It's because zero rating one video service over another is anti-competitive. Video services that are unable to implement adaptive bit-rate are automatically excluded. It allows the ISP to pick winners and losers rather than the free market. It reduces competition in the (in this case, video streaming) market. Reduced competition is ALWAYS bad for consumers.

On top of that, T-mobile's rules for binge-on are not exactly clear. For example: Why isn't YouTube part of the zero-rating, even though t-mobile has demonstrated they already can and do throttle it? How about services such as Plex, TabloTV, HDHomeRun PVR, etc., that allow you to stream media you already own, like recorded TV, etc., directly from your own home internet connection? There is no clear way for t-mobile to be able to detect and throttle that kind of service, putting such services at a disadvantage.

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: Clarity

"You damn well know why: It's because zero rating one video service over another is anti-competitive"

You obviously think so. We have lots of rules to judge whether an actor is being anti-competitive - on none of them does a) the 4th largest player in the market (ie, the smallest national mobile network) introducing a b) opt-out service, which c) doesn't block anyone meet these criteria.

Europe decided that the best way to deal with anti-competitive telcos is empirically, through the precedents, case law etc of antitrust. Not a random, make-it-up-as-well-go-along neutrality smell test.

What your comment really illustrates is that neutrality is about control, not actually remedying or regulating the market.

[brainbone]

Re: Clarity

What part of arbitrary, non-universal, zero-rating are you having trouble understanding? Do you not get that it favors one service over another? Do you not get that practice will spread to other ISPs? Are you really that naive?

It doesn't matter that consumers want it. You can convince consumers that Homeopathy works and should be paid for by their insurance -- doesn't mean it's a good thing.

[Tom 13]

@Andrew Orlowski

That assessment is both harsh and wrong. And I say that as someone who regards the freetards promoting net neutrality as the sort of vermin who cause one to shoot first and asks questions later.

While I concur the potential damage from T-Mobile itself is limited, if the same thing were applied by the big US providers for only their own content, the potential market distortions are more easily seen. Maybe that's difficult for a Brit like you to see because in the US, anti-trust is about method, not market share. So if the FCC, FTC, and Courts hold it isn't a violation for T-Mobile, it follows that it isn't a violation for the big US providers either.

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: @Tom13

"So if the FCC, FTC, and Courts hold it isn't a violation for T-Mobile, it follows that it isn't a violation for the big US providers either."

No, sorry. Antitrust has never worked like that. It's triggered by market share, and evidence of market distortion. Always has been. No Court has ever followed that logic.

See my a) b) and c) above. BingeOn just doesn't trigger competition issues. The fact it triggers a witchcraft panic tells you more about the witchhunters than it does about the nature of the witchiness that they object to.

I've listed things in the past that the US consumer can do to get a better more competitive market. Competition legislation is definitely one of them, particularly at the state level. Organising mass switching is another - you only get better service if you threaten to leave. People seem to be too lazy to do this and wish the Gubberment would just wave a magic wand and fix everything.

So this is all about control. The absence of rational standards for fighting anti-competitive behaviour, and the insistence instead on random witchfinding, means Net Neutrality is becoming a revolutionary cause that is devouring its own children. No Net Neutrality revolutionary wants to be seen to be 'soft', and face be denounced by his comrades as a sell out, so the onus is on finding witchiness in places nobody else has yet been able to find it.

Where strong Net Neutrality has been passed, ISPs can't differentiate themselves on speed or quality (bad, illegal, burn the witch) so a bad market becomes even worse. We know how this story ends.

[Anonymous Vulture]

Real world trumps philosophy once again

So the punters like it, T-Mobile likes it, the partner websites like it, and even the non-partner websites are seeing increased traffic. I think the net neutrality camp, the Google oriented lobbyist organizations and just the sundry part-time technology philosophers on their blogs, are going to find themselves in the ideological wilderness with Richard Stallman.

BingeOn might not be in compliance with your philosophical beliefs, but the punters have voted with their time, money, and bandwidth. Pure ideology is never going to win against that particular opponent.

[AdamWill]

Sigh, you really do protest too much, Andrew.

The reason this is bad is perfectly simple: it establishes the principle of a two-tier system. Once you get that in the door, it's very hard for anyone to later complain when they change the 'details' of the system.

So of course they introduce it with 'details' that seem nice and unthreatening: instead of charging more for things outside the scheme, we're charging less for things inside the scheme! Isn't that nice? Charging less is always good, right? We're not even charging partners to sign up! See, it's free! Who could possibly complain about free?

