Reply #33: Doubtful.

[Xithras]

AT&T is aware that cable has DSL beat in the performance, and that it's only market advantage at this point is DSL's lack of port blocking and dedicated per-user bandwidth. When a DSL customer orders a 5 megabit line, he knows that he'll have 5 megabits of throughput day or night, at noon or 5PM. This contrasts with cable in that cable systems are shared bandwidth networks...every download your neighbor makes reduces the throughput available to YOU. This is the only reason that DSL isn't dead. I use DSL because I can run my servers on it without AT&T complaining, and without worrying about bandwidth fluctuations and utilization issues throughout the day (Comcast flat out prohibits its customers from running personal email servers and web servers).

Besides, AT&T already does regulate the amount of throughput users get, based on their pricing plan. The cheapest $7 a month 512k DSL (don't bother looking, its not on their website...you have to call them to get info on it) has unlimited usage, but the 512k bandwidth cap limits the amount of data you can get anyway. The more you pay for your service, the more bandwidth you get and the more you can download. In that regard, DSL already has a limit similar to what is being proposed here. If AT&T were to implement an actual data limit ON TOP of that, they'd piss off all their customers.