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Google Spends $1 Million For Throttling Detection

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the i-see-what-you-did-there dept.

foamrat writes "Google has awarded $1 million to Georgia Tech researchers so that they can develop simple tools to detect Internet throttling, government censorship, and other 'transparency' problems."

99 comments

  1. Tools to detect transparency problems by TaoPhoenix · · Score: 1

    "Did your phone call end without a complete sentence? Please post the sentence fragment."

    --
    My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
  2. Google by James_Duncan8181 · · Score: 2

    Say what you like about them, but I'm hoping they'll bring this idealistic side out to play more now Eric has been given the elbow. Eric openly admitted that he was the most gung-ho on China of the leadership team, and I have to say I trust Sergey rather more and am a bit happier that he's 50% of the decision-making again.

    --
    "To any truly impartial person, it would be obvious that I am right."
    1. Re:Google by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't trust Google's altruism further than I can throw it(though it is likely that the founders are better than the outside CEO in that regard...); but it is somewhat convenient that Google's business model and business interests happen to be fairly strongly aligned with most of the internet's virtues.

      It cannot be ignored that they want to data-mine you to dump ad impressions down your consumer gullet; but this does mean that they view anybody else trying to do so as "competition" rather than "our bestest buddies in profit"(as with ISPs and Phorm/NSA for instance).

      Similarly, their desire to operate communications services without hindrance is not identical to an ideological stance in favor of freedom; but the end results are substantially closer than are those of entities that wish to hinder communications services in order to raise prices, or prevent "piracy", or the like.

      I don't trust them; but I would say that their self-interest aligns atypically well with much(though certainly not all) of what would want from the ideal internet. I do trust them to follow their self interest. I would certainly prefer the internet according to some genuinely freedom-focused entity; but those tend to be penniless ragtag optimists, rather than corporate behemoths....

    2. Re:Google by Aldanga · · Score: 1

      Bravo, good sir. I wish I had mod points for you.

    3. Re:Google by ShakaUVM · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It's always funny to watch an anti-corporate person trying to pay a compliment to a corporation without appearing hypocritical.

    4. Re:Google by gman003 · · Score: 1

      In other words, they're allies, but allies of convenience only, and we should be wary that they'll stab us in the back as soon as it's in their interests.

      Which, logically, means that we should be planning to stab their back first. Might I suggest hiding something nasty (for them, at least) in the GPL v4?

    5. Re:Google by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What's funny about it? He's basically saying that Google (mostly) does things that he likes, just not for the reasons he'd like them to. It's a perfectly reasonable position to take.

    6. Re:Google by ShakaUVM · · Score: 1

      >>What's funny about it?

      It's funny in the same way as trying to watch a Republican say something nice about Obama. He hates corporations, but has to bend over backwards before saying something nice about one.

    7. Re:Google by CrazyDuke · · Score: 1

      It's not nearly as funny as watching people whine and complain about a system of elected rich old fucks fucking over everyone else in favor of a system of unelected rich old fucks fucking over everyone else. You see by constructing a neutered paper tiger and calling it government, then calling the actual government something else, all of a sudden everyone is magically free from government, or something.

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced influence is indistinguishable from control.
    8. Re:Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Did you forget to take your pills again, CrazyDuke?

    9. Re:Google by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I'm curious to know what about my post marks it as "anti-corporate". As best I can tell, I started from a wholly orthodox account of how corporations operate and worked from there.

      Corporations are complex systems designed to serve the (typically financial) interests of their owners. Within the limits imposed by the principal-agent problem, this is supposed to mean that the people who run the corporation serve the interests of the shareholders, by some combination of upping stock prices or issuing dividends.

      Because of that, trying to infer the behavior of a corporation from the human motives of the guys at the top is typically going to be a bad model: one should instead expect that the corporation will act in the interests of its shareholders.

      I was under the impression that that was pretty much the standard model of corporate behavior. If that counts as "anti-corporate"(rather than, say, somebody actually challenging the notion of 'limited liability investments', or even just asserting that having mercilessly self-interested entities around is a bad idea...), then what kind of bowing and scraping would I need to engage in to be "pro corporate"?

    10. Re:Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Welcome to Slashdot, where contentless posts that contribute nothing to the discussion are rewarded with +5 insightful.

