Verizon plays coy with bandwidth caps

Verizon has no plans to implement consumption-based bandwidth caps on its Internet service - but left the door open to pursuing that option under certain circumstances. In remarks Tuesday at a National Association of Broadcasters panel discussion, Link Hoewing, assistant vice president for Internet and technology issues at Verizon (Verizon's point man for lobbying Capitol Hill), said he didn't want to "predict the future" but that currently selling flat-rate speeds without bandwidth caps was doing well in the marketplace, while cable companies had "network constraints," among other issues which lead them to caps. Hoewing went deeper into the usage caps issue in a Thursday blog post, trying to frame the issue as market experimentation in highly competitive markets to figure out what consumers want and don't want, with broadband providers "testing consumers reactions."