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BitTorrent Ponders Releasing World ISP P2P Speed Report

Mark.JUK writes "The San Francisco-based inventor of the hugely popular peer-to-peer (P2P) internet file sharing protocol BitTorrent has revealed that it is considering whether or not to release the broadband performance (speed) data for more than 9,000 ISPs around the world. The technology company claims that the data forms part of its new project, which is sadly still in the very early stages of development, but could one day give consumers a near real-time perspective of how their ISP is performing. It wouldn't just cover P2P traffic either, with BitTorrent also tracking general HTTP transfers too. BitTorrent claims that its service can, for example, display that most UK ISPs 'aggressively throttle BitTorrent traffic after 6 p.m. at night,' with speeds suddenly going 'off a cliff.' Suffice to say that such information could prove to be very useful for consumers and advocates of Net Neutrality."

3 of 156 comments (clear)

  1. Considering? by slaxative · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Consideration of performing an action is news now?

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  2. Forget advocates how about consumers in general by RichMan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Perhaps people would like to know tha the 10Mb/sec speed advertised by their provider is only available from 4am to 6:30am on weekdays.
    These actual usable bandwidth numbers should be general public knowledge. It would enable consumers to make valid choices and perhaps make providers do some real provisioning to support their advertised bandwidths.

  3. Re:Dumb comment by shuz · · Score: 4, Informative

    After 6pm, Internet traffic for most ISPs goes through the roof. With it, latency and available bandwidth are typically negatively affected.

    Internet traffic tends to look like a perfect curve that starts an upward trend around 700-800 for a given timezone and increases in a consistent patterned manor until 12 noon. There is a slight dip between noon and 1300 a second peak from 1300 till 1400 and a steady decline until 2300 to midnight. The decline from midday until midnight is slower but from all my experience in web traffic I don't see an increase in traffic after 1800 compared to the rest of the day.

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