    11. Re:Google by ShakaUVM · · Score: 1

      >>Welcome to Slashdot, where contentless posts that contribute nothing to the discussion are rewarded with +5 insightful.

      Perhaps the moderators were as tired as I was of hearing about how all corporations are evil, and only large governments can save us from the unmitigated greed of capitalism.

      And yet, oddly enough, America prospered and had more freedoms than the USSR, communist China, or socialist France.

    12. Re:Google by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      I would argue that, just as "trusting" Google means putting an excessively human face on a non-human construct, the notion of Google "stabbing us in the back" does as well.

      Barring executive bungling, Google can reasonably be expected to continuously act in its perceived interests. On the minus side, this means tracking you to operate their advertising operations. On the plus side, this means viewing others who would wish to do so as competitors, and a comparatively high unwillingness to "play ball" in order to tap foreign markets(compared to say, Yahoo...). Given their dependence on customers having mostly open internet access in order to access their services and see their ads, it also likely includes opposition to ISPs or tivoized devices that attempt to collect rents on their gatekeeper status(In Google's ideal world, they likely wouldn't mind if they were the option being enforced; but in a world of deep-pocketed competitors, and competitors with well entrenched OS and hardware businesses(Apple, Microsoft, News Corporation, etc.) they have more to lose than they have to win by making access to specific sites/services a bidding war at the ISP level). They also are likely in favor of security between the user and the host(since they are the host) and there are potential competitors/advertisement injectors(like Phorm) and such lurking in between them and the user; but likely to be against legal controls on their storage of potentially interesting information.

      Even today, they deliver a mixed bag of good and bad, largely, though arguably not wholly, predicted by their business interests. As those evolve, expect the mixture of costs and benefits delivered to evolve alongside them.

      Compared to most of the alternatives, I would say that Google's business interests are more strongly aligned with my interests for the internet than are those of most any other corporation of nontrivial size, I would just caution against viewing them as either friend or enemy. They follow their interests. At present, those converge fairly well, comparatively speaking, with those of users. If, after some change, they diverge, Google will continue to follow their interests, same as always.

    13. Re:Google by Insightfill · · Score: 1

      Welcome to Slashdot, where contentless posts that contribute nothing to the discussion are rewarded with +5 insightful.

      To be fair, his anti-corporate point was that IN SPITE of Google being a corporation out to make a buck, most of the results of its actions end up being good for the internet as a whole. THAT'S insightful. It's like discovering that the door-to-door salesman that you may hate has gone ahead and filled in the pot-holes and filled in the cracks to get to the houses easier.

    14. Re:Google by Frater+219 · · Score: 1
      One problem is that as the size of a corporation increases, the influences on its behavior may become dominated by principal-agent problems and specific motivations of individuals within the corporation. It's easy for the members of a ten-person startup to keep "increasing shareholder value" in mind, but in a ten-thousand-person company, a middle manager or mid-ranking engineer may be much more interested in his or her next quarterly review or promotion.

      Furthermore, the internal economy of a large corporation is a command economy, not a free market. In a free market, decision makers can count on prices to show them which goods are the most efficient choices, or which products may be the most lucrative. But within a large corporation, management is expected to know how best to apportion budgets, wages, investments, etc. â" all without the benefit of a pricing mechanism that accurately reflects (internal) needs. And as the corporation gets larger and more heavily capitalized, it becomes more and more different from the outside world, so external signals (such as the prevailing wages in the industry) become less relevant to internal decision-making.

    15. Re:Google by Asdanf · · Score: 1
      Hard way to do good as a business:
      1. 1. Consciously try to do good every day, despite business interests to the contrary.

      Easier way to do good as a business:

      1. 1. Align your corporate business model with good things.
      2. 2. Follow the business model.

      In other words, maybe it's because of Google's founders' altruism that you now don't have to trust Google's altruism.

    16. Re:Google by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 2

      Given that it's a thinly veiled application of Smith's 1776 examination of how selfish actors can end up achieving surprisingly positive effects and externalities(arguably to be found, in less formal language, in Mandeville's 1705 Fable of the Bees...) to the question of what Google is up to in terms of the health of the internet, I wouldn't claim too much original insight....

