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Cox Communications and "Congestion Management"
imamac writes "It appears Cox Communications is the next in line for throttling internet traffic. But it's not throttling of course; Cox's euphemism is 'congestion management.' From Cox's explanation: 'In February, Cox will begin testing a new method of managing traffic on our high-speed Internet network in our Kansas and Arkansas markets. During the occasional times the network is congested, this new technology automatically ensures that all time-sensitive Internet traffic — such as web pages, voice calls, streaming videos and gaming — moves without delay. Less time-sensitive traffic, such as file uploads, peer-to-peer and Usenet newsgroups, may be delayed momentarily...' Sounds like throttling to me."
Explain to me why my gaming or surfing should suffer because you want to download/upload XXX_Donkey_Love.WMV from thepiratebay, again?
Sounds like QOS to me.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
The same technology may give them the capability to do all sorts of mischief, but I don't see a problem with prioritization based on application. If they prioritize their own VoIP but somehow keep dropping or delaying Vonage packets, that's a problem. That's just an example, of course.
Umm.. thats not throttling, it applying QOS (Quality of service) Throttling would slow your traffic all the time, where as this applies prioritization to data that needs it. Packets have a qos field that says the priority they should be given..
Im glad there is a telco that will respect QOS - I've wasted a week with a voip problem, only to learn that the telco was shaping traffic and discarding everything above 3mb without paying attention to QOS Flags.. Allstream charges more for this!
Except for when I don't use VoIP but half my neighbors do, and I get less connection than my neighbors for the same price just because the company doesn't have the infrastracture to handle what they sold me.
If they don't want egg on their faces, they better do this right.
They better be completely transparent about what does and does not get priority.
They better be completely transparent about any "special rules" like "no more than 128kb/sec will get preferential treatment" - that's more than enough for 2 simultaneous 2-way audio channels.
They better be completely transparent if they make "additional priority traffic" a premium-charge option.
They better use common sense when determining what is and is not "priority." "If it looks like real-time, treat it like real-time unless the customer is above his real-time quota, then use more discerning measures" is a good rule of thumb. Another good rule of thumb is "only throttle as much as necessary, no more" so that bits fly without delay during times of no congestion.
They better listen to their customers and be willing to admit if they make a mistake.
If they fail do do all of these, they will get some major backlash.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
OK, so you would be happy paying the same price for a 128 Kbps connection or something? Then everyone could use their fully bandwidth all the time (and never any more than that).
As long as the P2P apps and file transfers can run at full speed when nothing time sensitive is using the network, this is the RIGHT way to do things.
How many of your neighbors have to create ~96kbps VoIP stream to innundate the local uplink? It's probably not even possible. How many people using BitTorrent would it take to do the same? Not very many. If you're pulling 7Mbps from a torrent, isn't it reasonable that the ISP makes sure others still have bandwidth available to them? From their description, their prioritization is pointedly vendor-neutral, ie they aren't preferring their own video application over Hulu, or some such competitor. How is this unfair to you?
If by good you meant 'pathetically obvious', then perhaps yes.
As long as they're using QOS techniques instead of throttling parts of the network that are not under duress, it's fine with me. As long as they're not prioritizing one party's packets over another's of the same protocol (Vonage vs Cox's self-branded VOIP) it's fine with me.
It seems foolish to expect a consumer ISP to provide 100% of the advertised bandwidth 100% of the time. If you need it, there's a certain expectation that you can get a professional line with some established guarantees there. It's widely known that the bandwidth is oversold, and while it's their responsibility to work out some of the congestion, it's not their responsibility to provide bandwidth for 100% of their customers to be uploading at 100% of their available bandwidth.
Even big pipes can get congested. P2P programs can generate 100's of connections for each client. For VoIP, it is just a single connection. Why have the router process 2,000 packets of P2P for one connection of VoIP? The router should make sure time sensitive things like VoIP get the priority so people that use VoIP can use it without getting crammed out by P2P traffic
The people that browse and have Vonage expect the same level of service as someone that is running P2P 24-hours a day.
I think the discussion of net neutrality keeps getting confused. Maybe confused on purpose. For what reason I am not sure. It seems to me that making sure that, known, time sensitive traffice *should* get priority. Isn't that what TOS bits are for in the IP stack?
NOT ALL TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT IS BAD YOU FUCKTARDS!
Why is it that every form of bandwidth throttling is seen as evil? There are some good, legitimate, reasons for managing traffic flow across a network. While most of the pukes on Slashdot may be hugely inconvenienced by having their latest pirated copy of software X, or DVD rip of 'I love it in the ass' over BitTorrent slowed down, there are people who are trying to use the same pipes for more normal activity. Who cares if it takes an extra five or ten minutes to download that file. I'm much more annoyed when a VoIP call, or streaming video gets choppy.
