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Netflix does offer something similar to ISPs so they don't need to route all that traffic over the backbones, but since Netflix charges a fee to maintain the cache system, ISPs don't want it.

Untrue. The CDNs are provided by Netflix for free.

ISPs can directly connect their networks to Open Connect for free. ISPs can do this either by free peering with us at common Internet exchanges, or can save even more transit costs by putting our free storage appliances in or near their network.

The ISPs are refusing because many of them also operate cable companies/online services *cough*Hulu*cough* that compete with Netflix.

Netflix has its own CDN! They are a large enough streaming provider it made sense to create their own CDN and they even made it open for other services. They're already peering on Google fiber and a host of non-US ISP's. It's only the big US ISP's that are refusing to play ball and insist Netflix pay extra for a service that would actually save them money in peering fees. Their only reason for doing this is to make their competing streaming offering more desirable.

about netflix.

http://blog.netflix.com/2014/0...
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+J...

Wow, I think I just felt two brain vessels pop from the sheer concentration of stupidity and lies.

So you can get your so claimed non-existent caching servers right here
https://www.netflix.com/openco...

You could also get free peering agreements with netflix, with more info at that same URL.
If offering free peering is being assholes about things however, I'd hate to see the cruel names you throw out at netflix when your own ISP tells you to go fuck yourself with your netflix peer...

If your ISP can't afford the internet bandwidth for one copy of a stream, in order to send that cached copy to each and every one of their customers an infinite amount of times... Well hopefully you can see why the ISP would get the blame here.

Also you really should do something about the guys in your home holding a gun to your head and forcing you to demand netflix send data to you. Would you like us to contact the police for you?

You have a choice. A T1 will give you guaranteed 1.5MB service 24/7 which is what you seem to think DSL/Cable should provide you. The cheapest I've ever seen a T1 go for was $200/month (and that's insanely cheap and only given to companies that order dozens or more) So if you want to pay $200 a month for 1.5mb/sec go right ahead. You wont be streaming HD content over that though.

However, if you do not want guaranteed speeds but a lower price, that's what DSL and Cable is for. You have a max speed, but if everyone jumps on at the same time it's going to slow down. That's how the tech works. No ISP on earth will give a residential customer with a single line guaranteed 15mb/sec 24/7 for less than a couple of grand a month. You seem to be complaining about their advertising. Go right ahead, but the idea that advertising is misleading and untruthful isn't a new concept. Does your car get the MPG the tag claimed? I sure it would if you only drove it in June and stayed under 20mph. Lobby your congressman for some "Truth in advertising" laws. People have been asking for that since the founding of the country so don't hold your breath.

With regards to Neflix's joke "Cache" servers...
First read point #1 of their guidelines:

General Requirements

        The ISP network must be located in or connected to the same peering locations as the Netflix network (AS2906).

Then click on the link to see where their peering locations are:
https://www.netflix.com/openco...

To save you time... there are none. It's complete bullshit. They don't even provide the equipment anymore because no-one would except their guidelines. If you know anything about enterprise networking, the legal ramifications of agreeing to their terms, etc... you'd pretty quickly realize the entire thing is a load of crap setup for PR. No ISP would agree to the terms even if they still offered the service. Especially when netflix could take any one of the hundreds of open source media caching code, put it into their software and be done with it. They're already using MS silverlight for christs sake. It would be so simple for them to change. The effect on their customers local ISP issues would be immediate and dramatic.

Have your local ISP sign up for Netflix's Open Connect caching box.

https://www.netflix.com/openco...

.. netflix also works on any modern SmartTV, xbox, a fricking $35 chromecast dongle, Rokus and any number of other media boxes. It runs on pretty much anything with internet connection and RCA/HDMI connector
https://www.netflix.com/Watch?...

Even Amazon VOD and Vudu have more cross platform clients than iTunes.

Worse than that, Itunes is the most guilty at perpetuating price discrimination over international borders, a DVD that costs US$15 in the US costs US$25-30 in Australia.

Thats one of the reasons DVD's are still around (well the number 1 reason is people still buy them). I really don't want DVD to go anywhere as I can buy DVD's from the UK or US for almost half the price after shipping (DVD's fall under the tax free import threshold in Oz). A lot of the services like Netflix and Amazon VOD aren't available here in Australia due to predatory licensing agreements.