      As you note, though, my bafflement about how I managed to be "anti-corporate" is only increasing. All I really did was apply a vaguely Smith-esque examination of "invisible hand" effects of profit seeking agents to a classic model of a self-interested corporation...

    17. Re:Google by vegiVamp · · Score: 1

      You'd have to happily submit to the corporation and willingly, nay, smilingly hand over your dough and your data, then drop your pants and bend over in case any of the janitors feel like assrape. The CEO obviously can buy better ass than yours with the cash you just gave him.

      Your grasp of the situation is pretty apt, and you put it more eloquently than I ever could. Good work :-)

      --
      What a depressingly stupid machine.
    18. Re:Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Please consider the possibility that Google is a company run by people. These people have strong opinions about how we can improve the world, and that Google's resources should be used, everywhere possible, to do precisely that. Most of the things Google ultimately does need to have some plausible positive impact on Google's business, just to avoid pissing off the shareholders, but it's not appropriate to conclude that Google's shareholders are running the show and that profit is all that Google's management cares about in the end.

    19. Re:Google by Discrete_infinity · · Score: 1

      I felt your statement was spot on in regards to Smith's position on profit seeking agents. Shaka's remark says more about his/her own position than yours. Shaka reminds me of Jack Nicholson's character Colonel Nathan Jessep in the movie "A Few Good Men", when the good Colonel scolds the prosecutors for sleeping under the very blanket of freedom he provides and then questioning the manner in which he provides it.

      I recently read Smith's "Wealth of Nations" again and found his insights very profound in light of the recent economic crisis.
      Just my 2 cents.

      --
      Windows Haiku Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot. Order shall return.
  3. Boot Strapping... by 0100010001010011 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    a suite of Web-based, Internet-scale measurement tools that any user around the world could access for free

    So, what happens if the Web-based suite is throttled or censored?

    1. Re:Boot Strapping... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      That would, one suspects, make throttling and censorship pretty easy to detect...

      That's the handy thing about such a tool: unless fantastically mal-architected, it is pretty likely that anybody who messes with access to it is up to no good. The real target is those who try to keep their hands clean while simultaneously bringing out the iron fist.

    2. Re:Boot Strapping... by chemicaldave · · Score: 1

      a suite of Web-based, Internet-scale measurement tools that any user around the world could access for free

      So, what happens if the Web-based suite is throttled or censored?

      You'd think the tool wouldn't be throttled at all. Censored maybe, but why throttled? Better to promote the connection to any speed checking sites and give the user a false sense of fulfillment.

    3. Re:Boot Strapping... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are tools, such as Collage, that can be used to send the reports undetectably. See http://gtnoise.net/collage/

    4. Re:Boot Strapping... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So, what happens if the Web-based suite is throttled or censored?

      a) throttled a little: no problem, it'd still be usable.
      b) throttled to the point of being unusable: no problem, as THIS would prove to you that your connection is throttled/censored.
      c) censored: as b) above.

    5. Re:Boot Strapping... by jd · · Score: 1

      What they are doing is re-inventing the Internet Weather stations that have existed for a decade or so. (Think MRTG but on a much larger scale and with rather more sophisticated output.)

      Well, ok, they're maybe adding in the capabilities of the open-source pchar utility, which gives you the packet loss and maximum throughput of every hop between any two points on the net.

      Throw in the Internet Routing Registry Toolset and you've a complete system.

      Tell you what, if Google is going to give a million bucks for a better-packaged MRTG + pchar + IRRToolset, I'll take the contract. May take me a little while to produce a uniform look-and-feel, clean some of the cruft from pchar, produce useful statistics showing exactly what, where and by how much traffic is being throttled. A week, maybe two, add one more for documentation, and a final one so I can have some R&R in Hawaii...

      It's not like Georgia will do any better. It'll probably do a lot worse, take longer to do it, and will likely take side-payments by ISPs to conceal any throttling detected.

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
    6. Re:Boot Strapping... by v1 · · Score: 1

      Collage appears to be automated stenography

      I don't think that really fits here?

      --
      I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
    7. Re:Boot Strapping... by CFTM · · Score: 1

      So on what grounds do you have more credibility than Georgia Tech? I mean you've basically just called GT Researchers frauds and snake oil salesmen, so is that backed by any evidence?

