Data-plan-based quality setting suggestions and use thereof to manage content provider services

摘要

A user device described herein suggests a change to a quality setting associated with the consumption of content from one or more content providers. The change is suggested based both on a user's data plan and on a service quality of content received by the user device. This user-selected quality setting is then provided to the telecommunication network, which reduces network resources available for transmission of the content based on the quality setting. Such reduced network resources cause the content providers to provide content at a service quality no greater than the quality setting. Also, the user may be presented with or defaulted to selecting an option for a program offering consumption of the video content free of charge when provided to the user at a limited service quality. When the user participates, consumption of video content is then conditionally excluded from a consumption metric of the data plan.