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High-speed Internet
access was once the sole experience of the wealthy, college
student or ISP. As advances in technology have been made,
the speed offered to the consumer has increased by leaps and
bounds. Wireless is one of the fastest access methods available
to the consumer anywhere in the world. We are extremely proud
to be able to bring high-speed wireless to the communities
we serve.
Many high-speed services
are marketed in such a way that the consumer gets the impression
they will have access to unlimited bandwidth, only to find
that they are very often restricted to less than was implied.
In the process of delivering Internet access to our customers,
the one variable cost we have is the bandwidth that connects
our ISP to the Internet. As we grow in size, we must add additional
pipes to the outside net in order to meet demand. As we roll
our higher speed services, we will continue to add additional
capacity to the Net.
A T1 connection of
bandwidth costs between $800-$1600 per month depending on
what part of the country you live in. It is unreasonable to
think that for $50-$100 a month, a consumer will have the
ability to use the capacity of T1 and not incur the costs
associated with that level of usage.
Our usage statistics
show that on average our customers spend an hour a day using
the Internet. These customers would benefit greatly from higher
speed access, as it would allow them to accomplish more in
that one hour than they can with a dial-up account. To rephrase
it, you don't need more bandwidth, you need greater speed.
In order to provide
high-speed services at an affordable cost, we will issue and
continue to develop a "Sensible Bandwidth Policy". The intention
of this policy is to make sure that the customer base understands,
that by subscribing to ShockWare's high-speed wireless service
they gain access to an Internet system that would allow them
to consume considerable volumes of bandwidth. As was stated
earlier, after establishing the connection to the customer,
this is the one area where our costs are variable, and heavy
usage by one customer on a high-speed link can use an amount
of bandwidth that costs far more than the $50-$100 they are
paying.
Our average user uses
approximately 1 Gig per month. Customers that display excessive
usage will be asked to curtail that usage and/or convert to
a metered plan that is priced to reflect the usage of Bandwidth
they consume. As for now, ShockWare reserves the right to
determine that the user is at a reasonable level and enforce
an excessive rate of $10.00 per/Gig. It is ShockWare's wish
to not have to enforce this requirement if the user stays
to a reasonable level, but once again ShockWare reserves the
right to determine if a user is operating at a reasonable
usage level.
High-speed
Internet has opened up the world of music in ways that we
couldn't have imagined. Enjoy downloading music from the net,
however we request that you turn off your sharing of music
with others through the Internet. Our service is not designed
to have your computer operating as a music server for others
across the world. Doing this compromises the speeds that we
can deliver to all of our residential and corporate clients.
ShockWare
is of the belief that on occasion a user will exceed the normal
levels and other occasions when the user will remain below
the normal level. We do not wish to penalize a user by charging
extra fees when past months have indicated usage levels within
a reasonable range.
We believe that high-speed
access to the Internet is something most people will use reasonably,
and this has been proven by other Wireless Internet Service
Providers ("WISPs") in the past. By requiring heavy users
to pay for that usage, ShockWare is better able to supply
a consistent high-speed connection to the majority that use
our system sensibly.
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