At the beginning of the article, you ask:

"Why do Netflix and a few other companies keep the DVD format alive, when streaming is more convenient for almost all users?

At the End of the article you then say:

I'd be interested in hearing other theories, as long as people understand the question: Why movie studios don't allow movies to be streamed in a manner that mimics, as closely as possible, the experience of checking out DVDs by mail from Netflix (including, say, a mandatory delay between the time you select the movie and the time that you can watch it).

"as long as people understand the question:"?
Which question? The second question clearly answers the first question by asking "Why movie studios don't allow movies to be streamed...". The question itself is saying that movie studios don't allow streaming in a manner to match DVD by mail, so that's why Netflix doesn't do it.

Netflix already explained why they don't license everything for streaming.
https://help.netflix.com/en/no...
http://blogs.indiewire.com/sha...

I used a almost secret hacker tool (used by the CIA, FBI, and NSA!) to get this information.
Try it: http://google.com/

.. netflix also works on any modern SmartTV, xbox, a fricking $35 chromecast dongle, Rokus and any number of other media boxes. It runs on pretty much anything with internet connection and RCA/HDMI connector
      https://www.netflix.com/Watch?...

Even Amazon VOD and Vudu have more cross platform clients than iTunes.

You are again full of shit. And you're apparently confused about what a straw-man is, and to further top it all off, you simply cannot read.

http://blog.netflix.com/2014/0...

Yes, what Netflix wants is federally-mandated free-peering arrangements that will scale with usage by mandate.
Don't take my word for it- read it and weep. It's right there, in their own words. Sure, they use all kinds of misleading words like "tolls" and "leverage", but the fact of the matter is, they want to force ISPs to care about Netflix's customers as much as Netflix does. They don't, nor should they have to.
That is what they call "strong net neutrality", they call it this because "weak net neutrality" (their verbiage) - or simple non-interference, "isn't good enough".
The actual problem here, for people with enough brain-cells rubbing together to notice it, is monopolization of the US ISP market. This shit happens because customers can't actually leave their ISP that is maintaing congested links (congested for everyone, mind you- net neutrally.)
Your turn, cowboy.

Except the costs are relatively tiny (like in the thousands for companies that routinely drop millions on infrastructure).

Also you cant honestly expect us to believe that Cogent thinks it can strong arm Verizon, ATT, and Comcast... for what.... some extra peering connections?. Cogent market cap is like $2B vs Verizon's $200B. And The ISPs are the ones demanding extra money.

Not to mention Netflix provides their OpenConnect CDN box for free.
https://signup.netflix.com/ope...

So yeah. I have heard it the other way around. That large providers wont open ports as a way of dragging their feet and putting the blame on others. Notice also they aren't complaining that Netflix is not following peering guidelines by peering at the appropriate places, they are just straight up asking for money. If this was purely some kind of bad network management on the part of Netflix/Cogent, why is that not the complaint? The complaint we hear from ISPs is they "have to pay their share" which is saying they think double dipping is appropriate.

... Netflix are aware of that and have the Open Connect Content Delivery Network, but that won't solve all the probelms.

That DOES solve the case in point. AT&T are just finger pointing and trying to latch on to a cash cow, while gaining an unfair advantage in customer pricing.

True net neutrality helps the little guys everywhere. Netflix noted that on the service side, as others have here, that if big companies have to pay for connectivity to the last mile to the users, small services will be hurt. It also makes absolutely no sense (services already pay for their internet access; customers already pay for theirs; there's lots of middle men, and those guys are trying to get around each other and get profit from customers on the other side).

The other side is that a competing ISP would also have trouble. If AT&T, for example, was charging all websites for their bandwidth to the end users, then at some point they really don't have to charge the end users anything. Where's the balance? How would a new ISP charge his customers?

The ISP tiered pricing is simply wrong if their network can't handle their customers requests. The cheapest possible plans often get you very good download speeds (ex. 15Mbps for the first 12months at $14.99/month for time warner). That's the problem right there. Their standard fee for that is $35/month, and $15 will only get you 2Mbps... which is still plenty for most people.