      I'm not expert in this field, nor an expert on "Internet Weather Stations" so I won't even try to assess the applicability of these tools. I'm sure if packaged correctly they could be a viable suite to do what you say, and if it is so easy why don't you go monetize it?

      And sure if a government entity had won this award, I'd agree that the likely result would be the telcos working with the agency to conceal the truth but how do you propose that the telcos will get their hooks into a public research institution. I'm not arrogant enough to say that this doesn't happen but it strikes me as far less likely in this setting than in a corporate/government setting so what alternative is there?

      Or are we back to trusting you because you say so?

    8. Re:Boot Strapping... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      1 million dollars to do something that's already been done n+1 times?

      The research is done, all that's needed is some extra packaging/idiot proofing.

      If GA tech quoted $1millon, then there is WAY too much administrative overhead.

      (Having worked at/for several colleges, I can say the admin overhead is a given fact, not speculation.....)

      You could get better results, faster by starting an open source project and offering bounties on the different parts.....

    9. Re:Boot Strapping... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OP made the mistake of confusing UGA and GATech. This is heresy and anathema, but does explain his lack of confidence in the researchers to produce an original and valuable result. I wouldn't trust UGA computer scientists with $1M either. But then, I'm biased since I bleed black and gold.

      - George P. Burdell

  4. Good - more transparency by GFLPraxis · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The easier to detect, the harder it is for ISP's to keep such practices out of the spotlight.

    1. Re:Good - more transparency by hedwards · · Score: 1

      As usually a brief case left with Honest Abe will certainly fix the problem.

    2. Re:Good - more transparency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tell that to Bell Canada who is cutting my whole Internet connection down from 400k to 30k when a torrent is active, effectively bringing down my voip phone line.... Well court has given them the right to do so...

      Note that this only applies during "peak hours", thank god these only range from about 2 pm to 2 am...

    3. Re:Good - more transparency by Charliemopps · · Score: 0

      Since the government seems to want to do the exact opposite... way to go google.

    4. Re:Good - more transparency by jd · · Score: 2

      http://www.kitchenlab.org/www/bmah/Software/pchar/
      http://www.isc.org/software/irrtoolset
      http://oss.oetiker.ch/mrtg/
      http://www.caida.org/tools/

      If you want transparency, you can always do it yourself. Why wait for Google? You've a list of tools right there that will tell you who is throttling, when, where, how, by how much, and maybe even what they had for breakfast.

      http://www.internettrafficreport.com/main.htm
      http://www.internettrafficreport.com/namerica.htm

      Then there's the Weather Channel for geeks. That should give you a good indication of "unusual" packet losses, indicative of throttling.

      http://www.noc.ucla.edu/weather.html
      http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/weather/weather.html

      For more local weather on the tens, there's UCLA and UCSF.

      There ya go, and it cost you rather less than the same information is costing Google.

      --
      It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
  5. Yah! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe there's some ulterior motive that I'm not seeing - but this sounds like a total win for us end users.

    1. Re:Yah! by Hazel+Bergeron · · Score: 1

      1, 2 and 3.

      HTH.

    2. Re:Yah! by mlts · · Score: 1

      The ulterior motive is that Google's interests are different than ISP's interests, and that ISPs may end up bullying Google to give preferences to their customers in return for Google's traffic not being "slowed down".

      If people knew that an ISP was throttling, Google can point that it is the ISP's doings, not Google. Right now, a slow website is usually the website owner's problem, and the ISP would likely never get blamed, especially if traffic to other places was not affected.

    3. Re:Yah! by XiaoMing · · Score: 1

      Just imagine if google's cloud-based tablet (http://www.infopackets.com/news/business/google/2010/20100420_google_tablet_rivals_ipad_with_cloud_open_source.htm) had to go up against the iPad4 on an ATT-dominated wireless infrastructure. With ATT's selective bandwidth throttling and caps, you'd effectively be pitting glorified notepad.exe vs. technological opium.

      It's pretty clear that the ATT bandwidth cap and purchasing of T-mobile is getting on the nerves of the corporations that have invested so much infrastructure on a cloud-based future that practically necessitates cheaply available bandwidth.

      With so much control in the hands of telecom, pushing for net-neutrality is probably the best bet companies like google will have. Impressive how capitalism and "Don't be evil" can align like celestial bodies every now and then.
      Keep fighting the good fight, Three-Goog!

