Who Pays for Rebuilding the Internet?

pcause writes "The Internet (physical as opposed to technical) was really not designed for applications that want to use maximum bandwidth all of the time, such as P2P and streaming video. Here in the US we've seen Comcast try to balance the demands of P2P traffic with other traffic and its backbone capacity. In the UK, a flame war has broken out between the BBC and ISPs about the same issue. So the question is who pays? Should the content owners who make the profits pay for the extra infrastructure, or should the consumer pay?"

Comments

Re:And as a further optimization...

[bagboy]

The ISP world has changed significantly from "many years ago". P2P, streaming media and Itunes-like services mean folks leave their systems on and pull content 24/7. As stated, 2-4 is the only low point (and we are not a small, more a medium-sized ISP). Margins for small-medium sized ISPs are pretty thin. You're not going to have "loads" of spare bandwidth if you expect to maintain any profit at all. I live in a state where the majority of locations are served via satellite. It's not cheap to rent time on a sat btw.

Re:Duh - we all do.

[Dun Malg]

So, if by "build" you mean "solicited bids," then yes. Yes it is, then, as that is how the government "builds" everything it builds. The Lunar Lander was built by Grumman, who won the bid. The M-1 Abrams, General Dynamics, who won the bid. The Interstate Highway System, which was built by hundreds of different contractors who won the damned bid to build them. With the exception of historical oddities like the Springfield Armory (closed in 1968) and the Army Corps of Engineers, that's the way the feds get things done: they pay someone else to build it to their specs.