I'm all for cheaper and faster internet access, but if it's a problem for them, then they should put the squeeze on their customers, not the services their custom wants. Netflix is a selling point for the ISP; something they should, if anything, be paying MORE for to get improved quality for their customers.

The only reason they should want to squeeze netflix is, IMO, because it competes with their other services - TV. That's anti-competitive through and through.

I think that everyone agrees, that. The point is who pays for the carrying of data between the providers. OK: what I pay my ISP should also pay for them to fetch/send my bytes onwards in the Internet as well. I will cost my ISP less if I choose to download something from a local mirror than if I grab it from the other side of the world. Netflix are aware of that and have the Open Connect Content Delivery Network, but that won't solve all the probelms.

Between them Netflix and YouTube made up more than 50 percent of peak downstream Internet traffic in N America, so it is a significant issue.

(Sorry, a properly grammatical title would not fit in the space allotted)

Netflix & Level 3 Only Telling Half The Story, Won’t Detail What Changes They Want To Net Neutrality

In a fairly deep and interesting article over at StreamingMedia.com, Dan Rayburn argues that there is more to the story here and that neither Netflix nor Level 3 are giving us their proposed solutions. He goes through both the Netflix and the Level3 blog posts, taking them apart very carefully.

It is not a network neutrality problem, but rather a business problem. Worthwhile read.

So, data centers are going to realize a > 8x increase in speed. Awesome. Do you think Time Warner, Comcast, AT&T, and every regional carrier along the way are going to cheerfully provision more bandwidth to their customers? Or will their pencil pushers continue to view bandwidth as a scarce resource to be jealously guarded and sold for a kings' ransom?

We've had cable and DSL modems out in customers' basements for years now that are capable of > 10-20 megabit speed, yet according to a recent NetFlix study, the average U.S. household is actually getting something closer to 2.
http://ispspeedindex.netflix.c...

Hurray to the boffins at Intel for devising a way for Pixar to allow their server farm to render Woody & Buzz's left butt cheeks 6x faster, university to run earthquake simulators at record speed and the NSA to read your grandmas sexts to Grandpa over at Shady Pines in real time, but someone please find a way to to put speed increases in the hands of consumers without affecting price.

I saw that documentary! Very well made.

There's so much spin and misinformation in above post.

It's not as simple as "data transfer" where peering agreements are involved. The fees you pay aren't there to allow Cogent to dump tons of data on one link of your ISP, forcing them to carry it on their backbone across the country to the end user there, rather than upgrading their own backbone to handle the traffic properly.

No, the fees you pay are for your ISP to provide a service, i.e. the transmission and delivery of digital content you choose over their network. And if you request Netflix to stream movies to you, your ISP by golly is contractually obliged to deliver that data to you . When Netflix/Cogent sends that data which you requested to your ISP, calling that transmission "dumping" is clearly 1. untrue and 2. BS.

That's exactly what they're doing. As Cogent dumps more traffic on them, they're just not upgrading the peering points, so Cogent customers see congestion and slowdowns going to/from other ISPs.

Not only Cogent customers. The customers of that ISP will also notice the slowdown . Take Verizon for instance. When/if Verizon refuses to upgrade peering points, all of Verizon's paying customers who use Netflix will be affected. So, what do you call failing to deliver a paid for service to your own customers?

Stop taking the ISP's side and look at the average consumer's point of view for once.

Netflix has a local caching solution for ISPs: Netflix OpenConnect Appliance, and it's over 100TB of content (refreshing 5TB per night). 4U chassis, Intel Sandy bridge CPU, 32GB RAM, 1TB solid state, 100TB+ spinning (36x3TB), FreeBSD, nginx, 2x10Gbps fiber

Overview

In-depth Deployment Guide

1) it's the ISP's users requesting 30% of the internet traffic, not Netflix. The ISPs aren't peering at all, they are the termination point. They aren't providing a service to Netflix, or to anyone else on the internet for that matter, except their customers.
2) It's the ISPs responsibility to provide enough network infrastructure to their customers. They don't get to hold hostage their users as a product to be bought by Netflix or other content providers.
3) Netflix offers Open Connect CDN

ISPs can directly connect their networks to Open Connect for free. ISPs can do this either by free peering with us at common Internet exchanges, or can save even more transit costs by putting our free storage appliances in or near their network.

https://signup.netflix.com/ope...