    4. Re:Yah! by HeckRuler · · Score: 2

      #1) Google caved to Verison in an effort to break the logjam that is stopping network neutrality legislation. Yeah, I'm not happy they're willing to compromise over something so important. But I'm not seeing how spotlighting network neutrality breakage helps Google with some ulterior motive. It'll probably help them put Verizon over a barrel and force them to accept NN.
      #2) Nifty. Got anything juicy to put in the comparator? Cause aside from some sites being re-ordered and some ads being different, I'm not seeing how letting people detect throttling is at odds with taking into account regional differences.
      #3) Ah yes, Google's cash cow, that whole "Search" thing that they do. I hear it's kind of important to them. Like a proprietary secret of sorts. Alright, alright, the world be more knowledgeable and probably better off in the long run if this was public, open and free. But as far as corporations go, not giving away their main product is hardly evil. And it still has nothing to do with throttling detection.


      Here's a vital bit of info that'll help you get over your fear of Google: A free and open Internet, where everyone uses it to... do whatever, makes Google money. If everyone used ONLY the services in their ISP's walled garden, or only ever went to facebook, then the Internet is diminished. And Google along with it. It is in Google's financial interests to make the Internet a good place to do things. Because finding stuff on the Internet is still the primary thing they do.

    5. Re:Yah! by CFTM · · Score: 1

      To quote WoW Users: ^

    6. Re:Yah! by tcr · · Score: 1

      Ah, 3. That old chestnut.

      What would the results be like if the most popular search algorithm could be trivially gamed?

      Look in your spam folder to find out.

      HTH.

      --


      Information wants to be beer.
    7. Re:Yah! by Hazel+Bergeron · · Score: 1

      Ah yes. Resilience through obscurity.

      Google can be and is already trivially gamed. The market for doing so is huge and effective.

  6. How long until they are labeled as evil terrorists by Bob+the+Super+Hamste · · Score: 1
    How long until they are labeled as evil terrorists by some government or corporate overlords for funding such tools.

    Unfortunately I am only half joking with.

    --
    Time to offend someone
  7. I for one... by Aighearach · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Really appreciate that google consistently places them in the proper position of an infrastructure provider, setting up their monetization to be supported by open, fair access.

    I don't trust "intent," but I do trust a business that is set up to maximize profit when things are best for the "little guy."

    Their APIs are a joy to work with, too.

  8. I want a million bucks too! by DarthVain · · Score: 4, Funny

    If Country = "Canada"
          Then Print "Yes, you're are being throttled!"
    Elseif Country = "China"
          Then Print "Yes, you're being censored, I hope you can read English or this will be really confusing!"
    .
    .
    .
    PROFIT!
    .
    .
    .
    End

    1. Re:I want a million bucks too! by Terrasque · · Score: 3, Informative

      Elseif Country = "USA":
              Then Pr^CHello, this is agent Smith. For your own safety, please stop visiting these terrorist sites. This is your first and only warning.

      --
      It's The Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."
  9. Was overdue. by unity100 · · Score: 1

    Apps for that hould have been out long ago.

    --
    Read radical news here
  10. First Post!!!! by Dutchmaan · · Score: 4, Funny

    DAMN! Throttled again... That's Google's project right there. Hiring 1000's of first posters and measuring the delay!

    1. Re:First Post!!!! by howardd21 · · Score: 1

      Now that's funny, and if I had /. did no throttle my mod points I'd give you one.

      --
      no comment
  11. Already exists? by menos · · Score: 1

    Wasn't there a page/site that did this awhile back? I seem to recall that there was. I can't remember if it was related to a university or not.

    1. Re:Already exists? by geedra · · Score: 1

      http://broadband.mpi-sws.org/transparency/bttest.php/

    2. Re:Already exists? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      http://www.youtube.com/my_speed

  12. Re:Might as well... by srussia · · Score: 0

    Fail

    Throttled!

    --
    Set your phasers on "funky"!
  13. Connection Throttling? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There's an App for that!

  14. ISPs by theBully · · Score: 1

    Some are not going to be happy if this gets through. I know mine (Rogers, ON, CA) is keep saying they do not throttle any traffic despite very frequent user complaints. Yes they happen to be one of the biggest Cable TV providers in Ontario as well and also to have the full support of CRTC in whatever they do. It's not going to have any effect but at least they'll be forced to admit it.

