South Korean broadband provider KT which was earlier in news for blocking the internet access for Samsung’s smart TVs is reportedly planning to charge YouTube and other bandwidth-heavy content providers a fee for data usage over its network to subsidize costly network upgrades.
“We want to set a rule that we can equally apply to every platform operator that offers data-heavy content as those services threaten to black out our network. They should pay for using our network,” Kim Taehwan, VP of KT’s smart network policy task force, told Reuters. “Once we set a rule with Samsung, we will apply it to other internet TV operators, be it Apple or Google.”
Having earlier establishing rules over smart TV, Taehwan added that the company’s focus will move to the data-heavy services which also include YouTube in its list. Well, interestingly, this lead to make us understand that what KT is planning or urging for – the company is looking out only for its “close benefits,” but what it seems to be missing out is its lead to consumers losing out on the services.