I think there is a fundamental misunderstanding of how peering arrangements are supposed to work that is being exploited by the PR departments of ISPs.

I do not know the particulars there. IMO, if Netflix expects ISPs to pay for their CDN, they are on drugs.

All the peering details are here. In short: they don't charge anything. They offer direct interconnects to Netflix's CDN for free, free peering at major internet exchange points, and free, Netflix-managed hardware caches to ISPs to avoid duplicate network traffic (the vast majority of traffic stays within the ISPs internal network). For the hardware caches the ISP needs only provide power and network connectivity.

There's really no reason for ISPs to wrangle with Netflix -- there's plenty of options to avoid congestion.

Comcast gets Level3 (Netflix's bandwidth provider) to pay them extra to deliver there video streams to there customers. We are so small, how are we supoosed to get Level3/Netflix to compensate us without getting laughed out of the room?

Peering agreements are based upon how unbalanced traffic is, not how important that traffic is to one company or another. I'm going to go out on a limb, and say you're too small to have peering agreements with ANYBODY, so you don't even have a seat at the table. If you were peered, you could balance things out by changing routing tables to send more outbound traffic over level3's network.

Netflix Open Connect offers "free storage appliances" to ISPs to reduce their transit costs. Why don't you take them up on that offer? https://signup.netflix.com/ope...

I'm sure Comcast's agreement with level3 doesn't move the needle enough to really change how much they charge subscribers. If your subscribers are costing you too much, you should charge them more for the service. Alternatively, you can drop their internet speeds, until they fall within Netflix's next lower speed tier, significantly reducing bandwidth usage, at the expense of lower video quality.

Or if Netflix is really just causing a problem at peak, then QoS/throttle them to make sure other traffic gets through. Again, Netflix will probably drop the user down to lower-quality streams, saving both of you some bandwidth.

The problem you're describing is a solved one, and has been for years.

As you said, streaming is wasteful. On the other hand, most content only gets watched once by a person, so storing it locally ad infinitum is inefficient as well. The answer, then, is to store it communally in a place that is close to the user but where more users can access it. At that point, it starts to sound a lot like caching, and if you actually implement that sort of a system at an ISP or higher level, you get yourself a CDN.

In the case of Netflix, they've already addressed this issue with their Open Connect CDN which any ISP can join for free. Netflix provides all of the necessary hardware to cache hundreds of TB of content locally within the ISP at no cost to the ISP. As a result, when I decided to binge watch the new season of House of Cards this last weekend, it was likely being served up from network appliances my ISP had received from Netflix, rather than coming all the way from Netflix's servers. The same was true for the hundreds or thousands of other people in the area watching it as well, meaning that the inter-ISP bandwidth would have been greatly reduced for our ISP, thus keeping its peering costs down and also leaving the Internet as a whole significantly less congested.

Seriously, when the summary's entire premise is founded on false assumptions, you can't expect much. For instance, this gem is patently false:

But content owners may be the real heavyweights here: It was Netflix that withheld high-quality streaming from Time Warner Cable customers last year, not vice versa

The ability for an ISP to provide "Super HD" video is entirely in their own hands, since Netflix makes available everything that is necessary at zero cost to the ISP, other than the utilities bills for running the devices. All they need to do is install one of Netflix's network appliances, which they give away for free to interested ISPs. And the network appliance is a win-win, since it reduces inbound traffic from Netflix to the ISP, thus reducing their load at peering locations, while also providing Netflix customers with faster load times and higher quality video (i.e. it sets the ISP up as a member of Netflix's CDN). For companies complaining about Netflix traffic, installing one of those appliances is an obvious step to take, but Time Warner decided not to do that, since they wanted to cripple Netflix on a major network in order to try and give Netflix an incentive to pay for better connectivity.

Alternatively, if the ISP wants to be petty and not install one of the network appliances that Netflix is just giving away, they can enter a free peering agreement with Netflix, which effectively means that they agree not to charge Netflix an arm and a leg for serving up HD videos to the ISP's customers, but that sort of thing is unlikely if they're unwilling to accept the appliances in the first place.

