The Internet Reacts To NBN CEO Blaming Gamers For Congestion

[Len]

A parliamentary hearing in Sydney got an extra touch of spice yesterday, after the chief executive of NBN Co appeared to finger one group of users supposedly responsible for congestion on NBN's fixed wireless network: gamers.

The outgoing CEO, who is due to step down before the end of the year, announced that NBN was investigating a "fair use" policy that would throttle data usage for the heaviest users on the fixed wireless network.

In remarks that were reported by the ABC and The Guardian, Bill Morrow initially explained that there was a group of users that were consuming "terabytes" of data. When asked by Labor shadow regional communications minister Stephen Jones to explain who these extreme users were, the NBN chief replied that they were "gamers predominately, on fixed wireless".

"While people are gaming it is a high bandwidth requirement that is a steady streaming process," the Guardian reported Mr Morrow as saying. The NBN chief was also quoted as saying "while people are gaming it is a high bandwidth requirement that is a steady streaming process".

Morrow later tried to refocus his comments on the "super users out there consuming terabytes of data", and added that he did not have the behavioural data on hand to confirm those super users were actually gamers.

And like clockwork, the internet had a field day. Users in particular focused on Morrow's point about the amount of data used while playing games, a contention that doesn't seem supported by imagery on NBN Co's own website:
 

Others focused on breaking down the raw data used by various applications, while others expressed their dismay at Morrow's previous public assertions.