    1. Re:ISPs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I also live in Ontario, Canada. I was on Rogers until about a month ago when I got fed up of their throttling. I switched to Teksavvy cable, which rents/leases the bandwidth from Rogers. As soon as the switch happened I noticed a HUGE difference in my download and upload speeds, and this was before I switched to the new cable modem that I bought from Teksavvy! The comparison is like night and day.

      Proof enough that Rogers throttles? It's obvious to me and anyone else thinking logically. How they can deny that they are not throttling people and get away with it, I don't know. And now this new "Speed Boost" technology they are advertising? In other words, they're basically reducing the amount of throttling they're doing when there is a lot of bandwidth available, to give the appearance of a "speed boost". Criminal behaviour, if you ask me.

    2. Re:ISPs by future+assassin · · Score: 1

      >Criminal behaviour, if you ask me.

      Rogers, Shaw, Bell and Telus should be illegal but hookers and blow gets your company anything you want, even the politicians.

      --
      by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
  15. Do want by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is something that was needed a long time ago. It's good to see this being done by a bigger corporation. I really feel like google is fighting for the little guys

  16. why pay to have our unclesam.gov censored? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    throttled? maybe? yeah, that might help.

    isn't it supposed to be the other way around? why does anyone have to censor/kill etc...? historically, only the truth, & the public loses out, when the truth leaves, as it requires none, & cannot be, 'censored' save temporarily (throttled?). censures. indictments? who's better at censoring calls for that stuff?

  17. $1m for `ttcp` and `ping`? by redelm · · Score: 1

    OK, maybe just a bit more than these ancient tools, but _really_? GOOG have some of the phattest pipes around and ought to be monitoring RTT and bandwidth variations all on their own.

    Or rather, I'm severely disappointed they're not already monitoring. Or maybe they are, and this is just dezinformatzia.

    1. Re:$1m for `ttcp` and `ping`? by hedwards · · Score: 1

      Doubtful, few ISPs are stupid enough to throttle those tools.

    2. Re:$1m for `ttcp` and `ping`? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ICMP is blocked by most sites. I suspect they know a little more about networking and scale than a prick like you?
      Buying this merely gives it news coverage, something ISPs will not want.

    3. Re:$1m for `ttcp` and `ping`? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Neither of those tools will detect throttling. If I limit my internet connection to 5kb/sec then I can still get a great ping/latency response, but it will still takes me ages to download a video compared to a 500kb/sec connection.

    4. Re:$1m for `ttcp` and `ping`? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unless you are pinging while downloading a video.

  18. Long overdue... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    (This comment has been removed due to a copyright claim from The People's Republic of China.)

  19. Buffer Bloat by seifried · · Score: 2

    A lot of what looks like throttling (especially of latency sensitive applications like VOIP) may actually be buffer bloat - http://www.bufferbloat.net/, so while not malicious the end effect is the same (stuff that should work, doesn't).

    1. Re:Buffer Bloat by mtaht · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The original gatech study showed not only bufferbloat, but enormous variation of base latencies in the first mile for different brands of cable modem as well as for different kinds of DSL and wireless technologies.

      Slides: http://www.caida.org/workshops/isma/1102/slides/aims1102_ssundaresan.pdf

      Some commentary: http://gettys.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/caida-workshop/

      I look forward to the followup!

  20. Comcast by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 1

    Comcast must be shitting their pants right about now.

    --
    Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
    1. Re:Comcast by Rudolf · · Score: 1

      Comcast must be shitting their pants right about now.
      Why? Someone might find out they're throttling? I thought everyone knew that already.

    2. Re:Comcast by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 1

      Most people don't know. We geeks know. And someone like Consumer Reports might use the data and publish it. One can hope!

      --
      Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
  21. our uncle sam is an incestuous old fink? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    let's not start on that religious training schoolyard gossip, & hurtful language legacy, again?

  22. An example of such a tool - ICSI Netalyzr by seifried · · Score: 1

    http://netalyzr.icsi.berkeley.edu/, requires Java. I personally used this tool to benchmark some consumer router/firewall gear, to find most of it takes 100-300ms to make DNS lookups (which explained why web surfing felt so slow through these things, all the DNS requests were taking about 6x longer than they should).