And their ESPN reports are based on rumored negotiations which appear to have not come to fruition yet, so rather than our concerns being "premature", as the summary suggests, it's pretty clear that their justifications are premature. Not to mention the fact that it's widely known that ESPN is the crown jewel of cable television, with a plurality of cable subscription costs going to it. Small wonder that a content brand like that would have the clout to try and wield influence elsewhere. But they're a singular exception, compared to a multitude of companies like Comcast that dominate the market. By comparison, Netflix is still just an upstart company with a few tens of millions of subscribers worldwide. They're not scared of what it is now, since it's not a big player yet. They're scared of what it could be in another five or ten years, since then it could be serious competition.

Seriously, when the summary's entire premise is founded on false assumptions, you can't expect much. For instance, this gem is patently false:

But content owners may be the real heavyweights here: It was Netflix that withheld high-quality streaming from Time Warner Cable customers last year, not vice versa

The ability for an ISP to provide "Super HD" video is entirely in their own hands, since Netflix makes available everything that is necessary at zero cost to the ISP, other than the utilities bills for running the devices. All they need to do is install one of Netflix's network appliances, which they give away for free to interested ISPs. And the network appliance is a win-win, since it reduces inbound traffic from Netflix to the ISP, thus reducing their load at peering locations, while also providing Netflix customers with faster load times and higher quality video (i.e. it sets the ISP up as a member of Netflix's CDN). For companies complaining about Netflix traffic, installing one of those appliances is an obvious step to take, but Time Warner decided not to do that, since they wanted to cripple Netflix on a major network in order to try and give Netflix an incentive to pay for better connectivity.

Alternatively, if the ISP wants to be petty and not install one of the network appliances that Netflix is just giving away, they can enter a free peering agreement with Netflix, which effectively means that they agree not to charge Netflix an arm and a leg for serving up HD videos to the ISP's customers, but that sort of thing is unlikely if they're unwilling to accept the appliances in the first place.

And their ESPN reports are based on rumored negotiations which appear to have not come to fruition yet, so rather than our concerns being "premature", as the summary suggests, it's pretty clear that their justifications are premature. Not to mention the fact that it's widely known that ESPN is the crown jewel of cable television, with a plurality of cable subscription costs going to it. Small wonder that a content brand like that would have the clout to try and wield influence elsewhere. But they're a singular exception, compared to a multitude of companies like Comcast that dominate the market. By comparison, Netflix is still just an upstart company with a few tens of millions of subscribers worldwide. They're not scared of what it is now, since it's not a big player yet. They're scared of what it could be in another five or ten years, since then it could be serious competition.

if you search on the internet, netflix is pushing it's own CDN with the condition that they don't pay the regular CDN fees. most of the big ISP's haven't signed on which is why netflix is slow on their networks. the pipes to the CDN provider are probably maxed out like the issue with Cogent a few years ago

business scuffle with two companies trying to lower their costs of business. not like netflix is the angel here either.

This is the second time you've posted about this here as if you have some sort of inside information.
It's not a rumor, and it's not newsworthy. Netflix announced this shit a year ago when they started touting "Super HD". https://signup.netflix.com/ope...

Netflix gave ISPs 3 options:

A: Peer with us at favorable rates and we'll allow your users to access our higher quality streams and help make sure shit is routing efficiently.
B: Drop our content boxes directly on your network and we'll allow your users to access our higher quality streams and pay you fair rates.
C: Don't peer with us at lower rates or let us store content on your network, and we'll name and shame you as not fully supporting Netflix.

Once all the major ISPs agreed with A or B, Netflix opened up "Super HD" to (almost) everyone. They now have a lot of those distributed content boxes and favorable agreements, and are effectively a CDN.

You mean this? https://signup.netflix.com/ope... This is already live and any ISP that wants to reduce their Internet drain costs is participating.

I would argue that Assange isn't a journalist, but a fame whore. I highly recommend the document "We Steal Secrets: The Story of Wikileaks". Link to Netflix Instant View: http://movies.netflix.com/WiMo...

The documentary is very good, IMHO, and argues that Assange is actually kind of a glutton for media attention. He did a really good thing (started Wikileaks, and perhaps more importantly, gave it name recognition and branding) and and now uses it to empower himself, the bastard. Which doesn't diminish his contribution, but makes him a less trustworthy character at this point.