Well, the problem is the pricing numbers are just numbers. Once they've got the trojan horse in the gate, they can twiddle the numbers any damn time they like. Two years down the road the scheme will cover a lot more large, rich companies, but suddenly you'll be paying twice as much for data outside the 'scheme'. But who cares, right? All your tweetfaces are inside the scheme! A bit later they'll make some mumbly noises about overheads and start charging providers to join the scheme, but who cares, right? We can still see our tweetfaces for free!

Then just wait until they need a revenue injection and start re-introducing charging for data within the scheme...and oh look, we've got the differential pricing that was supposed to not be allowed in the first place.

There's an argument of course that there's nothing really wrong with allowing this sort of tomfoolery in a reasonable simulacrum of a free market. AOL and Compuserve got competed out of existence, we didn't need laws for that. But cellular network markets are rarely particularly good examples of ideal capitalism.

[PghMike]

Binge-on obviously doesn't violate net neutrality

The 480p that video gets reduced to is still better than decent quality, and it's very nice to be able to watch Netflix or whatever even when your hotel Wifi is crap.

No one is being held up for cash to get binge-on's benefits, and users can disable it if they want. As far as I can tell, it is just an automated tool to do something that I used to wish to be able to do anyway: reduce the bandwidth used by a video stream when using 3G/4G/LTE.

The risk of violating net neutrality is that smaller companies might not be able to afford to pay off someone like Verizon for good access to its customers. That's not a problem here -- anyone can participate in Binge-on, and it doesn't cost the server's company any extra money.

[brainbone]

Re: Binge-on obviously doesn't violate net neutrality

"No one is being held up for cash to get binge-on's benefits, and users can disable it if they want."

That the service does not and cannot include all video services immediately means that is DOES violate net neutrality. It picks winners. Services that are unable to be included in Binge-On are automatically put at a disadvantage.

If T-Mobile included an open API that allowed services and customers to automatically request that traffic to/from specific addresses/ports be throttled and zero-rated on a per customer and per service basis, then, and only then, could it avoid being anti-competitive. But then T-Mobile would complain that the API could be abused for non-video traffic -- and it would be abused -- so, no Binge-On then.

[Vector]

"YouTube owner Google has grumbled about being optimised down to 480 pixels"

Now, granted, my eyes are not what they once were, but fer gawd's sake, 480p on a 4 or 5 inch screen is easily good enough to watch video. I even happily watch at that resolution on my 10 inch tablet. It's not like T-Mo users have no choice; they can turn off Binge-On and get whatever resolution they like (while sucking their data allocation dry [in about 4 hours]). The reality is that minimally acceptable resolution at a drastically reduced bit-rate is a big win on a metered connection. That some of that video doesn't count against the meter is a bonus.

Give it a rest Google.

[Nate Amsden]

i think most people don't care

I'd wager most people don't care enough to know or see that it is 480i. A lot of content on youtube is crappy quality anyway (because of how it was recorded, nothing related to youtube itself).

It wouldn't surprise me either if customers liked it more because it runs faster too, less bandwidth required means streaming video buffers less and provides a more smooth experience.

The ones that really care about quality are probably not using t-mobile to begin with (and are ok with paying significantly higher fees as a result).

Since video consumption is up, or so they claim it seems people like it. It's good that you can turn the feature off (and pay for more data), though it would be nicer if it was easier to access this (I read you have to login to the t-mobile account page and change it there). Having it as a default doesn't seem like a bad idea to me anyway (I use AT&T so probably pay triple what the average t-mobile customer pays though my employer covers the tab). I wouldn't use t-mobile on service coverage area alone.

If AT&T did it then I would figure out how to login to my account page and disable the feature. No need to whine.

[scrubber]

Finally, a genuine slippery slope fallacy

There are genuine arguments for net neutrality: the blocking/restricting of views contrary to the service provider or the sale of access to consumers, but bingeon is clearly not that. To ban this service on the basis that it somehow restricted freedom of speech is to say people are so stupid they can't tell the difference between a voluntary segregation of video quality in exchange for increased quantity of video and the start of a move towards the great firewall of China as policed by corporate America.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Finally, a genuine slippery slope fallacy

"To ban this service on the basis that it somehow restricted freedom of speech is to say people are so stupid they can't tell the difference between a voluntary segregation of video quality in exchange for increased quantity of video and the start of a move towards the great firewall of China as policed by corporate America."

Be careful what you say. People could actually BE too stupid. I mean, look at history. The rise of the Nazis through today's American political campaign and Donald "I could shoot somebody and people would still vote for me" Trump.

[Queasy Rider]

Re: Finally, a genuine slippery slope fallacy

I just want to slip this obvious prediction in before anybody else. If Trump loses the Republican nomination, some unimaginative editor of a magazine, newspaper or tv spot will lead with the headline, "You're Fired" and if he wins, "You're Hired."