  23. Google - yeah right by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Network diagnostic tools coming from the same folks (Google) who told a customer of my own that a single 7mbit ADSL connection would support their 80 employees using Outlook plug in for Gmail. They gave my client a 'tool' to see how well the line would work. I told the client that they need to upgrade and that I don't care what the tool said (despite the tool saying everything would 'be fine'). Sure enough, the ADSL wouldn't cut it and it was time to get a symmetrical optical connection. After that, everything was fine (only a 10 x 10 connection). Point being: I sure hope they get the network diagnostic tool 'right'.

    1. Re:Google - yeah right by CFTM · · Score: 1

      It's very easy to be cynical about Google given their stance on privacy, but at this point there is no indication that there will be an attempt to monetize this technology. Moreover, George Tech will be providing the tool, not Google. Google just said, here's a million dollars to make the tool. Five years from now we'll have a better idea of the real purpose of this initiative but given they did not purchase a company, and as to yet the lead researcher on the topic is not a senior Google person so I'm willing to suspend any disbelief and hope that this is really Google saying "Fuck You" to the US Senate.

      Seeing as the US Senate just overturned the FCC's ruling on net neutrality, this seems like a rather bold response by Google but maybe I'm being idealistic.

  24. Re:could have used this last night... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Awww... Was 4chan being DDoS'd again and you couldn't access your favorite /b/ and /soc/ boards?

  25. Full Press Release by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The full press release with more information (including attribution to Nick Feamster on this project, who has past work in both anti-censorship and developing network neutrality tools) is here:
    http://www.cc.gatech.edu/news/georgia-tech-pursue-transparent-internet-1m-google-focused-research-award

  26. Real speeds across the internet by mtaht · · Score: 1

    on google maps http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/google-maps-300tb-of-real-world-internet-speeds.ars

  27. i can see how this went by nopainogain · · Score: 0

    used server running linux and snort---$5000.00 beer and pizza to spend a year pretending to do research while ignoring the conf file and logs.... $995,000.00

  28. And do what about it? by blair1q · · Score: 0

    Seriously. Google has done little or nothing to get itself out from under blatant censorship by the Chinese government. Just what are they going to do when every backbone dangler is subtly manipulating mercantile network traffic for their own profit? Wave vague statistics at them?

    1. Re:And do what about it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The difference is that the chinese threaten with violence.... oh wait, I'm sure that's no different than what the US will be like years from now... oh right, nm...

  29. Re:could have used this last night... by adamdoyle · · Score: 1

    I wish Slashdot would just block the substring "MichaelKristopeit" from all user registrations. (and block his IP address) I mean people with mod points are doing a good job keeping him in the -1, but for those of us who browse at -1 when moderating, we're sicking of seeing this crap.

  30. Google says: by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    "You WILL see our advertising!"

  31. GreatFirewall.biz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "simple tools to detect Internet throttling, government censorship, and other 'transparency' problems."

    Sounds like http://www.greatfirewall.biz - a website that keeps track of websites and searches that are blocked in mainland China.

  32. Google Rat by xnpu · · Score: 1

    While Google is making nice press with their "good" things, they're still running their recently introduced service where they report China based VPN users to the Chinese government, incl. what they search for. No other search engine does this. Google has gone form great to most evil in my book, just because of this. I've posted this to a number of places, but nobody seems to care about the lives of people who use VPN's in China and the risk of the Chinese government being made aware of the controversial things these people Google for. But low and behold and when Gmail feels "slow" for a few days in China, then it's front page news.

    1. Re:Google Rat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dude, you have any links for more info on this?

  33. Google Spends $1 Million For Trolling Detection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Am I the only one who misread the title?

  34. Re:could have used this last night... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Ban evasion is unauthorized access to a computer system (a.k.a. hacking). Enjoy your jailtime if they ever care enough to bother taking you in for it.

  35. I can tell you who throttles right now by hesaigo999ca · · Score: 1

    It will only cost you 5$ and i can tell you who already throttles right now.....the UK,
    http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/03/22/2237225/UK-ISPs-Hatch-Plan-To-Block-the-Pirate-Bay-and-Other-File-Sharing-Sites

    wow putting 2 and 2 together is a great payday.