That's not quite right. Netflix utilizes FreeBSD heavily. See: https://signup.netflix.com/openconnect/software

1) Set up a web page with the address http://netflix.com/linux/ which helps customers to watch the flicks under Linux
2) Become a sponsor of the Moonlight project
3) ???
4) Profit!

The original question was why care and where is serious stuff being done. Are you disagreeing that putting together one of the largest content delivery networks ever is serious?

Netflix is doing really interesting stuff on their FreeBSD systems.

If you want very specific answers to why: The BSD port system is a huge reason. The main OS is developed in a release cycle where stability and security are the main goal. Riding on top of this is the ports system which all other software packages are built from. If you don't like one of the compile time flags in some software package you just make that change you want the first time you build from ports. You then have a custom package that you can deploy to all your other instances. The ports system also has the benefit of being much much more up-to-date than any linux distro except for Arch and Gentoo. Arch uses a rolling release development model and strives for everything being up-to-date. Gentoo uses the BSD ports system idea for their package management system portage.

The basics of it are that you get the stability of a regular release cycle and your installed software is always the current stable version.

You may want to pose that question to Netflix. They account for about 1/3 of the traffic on the internet and all that traffic is served from FreeBSD servers.

Netflix may use freebsd internally, but the movies are stored on amazon s3 and served from there. So, no, freebsd doesn't account for 1/3 of the internet traffic.

I have nothing against freebsd and have used it extensively in business.

You may want to pose that question to Netflix. They account for about 1/3 of the traffic on the internet and all that traffic is served from FreeBSD servers.

Also, Mac OS X is essentially a fork of FreeBSD.

The OS on all Juniper equipment is a modified version of FreeBSD.

The Playstation 3 and 4 OS are both modified FreeBSD.

Plus more.

I didn't see anyone else mention it, but there's a decent low-budget sci-fi movie about the first manned mission to Europa where they're looking for life under the ice: Europa Report. I thought it was quite good.

Do you really think Netflix is paying for the proportion of the internet that it uses?

Netflix pays for their end of the connection, and the users pay for the other end.
Now the ISPs (and you, apparently) want Netflix to pay for both ends of the connection while also collecting from the users.

Very simply, netflix's business strategy is to shift the cost of business to other users [...] This effectively limits the potential for competitors to develop

Wouldn't a lower cost of entry encourage competition?

pursuing more efficient means of production (more efficient transmission algorithms).

You can only compress video so much.
And none of the ISPs will let you use multicast.
So instead, netflix will put local streaming servers at ISPs to reduce their overhead.

In any case, more than half the planet is more concerned with clean drinking water and electricity, so frankly the whole planet isn't the target.

As for bandwidth, actually Netflix doesn't require as much as you'd think, they have local machines they put in busy ISPs to keep the backbone as clear as possible of video traffic.

https://signup.netflix.com/openconnect

Netflix will install their server for free right in the ISP datacenter. This means that movies don't have to use the backbone, saving a ton of bandwidth.

That is the title of an excellent BBC series from 2004, that addresses this topic. The contention is that fear has replaced promises of a better tomorrow as the leverage point politicians exploit to persuade the masses. It is available on Netflix, here: http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/The-Power-of-Nightmares/70035190?strkid=2097735933_4_0&strackid=4c753cb9c81ba8d_4_srl&trkid=222336

And I think that will happen when 4k TV takes off. I don’t hear anybody talking about shipping physical media for that format.

No way will this work. Bandwidth caps as they are today will prevent people from downloading 4k video. Here's a reference to a 4k documentary that is 160GB. Does that sound like something that's going to fly with the ISPs we currently have?

4K has only 4X more pixels than 1080p. Netflix says that currently, you need a 5mbit connection for Hidef streaming, or 7mbit for super hidef. So that would put 4K streaming at around 20 - 28mbit... maybe less if better graphics hardware means they can use better compression algorithms. Many people are already able to get that speed from a Cable modem or U-verse style DSL.

Bandwidth caps are a business limitation, not a physical restriction. I'm sure there are bottlenecks that providers will have to overcome, but that's the nature of the business.

Redbox does not do blueray

What?

neither does netflex mail service

Again, what?