No groaning out there, folks, we all know that it's coming.

[Adam 52]

Popularity doesn't make something any more or less wicked.

The issue is presumably long-term, when the current packages are replaced, users have become conditioned to some providers being high quality and others not. Then content providers will have the choice - be a "partner", with whatever golden handcuffs come with the partnership, or be low-res.

[Paul Shirley]

unfair hybrid charging

Of course "the people" jump on board free stuff. They always do and rarely consider the implications.

What this firmly establishes is the networks are grossly overcharging for data. Net neutrality means all data is the same, zero rated video means average prices are massively lower for some users than others.

I can accept flat rate pricing (with some conditions to make it fairer), I can grit my teeth and accept non discriminatory fixed rates for raw pipes. This hybrid crap is worse than both, unfair and removing any competitive pressure to just charge a fair profit margin equally across users.

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: unfair hybrid charging

All data isn't "the same" though. People don't actually want all data to be "the same", and would riot if it was treated as such.

So you've just created a rule, a standard, whatever you want to call it, that real world networks, and users don't want.

[Charles 9]

Re: unfair hybrid charging

People don't want their data to be the same...until it's the other guy's data that's the winner. Since you can't pick winners without complaints, the only way to be fair is to pick no winner at all. That way, at worst, everyone complains but at least they're on the same boat.

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: unfair hybrid charging

"People don't want their data to be the same...until it's the other guy's data that's the winner."

Networks try really hard to do this as fairly as possible - but they have never *not* discriminated at all. They have to discriminate on service, or the internet wouldn't work.

BingeOn may be uncompetitive if it excluded particular services or companies, but it doesn't. It offers the consumer a quality-price trade off that they seem really happy with.

I am enjoying it all enormously, because critics are simultaneously complaining that they can't get in, but once they're in, it's the end of the world.

Now Google the phrase: "The food is terrible and such small portions"

[captain veg]

Re: unfair hybrid charging

> People don't actually want all data to be "the same"

I rather think that they do. I know that I do. Before Free Mobile came along, all the French operators tried to impose limits on what you could use your data connection for. It was mad. Unlimited emails, but strictly capped web browsing. Except no tethering allowed. Bizarrely, Usenet specfically outlawed. Any ports not used for web and email and the like blocked completely. How can a protocol or port number affect their cost of transmission? Why should it make the slightest, um, bit of difference what I use the bits for? Moreover, what happens when a new protocol emerges, or an old one is repurposed?

The only thing I want is a big pipe, and I'm prepared to pay a fair price for it. What I do with what comes down it is my business.

Sorry Andrew, this another one of your high horses that needs to be put out to pasture.

-A.

[Tom 13]

Re: What this firmly establishes

No it doesn't.

The price for using the service is significantly reduced quality of image. Yes, it's good enough for a cell phone or tablet but still significantly reduced from posted quality. When coupled with the caching in which T-Mobile is engaging, the cost to the company isn't the same as it would be without the service. Furthermore, there's insufficient data about the long term effects of profitability of this service. Honestly, here in the US if you aren't on Verizon or AT&T for wireless service, it's pretty much crap. So we don't know anything about how sustainable such a service would be if they had either a) the geographic coverage needed to be a proper supplier or b) the rate of subscription either of the major players has.

The truth of the matter is that unless everyone is paying for their particular mix of speed and amount of data consumed, we'll never get an accurately shaped service market. And it doesn't matter how much you "dislike" that fact.

[Florida1920]

The moral of the story

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

[Charles 9]

Re: The moral of the story

Bandwidth is a limited resource, especially wireless (which raises physical limitations). You either ration ALL or ration NONE; otherwise, you're picking winners which isn't fair.

[Tom 13]

Re: a limited resource, especially wireless

Wireless is actually the example that most proves Andrew's point that all Net Neutrality advocates are Holier Than Thou freetards out to control the interwebs.

For precisely the reason that there are physical limitations and bandwidth is limited, certain data DOES need to be prioritized over other. Voice being the most obvious type of data that needs to be prioritized, and events like blizzards and 9/11 being the most obvious examples of times that prioritization is even more critical.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: a limited resource, especially wireless

> For precisely the reason that there are physical limitations and bandwidth is limited, certain data DOES need to be prioritized over other. Voice being the most obvious type of data that needs to be prioritized, and events like blizzards and 9/11 being the most obvious examples of times that prioritization is even more critical

That's called QoS and is established good practice.

What is not QoS and is most certainly bad practice is making that distinction between the same types of traffic but different companies supplying it. I really don't understand why people don't understand the difference. It's exasperating.

