Of course, this kind of scheme is exactly how nearly every cell phone plan in the United States works: you’re allowed a certain level of usage (minutes of talk time) at the fixed monthly rate, and if you exceed that level, you are metered and charged for your excess usage. Different plans allow for different levels of unmetered usage, which with cell phone plans is rather important, since the charges for usage over the limit are exorbitant.

Tim Lee: It’s only during periods of peak usage that the customer’s bandwidth uses has any marginal effect.

Every cell phone plan which offers unlimited nights and weekends already engages in this kind of time-based calculation.

I don’t think this sort of change would actually be much of a novelty for people who are used to buying telecommunications services.