Whether you mod me -1 Troll or -1 Flamebait or not, you know you agree with me, at least in part.
Yes because you calling your grandmother to chit chat using VoIP is far more important than me sending Magnetic Resonance Imaging files to India via FTP.
If you need guaranteed bandwidth, you buy it. We receive hundreds of MRIs per months at work and we don't have a residential DSL. We have an optical fiber link (GigE) with an ultimate "Internet" (for what it's worth in a BGP world) link around 300mbps 95-percentile. Guess what, we get our contracted bandwidth... All the time. It's not exactly cheap though, but then we're not downloading porn torrents...
"Latency-sensitive" would be a better term. P2P can tolerate a packet arriving half a second after it was sent (even batter than a regular HTTP download, in fact), and assuming they are pushing out packets at a steady rate you shouldn't notice a drop in your kbps. However, I know from experience that WoW and VoIP are very painful to use if you have a half-second delay.
The end game on that is a lose-lose proposition. When dial-up was still popular this over-subscribed broadband plan was workable. The traffic generated by file sharing, email, web browsing etc. could be handled in this manner. The trouble is that ISPs did not update or upgrade the 'tubes' to handle the traffic that they themselves intended on selling to users. All this crap about bundled services (triple-play and Quadruple-play) for the last 5 years is about ISP's selling you streaming content and high-bandwidth content. To claim that they need to 'manage congestion' while trying to sell data content is absolute BS. What they want is carte blanche to tell you what data you are allowed to send and receive. period. no arguing.
We tend to forget that they have this plan to sell you streaming data that has to fit in the same damned pipes as the data you are using now, that they claim are not big enough to handle some file sharing. I call bullshit. The ISPs cannot force the Internet to be how it used to be. Rich Internet content, web 2.0, streaming content... all of this is ruining their original over-subscription network configuration plan. Now, the very same ISPs that are complaining about congestion are fully into planning and implementation of bandwidth intensive services they want to sell you. What they want is for you to only use bandwidth on data services that you have purchased from them. They are double dipping on this, and there is no other way to see it.
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Yes because you calling your grandmother to chit chat using VoIP is far more important than me sending Magnetic Resonance Imaging files to India via FTP.
Sure is. In fact, you are stating as much by choosing to use residential cable service to do it. If it's that important, pay for a guarantee.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
I don't know about where you live, but in Phoenix they have these sensors above most traffic lights that are sensitive to emergency vehicle lights (or something.) Guess what they do? They change the light to allow emergency traffic through. I guess if you really want to get to your destination unimpeded by other traffic you could build your own road. Or you could just use emergency services in an emergency.
I realize that the internet isn't a society funded project but why is everyone so concerned with "getting whats theirs" at everyone else's expense anyway? Because that IS what we're talking about here. Not Cox having the ultimate network that is impossible to saturate - because we know there are applications that will use whatever is possibly available. Consider the alternatives here.
1) Lower bandwidth caps for the same price
2) Much higher prices to pay for massive infrastructure upgrades and higher risk deployment investments.
3) A pay for use service that heavily charges for usage above a certain limit.
4) Enforced monthly bandwidth caps (Which cox does have - and at least for me, do not enforce)
In scenario 1 I would be negatively impacted. Why? I use my internet more heavily after hours for downloading and uploading. I would be limited all the time because of peak usage trends.
In scenario 2 I would be negatively impacted because I would have to pay a hell of a lot more than I do now despite my low network impact during said peak times (IE - when it is a problem)
In scenario 3 I would be negatively impacted because I would get charged out the ASS for bandwidth usage because I use my connection during non peak times. While it does probably cost more, it doesn't interfere with anyone else and it doesn't require massive network upgrades like you're demanding either.
In scenario 4 I might well be limited to only using my connection for work and no file transfers, because I work from home. I have to be available to transfer large files every now and then because sometimes it's required.
In all of the above scenarios, i bet they apply to most other people too. Heavy file transfers during peak usage are already going to be slowed down - I don't think you'll notice much difference if the routers shuffle packet priorities in the buffer because cox has a pretty outstanding network already. other downloads are usually on a "start it and forget it" basis. You can seed your crap overnight - it doesn't matter that much.
Whatever. I'm done trolling this post. Those that get it already get it. those that don't wont. and those that don't give a fuck have bigger problems.
No, I am not an English major. My posts are subject to typos and incorrect grammar. Do not expect perfection.