Yes, VOIP requires timely delivery but will tolerate loss. File transfers do not require timely delivery but will definitely *not* tolerate loss (yes, TCP will retransmit but it bugger's your throughput).

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: a limited resource, especially wireless

Thanks Tom 13 - there's a strong overlap between "copyfighters" and neutralists, for sure.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

If you’re not inclined to be polite, you could say use of the word ‘throttling’ is emotive and misleading, and designed to alarm the technically illiterate.

On the contrary, "throttling" is the straight-forward and accurate word. An "emotive" (and not polite) term might be "mafia-style": it would be a shame if anything happened to those lovely bit-streams of yours. There is no optimisation, only throttling: if you try to use more than the bandwidth limit they have set for video, your stream will be throttled, whether you or your customer want it to be or not.

There are many neutral ways to offer the service, such that it would work just as well for the users but conform to net neutrality. See Professor van Schewick's report to the FCC for some examples.

[Charles 9]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

Just curious. As someone noted, without some kind of vetting (which then breaks neutrality), you could have people cheating. How do you stay neutral AND simultaneously guard against cheating?

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

Throttling is something you do to kill something. T-Mobile is evdidently not killing video.

T-Mobile here is attempting to find a middle ground that maximises welfare for the largest number of users with a finite resource. It isn't going to please everyone, but "murdering", "throttling" is clearly not applicable.

You need to be more specific about what neutrality means here. The problem with Professor von Shriek, is that it means whatever she wants it to mean at any moment. And if something smells bad to her, it isn't neutral. Like witchcraft, then.

[Charles 9]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

It's simple. No picking winners. You handle all data equally, regardless of what anyone else says. If you run out of space, you split the difference evenly across all contenders. That's the only way to be fair, and if your data model doesn't like it, tough shakes and get in the queue. It's the ONLY way to be honestly fair.

[FatGerman]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

"It's simple. No picking winners. You handle all data equally, regardless of what anyone else says. If you run out of space, you split the difference evenly across all contenders. That's the only way to be fair, and if your data model doesn't like it, tough shakes and get in the queue. It's the ONLY way to be honestly fair."

Total utopian bollocks. In what world is it fair that my realtime-dependant streaming service should get the same priority as Johnny Nobend uploading pictures of his dinner to Facebook? Dumbly saying "hey man we're all the same" demonstrates a head-in-the-sand approach to solving a very complex technical problem. The Fair way is to analyse the way your customers use your service and come up with a solution that allocates bandwidth intelligently so that everyone receives *a good service* all the time. Which is what T-Mobile have done.

They understand they don't have enough bandwidth for everyone to stream all the video they want. They realise that that 'buffering' symbol is something nobody ever wants to see. So they've come up with something that reduces the amount of bandwidth required - by reducing the quality - and in return for opting in to the service they give something back - unlimited use. Everybody wins. Except that some people - users and providers - decide this is "unfair" and refuse to support the service, thus ruining it for everyone. Who's being unfair now?

[Charles 9]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

"Total utopian bollocks. In what world is it fair that my realtime-dependant streaming service should get the same priority as Johnny Nobend uploading pictures of his dinner to Facebook?"

Yes, because the Internet is NOT designed that way (it's designed for robustness, NOT latency). If you need low-latency networking that badly, plunk down for your own specialized infrastructure the way we used to do it. That's why dedicated carriers like UPS have their own vehicle fleets, including airplanes, so they're not beholden to third-party couriers.

[FatGerman]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

"Yes, because the Internet is NOT designed that way (it's designed for robustness, NOT latency). If you need low-latency networking that badly, plunk down for your own specialized infrastructure the way we used to do it. That's why dedicated carriers like UPS have their own vehicle fleets, including airplanes, so they're not beholden to third-party couriers."

We're not talking about the internet. We're talking about the mobile network, which is T-Mobile's own infrastructure. The bandwidth problem exists there. They can't improve the technology, because it's 3G, or 4G, or whatever, so they have to make the best use of what the technology allows. And it's not necessarily low-latency that's required, just a connection that doesn't get interrupted by traffic that could be interrupted without the user even noticing.

[Charles 9]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

What about more towers and backhaul to reduce congestion?

[Tom 13]

Re: Everybody wins.

Not necessarily.

Yes, as currently implemented by T-Mobile, it is unlikely to have adverse affects. But the sample size is to small and to short to extend over time. But I can see implementation schemes that are little different than what T-Mobile has done which WOULD have adverse effects on content producers.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

The Fair way is to analyse the way your customers use your service and come up with a solution that allocates bandwidth intelligently so that everyone receives *a good service* all the time. Which is what T-Mobile have done.

