Unlimited Internet is a luxury most consumers expect, but data caps could be coming to every household in the near future.
As telecommunications giants Comcast and Time Warner Cable merge, customers should steel themselves for Comcast's relatively strict data caps, Gizmodo reported.
Most people don't know that Internet provider have data caps. But Time Warner Cable customers will go from having unlimited Internet to staying within the 300GB boundary set by Comcast, according to Gizmodo.
The company has been giving customers a cushion for now, simply issuing a warning when they exceed the 300GB threshold. But Comcast is implementing a penalty plan for subscribers who go over the limit: $10 for every 50GB over the allotted 300GB.
Already testing in major markets in Tennessee, Georgia, and Mississippi, the penalty will be further strengthened as Comcast adds 11 million broadband customers from the Time Warner Cable deal. The merger will let the company "push cap penalties even more aggressively," according to Gizmodo.
The culprits going over their data limit are usually heavy gamers, but that could change as streaming services become more common and take up more data.
"What happens three years from now when you're streaming 4K Netflix on your ultra high def television?" Gizmodo asked. "What happens as console gaming leans more and more heavily on downloadable content?" As more users leave cable behind, they could eventually be paying just as much for Internet.
The Time Warner Cable and Comcast merger spells trouble with the rest of providers as well since the penalty plan will "normalize" the data limit. Just as mobile phones have mostly left unlimited data behind, the days of boundless Internet access could be over soon as well.
Comcast recently announced the purchase of Time Warner Cable for $45.2 billion in an all-stock deal.
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