UC
This week’s FCC chairman’s proposal for network neutrality rules endorses the idea that Internet service providers should have the ability to institute usage-based pricing models rather than flat-rate or capped services that are today the norm.
The battle lines over net neutrality have typically come down to those who favor a free and unfiltered Internet versus those who want to allow service providers freedom to prioritize their own services, restrict competing services, or bill based on usage. Should Internet service providers migrate to usage-based billing models, enterprise IT managers will have to rethink their teleworker plans in response to the likelihood of higher residential bandwidth costs. Those organizations that are extending high-bandwidth services such as video and backup to their home workers will have to adjust their cost models to account for the prospects of paying increasing access fees. Meanwhile, performance could suffer if providers rate limit non-premium services to prioritize their own video or application offerings.
Investigate technologies such as application optimization, desktop virtualization, and H.264 scalable video coding (SVC) for video conferencing to reduce bandwidth demands or the potential impacts of best-effort forwarding.