No, that isn't what T-Mobile have done. If that is what they had wanted to do, they could have done it and remained neutral. For example, they could have made the first 1.5 Mbps of traffic free, whatever that traffic is, and whomever it is to or from. Or various more complex but still neutral forms (seriously, either read van Schewick's report or, at least, read something like the Techdirt summary of it).

The non-neutral aspects are: (i) having a club of sources who's traffic is free but for which they have to pay (not in cash, today, but in following various rules and signing legal contracts - do you think that they are allowed to criticise T-Mobile, for example?), and (ii) restricting traffic based on what content is being carried (i.e. by throttling all video).

[Andrew Orlowski]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

"It's simple. No picking winners."

T-Mobile hasn't picked winners. That's the point. But it's still declared witchy, and evil, and must be stopped.

"You handle all data equally"

#facepalm

[TallGuy]

Re: "Throttling" is the "nice" word for it

The meaning of bandwidth throttling in this context is limiting the throughput for a certain use, which is exactly what T-Mobile is doing in this case. As far as I understood, if BingOn is enabled and video is detected, the bandwidth for that particular connection is limited to what's needed for 480p.

It does not 'kill' video, but it does impact ALL video, even the services not subscribed to it.

Personally, I wouldn't have a problem with it if it only affected the zero-rated services. Unfortunately, it doesn't do that, and all your video services will be limited to 480p when BingOn is enabled.

If you only care about the zero-rated services it's definitely a win. If you want other services at normal quality it's not.

NOTE: This is from reading various pieces on BingeOn. I don't live in the US, and don't have a T-Mobile LTE myself.

[captain veg]

Re: Throttling is something you do to kill something.

Alarmist bollox. The right-hand pedal in your motor car is the throttle. It doesn't kill anyone.

-A.

[Queasy Rider]

Can I do this?

So my allowance now is 5Gb. I would normally spread that around numerous sites, grabbing videos here and there till I ran out. Now, what is to stop me from Binging till my eyes bulged, then turning it off and continuing on to the non-favoured sites and still downloading a further 5Gb. And if T-Mobile don't allow you to shift in the middle of a payment period, how about alternating, one month on, one month off. That would certainly work for me. And I agree with the previous posters, 480p is plenty for the YouTube crap that I download.

[Anonymous Coward]

Mobile Video Use

The key here is they are talking about mobile users watching video on tiny screens where anything regardless of resolution looks like the same tiny postage stamp of a picture.

This would never sell to home users watching on their PC's and big screens.

Sadly the younger generation will buy this just like they did the de-hifi-zation of music with mobiles and earbuds.

[Aedile]

From the EFF's research:

"Our last finding is that T-Mobile’s video “optimization” doesn’t actually alter or enhance the video stream for delivery to a mobile device over a mobile network in any way. 2 This means T-Mobile’s “optimization” consists entirely of throttling the video stream’s throughput down to 1.5Mbps. If the video is more than 480p and the server sending the video doesn’t have a way to reduce or adapt the bitrate of the video as it’s being streamed, the result is stuttering and uneven streaming—exactly the opposite of the experience T-Mobile claims their “optimization” will have.

Given the difference between what T-Mobile implies they do and what we found, we contacted them to get clarification. They confirmed that they don’t do any actual optimization of video streams other than reducing the bandwidth allocated to them (and relying on the provider to notice, and adapt the bitrate accordingly).

T-Mobile has claimed that this practice isn't really "throttling," but we disagree. It's clearly not "optimization," since T-Mobile doesn't alter the actual content of the video streams in any way. Even the term "downgrading" is inaccurate, because that would mean video streams are simply being given a lower priority than other traffic. If that were true, then in the absence of higher priority traffic, videos should stream at the same throughput as any other content. But that's not the case: our tests show that video streams are capped at around 1.5Mbps, even when the LTE connection and the rest of T-Mobile's network can support higher throughput between the customer and the server."

So unless you subscribe to some odd definition of throttling (IE is something you do to kill something) then T-Mobile IS throttling (TallGuy has the correct definition).

So they are throttling. Even this wouldn't be an issue if:

1. When Binge-On is enabled and you're downloading from a non-partner your video wasn't throttled and it still counted against your data caps.

2. T-Mobile wasn't obscuring what they were doing.

3. It was opt in. Instead it is opt out and as such customers with unlimited plans are being affected by the throttling until they disable Binge-On.

So what about the slippery slope? The concern is that while Binge-On is currently free it would be trivial for it to stop being so. If it isn't protested now zero rating could become the status quo and that much harder to roll back later.