Sure their entire catalogs are not in Bluray.

How in the hell are DVDs cheaper than a flat $7.99/month?

DVDs *are* a flat $7.99 a month.

Your ISP installs equipment in your area. That equipment is VERY expensive. You'd be surprised how much actually.

...if you're paying over $100/port for any equipment, you're being ripped off. I've found DSL tends to be the most expensive equipment on this basis. Cable and OLTs less so.

In fact, your bill is likely heavily subsidized by the government and even other customers via fees and such. Your ISP figures out average usage in your area and then installs the equipment that will provide whatever speed they're trying to sell there. Not everyone uses 100% of their connection 100% of the time. If they did, your bill would be much more expensive. So the equipment that leads to your house CAN support the speed (usually) that you are paying for. And the equipment that feeds the remote in your area can usually support about 60% of users at max capacity.

Mostly true - it is a numbers game.

Now, the problem is that Netflix and services like it concentrate usage at specific times. Not only that but netflix, unlike other content providers, refuses to work with ISPs.

Are you sure? https://signup.netflix.com/openconnect

Google, for example has a department in charge of "peering" and when they have a contract with Level3 but plan to move to Sprint or something, they call up the ISPs and let them know in advance. The ISPs can then sign similar peering contracts with Sprint. Netflix is hostile in this area, they just switch... with no notice... and they leave the ISPs in the lurch. There are about 10 major players on the net, and Netflix is one of the biggest. When they just move all of their traffic to another network its equivalent to a stampede of elephants running to one side of your boat. The ISP either has to let customers suffer or sign a hasty contract with another carrier and take a loss on the previous commitment. Google doesn't do that, not even Microsoft does that.

What? They multi-home and work with AWS. If your traffic to Netflix is all of a sudden being routed through another AS, it's more likely that someone is throwing a tantrum like the one with L3 and whatnot a while ago. That doesn't necessarily mean Netflix itself has done anything, it may mean that (for example) L3 has decided to stop carrying Netflix traffic or something along those lines. They may or may not have had warning themselves, and both parties may or may not have had a point.

Anyways, I'm not sure usage based billing is the solution, but like it or not, it IS coming to this country. and yes, I work for an ISP. They are trying to be creative about it, but I doubt it'll come to anything. The easiest solution is to just charge you more. So that's what will happen.

Which one? Remind me to avoid it.

before you think it, i'm no MS shill, i use Linux and only Linux. that said, the MSIE team is doing it right this time with IE11.

while many people here are slamming on the basis of standards compliance, there is something you should know: it's broken because they are striving standards compliance.

as we all know, there are plenty of MSIE exclusive ways of doing things in the DOM and render hacks that have had to be done so you end up with code that has "browser detection" to apply browser specific hacks. MSIE is making a clean break from all of that. so all those IE only apps like Outlook Web App will now fail because all the IE specific stuff has been removed. they went so far as to remove "MSIE" from their user agent string to prevent any old code from detecting it as Internet Explorer.

IE10 user agent string: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 10.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/6.0)
IE11 user agent string: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3; Trident/7.0; rv 11.0) like Gecko

so while it seems to have growing pains, as far as IE goes, IE11 is a step in the right direction.

some nice differences:

Deprecation of file:// based Proxy configuration scripts
Deprecation of document modes
Deprecated VBScript in IE11 mode pages
navigator.plugins -- now a supported extensibility point <-- ironically chrome is removing this support
ActiveX now behaves like a navigator plugin.
Silverlight plugin is not installed by default (they got Netflix to support HTML5 via Encrypted Media Extensions aka DRM in the HTML5 spec)

more info:
http://www.nczonline.net/blog/2013/07/02/internet-explorer-11-dont-call-me-ie/
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ieinternals/archive/2013/09/24/internet-explorer-11-changelist-change-log.asp

> the most popular stuff that gets torrented is point blank not available from those sources

Let's check and see:

http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Grosse_Pointe_Blank/1153034?locale=en-US

Oh, you said "most popular". Is the most popular movie of 2012 available on Netflix?:
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Avengers/70217913?locale=en-US

How about so far this year? The most popular movie of the 2013 summer movie season is "Iron Man 3":
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Iron_Man_3/70243360?locale=en-US

