Slashdot Mirror
BT Wants Cash For iPlayer, Video Bandwidth
eldavojohn writes "British Telecom is asking for more money for the bandwidth that iPlayer and video streaming sites eat up. The BBC's Tech Editor is claiming that 'Now Britain's biggest internet service provider is making it clear that, in a cut-throat broadband market, something is going to have to give — and net neutrality may have to be chucked overboard.' The BBC and BT are currently already in talks over how to get past this together. This might sound like a familiar battle from over a year ago."
Let me get this straight... the BBC pays for their internet connection, and they will have to pay a tariff appropriate to the bandwidth that they use in providing these services, which covers iPlayer video being delivered from their servers. As a consumer, I pay for my internet connection, and pay a tariff appropriate to the bandwidth that I use in consuming services, included iPlayer video that I download and stream. So if both ends are paid for, what is the problem?
It sounds to me like BT has suddenly realised that they have oversold their services on the basis that not everyone uses their internet connection at the same time. This is a classic telecommunications model. Except that, unlike the telephone, our internet access is largely un-metered (flat-rate charge), and we can use it even when we are not physically present.
Any fool can talk, but it takes a wise man to listen.
Here's an independent UK ISP ratings site. BT is third-from-bottom for a reason.
All the top ISP's on the list implement download quotas instead of throttling and port blocking to manage traffic, it is the fairest solution to load management IMHO.
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
I feel I need to put some of that in perspective - BT aren't saints, but they're not as bad as you're making out. This is from experience working for a UK ISP (not BT, one of the other ones).
That was indeed the case, but is not nearly as bad now. BT Broadband (the ISP), and BT OpenReach (the infrastructure operator) are required by law to be separate entities, and can not give each other preferential treatment. In my experience that's also the case, with it being no more hassle to get a line setup regardless of who you're subscribing to.
So does every other major ISP in the country. There's an agreement in place since the government essentially said "do this voluntarily, on your terms, or we'll make it a legal requirement". Believe me, the terms written up by a bunch of network engineers are far better - the original request included logging anyone who hit something on the list, which was thrown out early on due to the possibility of false positives.
I'll concede that. It's a terrible move to screw over your own customers like that.
Of course they aren't, they're a large company. Large companies are never the good guys.
Look, I'm going to type this really slowly so that you understand.
The choice quotes in this article are slighly misleading. The issue isn't the "cost" to BT of carrying the bits. That's as close to nil as makes no difference. The issue for BT is that they are running out of capacity to carry those bits, and will have to upgrade their infrastructure, as you note.
Who. Pays. For. It?
Who pays the wages of the guys digging the holes? Who pays for the fiber that goes in them, and the switches and routers?
That's all BT are arguing over: whether they have to increase the cost to consumers directly, or whether they can tax the producers (who will then have to tax the consumers through the 'television' license fee).
The only issue here is who's going to look like the bad guys for making the populace pay for upgrading BT's infrastructure. BT would prefer that the BBC do the squeezing, that's all.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
BT are already on the ball. From 4pm to midnight, iPlayer is unusable for me, rebuffers every 10 seconds. Other services such as Youtube and Vimeo suffer too.
Erm, the BBC don't have an ISP. They produce enough traffic in the UK that they peer directly with most UK ISPs at LINX.
BT's cost is only on its internal network, they won't be paying someone else for bandwidth.
BTs customers are paying for a connection speed e.g. 2Mbit and they should be able to get that rate from the BBC if they want. BT needs to change its customer charging infrastructure not bitch and whine
Really? No problems for me on my LLU ISP. Maybe you should consider one of those instead. Most exchanges are LLU these days, unless it is you really have no excuse to still be with BT's overpriced and underserviced offering. One example of this, on my LLU ISP when it was first activated it was only at 1meg down 256 up, I should have been on their max offering with 2.2ish down and 768 up. Were I with a BT ISP this would have probably taken a fault report to BT to get them to fix their DSLAM, but with this ISP it was done in 5 mins, no hassle. It was a freephone number too. BT are a fail, if you continue to give them money (even on an ISP that uses their network) you are asking for trouble.
BT, the monopoly provider of telephone landlines in most of the UK, only have IPstream in their exchanges, which has a maximum speed of 8Mbps. Most broadband providers, including BT Broadband, are merely reselling this 8Mbps access.
Be, Virgin and TalkTalk took advantage of the OLO (other licensed operator) scheme that BT was forced by OFTEL/OFCOM to provide. They put their equipment in BT's exchanges. They can provide broadband speeds higher than 8Mbps.
However, in order get access to those other providers inside BT's exchanges, you need a BT line, even if you never use the BT line. Sure, it sucks to be you, but what's the alternative? Other operators would be forced to build and operate all their own cables and exchanges, rather than rent a corner of BT's exchange, and given they don't have access rights to the land like BT does, there are many places they wouldn't be able to go.
That's the tradeoff - you can get better-than-BT broadband almost anywhere in the country because you need a BT line.
Does my bum look big in this?
The BT Wholesale network is actually rather good. BT Retail is just one of 130 ISPs who use the BT wholesale network, and they're a particularly bad example.
It's vitally important to not confuse the two, and do not let BT tell you otherwise. I have BT copper to my home/office, I pay BT the minimum amount a month for this copper, but my Internet access is through the BT wholesale network, via another ISP, not BT.
they arent using WMP anymore - they're using Adobe Air to deliver the downloadable streams.
its also not p2p anymore
sorry for ruining the dodgy analogy, but in the UK FMCG market (fast moving consumer goods), brands do pay the supermarkets for premium shelf space - and they will pay varying amounts depending on whether the goods are at eyeline etc. the problem with brand push economics is that it is not transparent to the public and will end up in some sort of sleazy monopolistic situation where some providers are being given preferential treatment over others no matter what is being paid.