The other side of flat pricing in wireless internet

In this work we investigate a series of phenomena that can result from the flat pricing in the current wireless Internet service. First, we investigate the charging model of current wireless Internet service, especially the WiBro (wireless broadband) service, via which we present inherent problems that result from the flat pricing scheme. After that, we present an analytic model for the measurement of the negative consequences that arise from the flat pricing. To that purpose, we introduce the concept of utility as a measure of user´s satisfaction about the quality of the wireless Internet service, from which we derive a measure of user´s dissatisfaction about diminished achievable bandwidth due to overload of the wireless resource. Finally, we quantify the proportion of users who are dissatisfied by degraded QoE (quality of experience).