> the most popular stuff that gets torrented is point blank not available from those sources

Let's check and see:

http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Grosse_Pointe_Blank/1153034?locale=en-US

Oh, you said "most popular". Is the most popular movie of 2012 available on Netflix?:
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Avengers/70217913?locale=en-US

How about so far this year? The most popular movie of the 2013 summer movie season is "Iron Man 3":
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Iron_Man_3/70243360?locale=en-US

> the most popular stuff that gets torrented is point blank not available from those sources

Let's check and see:

http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Grosse_Pointe_Blank/1153034?locale=en-US

Oh, you said "most popular". Is the most popular movie of 2012 available on Netflix?:
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The_Avengers/70217913?locale=en-US

How about so far this year? The most popular movie of the 2013 summer movie season is "Iron Man 3":
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Iron_Man_3/70243360?locale=en-US

If you have Netflix streaming (or want to go through some hassle), check out When We Left Earth: The NASA Missions. Absolutely fantastic documentary on the space race and the way I recently learned about his landing. For reasons outside my control, I was not alive until many years later.

I totally get the conspiracy theories about a fake moon landing. I know we did it. But looking up at the moon, it's hard to believe it.

Comcast just updated their usage limits and they seem pretty reasonable.

XFINITY Internet Package New Data Usage Allowance
Economy 300 GB
Economy Plus 300 GB
Internet Essentials 300 GB
Performance Starter 300 GB
Performance 300 GB
Blast! 350 GB
Extreme 50 450 GB
Extreme 105 600 GB

If you go over, they charge you $10 per 50GB. I've got the 50/10 Mb plan and I'd have to be running at 50Mb for 16 hours. This is assuming that I'm downloading from a site/torrent that can provide 50Mbps of bandwidth. Over the past three months the most I've used is 150GB. ..but what if you watch lots of netflix...?

They've got a meter with details. Their highest quality tier is still pretty small: Best quality (uses up to 1 GB per hour, up to 2.8 GB per hour if watching HD, or up to 4.7 GB per hour if watching 3D)

At 2.8GB per hour with a 350GB cap you could watch 125HD movies. There's about 720 hours in a month, so do you really want to spend about 1/3 of your time (including sleeping time) watching movies?

Like others have said, how much really do you need? These caps are so high, I can't imagine surpassing them. If you need more usage, call up Comcast, Verizon, ATT or any other SP and ask for a business line. Heck, if you really need bandwidth, most will be more than happy to sell you a 40Gb synchronous circuit.

and a whole availability zone dying

Even doing that, you end up less stable than amazon.com : http://techblog.netflix.com/2011/07/netflix-simian-army.html

Chaos Gorilla is similar to Chaos Monkey, but simulates an outage of an entire Amazon availability zone. We want to verify that our services automatically re-balance to the functional availability zones without user-visible impact or manual intervention.

What? Ayn Rand could be wrong? The shock and horror of it!

Um, didn't Dagny Taggart and Hank Reardon cooperate to build the John Galt Line?

Rand's protagonists cooperated all the the time, and of course also provided value to their voluntary customers - what they tried not to do is let their property be controlled or taken involuntarily by government.

Ask yourself, what is the difference between cooperation and theft? Isn't it whether you volunteer to participate?

Go watch the movie!

This paper was about evolution favouring cooperation in a prisoner's dilemma. The central lesson of Atlas Shrugged is not sacrificing yourself for someone else's benefit, translated to a prisoner's dilemma it implies non-cooperation.

The cooperation you're referring to that was in Atlas Shrugged made more money for both parties than non-cooperation, just about any moral system is fine with that sort of cooperation.

What? Ayn Rand could be wrong? The shock and horror of it!

Um, didn't Dagny Taggart and Hank Reardon cooperate to build the John Galt Line?

Rand's protagonists cooperated all the the time, and of course also provided value to their voluntary customers - what they tried not to do is let their property be controlled or taken involuntarily by government.

Ask yourself, what is the difference between cooperation and theft? Isn't it whether you volunteer to participate?

Go watch the movie!

An IE specific plugin for video... wait a second.. ActiveDivX?... anyone.. anyone..

Well if you're using IE then obviously yes, if you were using say Chrome you would use the Chrome plugin they make mention of.