new exede customers, they have great prices on there packages, around three times the GB for the same money.appritiation for old cutomers

Bev,

There are two separate issues at play here.

First, the Great Gig Giveaway is simply aimed at lessening the pain of existing subscribers caused by the 6 month promotion to new customers (apparently on all beams) - it's a bone tossed to existing customers for 6 months (or less if I understand it). Even then, it's not available to all existing subscribers - for example, I've subscribed to first Wildblue and now Exede via the NRTC, and it's not even available to NRTC subscribers despite the fact that NRTC was one of the early investors in Wildblue helping to literally and figuratively get it off the ground  - not to mention the loyalty of those early NRTC subscribers who went through NRTC's and Wildblue's growing pains.

Undoubtedly after the 6 month promotional periods of double and triple data capacity,  those new customers will start showing up here complaining about their usage and have an even harder time living within their reduced data capacity having gorged themselves on that promotional data and being forced to go on a data diet or "buy more".

Secondly, the Freedom Plan (as well as the infrequently mentioned Evolution 20 Plan) target specific spot beams having under utilized capacity and apparently existing customers on those beams  can upgrade. When first announced, those beams included: 301, 322, 337, 341, 344 ,349, 350, 351, 357, 359, 360, 361, 363, 367, 368, and 370.

With a quick look at the Exede beam map (http://www.wildbluetools.com/content/dealer/email/Beam_map-high-mid-low.html), it's easy to see why those beams are under utilized - they're either very low density population areas representing inherently limited markets, or their high-density population areas having a wealth of internet access choices - e.g. New York City, Boston - not that anyone in either NYC or Boston would make a conscious decision to go with a satellite internet provider - although some might make an unconscious decision to do so. While there may be isolated pockets in those beams where a satellite internet provider may make sense, they are again very limited markets for Exede, and they're just trying to maximize utilization and profits - which indirectly is beneficial to us all. They do have to remain profitable. So it's really not premium space being sold, it's unused space. 

If Exede were to offer the new Freedom Plan to all existing subscribers, undoubtedly most of us would jump on it. Unfortunately everyone would quickly suffer the effects of congested beams. some of us can see the effects of congested beams right now when the late night free zone kicks in and everybody's scheduled downloads start. For me and for all intents and purposes the LNFZ doesn't actually start until around 3:00 AM when everybody's scheduled downloads near completion.  Until then, speeds are degraded, thereby explaining my hours and lack of sleep - I've given up on 12:00 AM to 3:00AM for the most part.  Some of us even view it is "deja vu" all over again, when Wildblue was oversold beyond its capacity but I think it's more that Viasat has learned from past mistakes in over subscibing/filling beams beyond their capacity.            

Sorry for the lengthy post - but 140 characters or less doesn't do it justice.

Back when Exede was first being rolled out, there was a three month period that Exede had major metering problems, and while they were working on a fix, there was no metering taking place, and we had unlimited data. That caused some severe overloads to the system, and I can remember that during the peak periods of the day, early afternoon until after 10 at night, speeds would drop to the 2 or 3 Mbps range, and not the 15 to 20 Mbps that were available during the other times. People were streaming like crazy, and thereby overloading many of the beams. And that data overload was happening back when Exede had 300,000 subscribers. Today, there are in excess of 650,000 subscribers, and that is why unlimited data just would not allow many of us in the more congested beams to get decent internet service. I do enjoy the speeds above 12 Mbps and have no desire to have lower speeds from Exede. We can all look forward to the launch of the new satellite in 2016, and the possibilities of higher data limits when that added capacity is in service.

There are currently many of the beams that are not available to add new customers because they are already nearing capacity at the current data plan offerings.