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Kill Net Neutrality and You'll Kill Us, Say 800 US Startups (google.com)
A group of more than 800 startups has sent a letter to the FCC chairman Ajit Pai saying they are "deeply concerned" about his decision to kill net neutrality -- reversing the Title II classification of internet service providers. The group, which includes Y Combinator, Etsy, Foursquare, GitHub, Imgur, Nextdoor, and Warby Parker, added that the decision could end up shutting their businesses. They add, via an article on The Verge: "The success of America's startup ecosystem depends on more than improved broadband speeds. We also depend on an open Internet -- including enforceable net neutrality rules that ensure big cable companies can't discriminate against people like us. We're deeply concerned with your intention to undo the existing legal framework. Without net neutrality, the incumbents who provide access to the Internet would be able to pick winners or losers in the market. They could impede traffic from our services in order to favor their own services or established competitors. Or they could impose new tolls on us, inhibiting consumer choice. [...] Our companies should be able to compete with incumbents on the quality of our products and services, not our capacity to pay tolls to Internet access providers."
Unless one of those 100 startups is owned by Vladimir Putin, "Moscow Donald" isn't interested.
He's one of Trump's cronies. They're all in it to get rich together. You think they care about some place where a bunch of hippies share open source code or hipsters try to sell pretty trinkets for peanuts? Fuck no.
Welcome to America made great again. Better get used to it, because it's gonna get a whole lot worse before it gets any better.
And as we all know, Republicans are all about being good for business.
And the businesses of America have always thought about the people of this country, first and foremost, whether importing hundreds of thousands of African slaves to toil on Cotton and Tobacco plantations, to starting wars over bananas, pineapples and guano.
Truly, they are blessed
Seriously, the last thing major investors (the kind that run Goldman Sachs) want is disruption. Just keep the gravy train going and fire off a little war every now and then and they're happy. Nobody wants another Google, Netflix or Square changing the landscape. Well, nobody Congress is listening too anyway.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Dateline SAN JOSE: Special interests make dire predictions of the future to try to gain favorable government policy treatment. "Give us what we want or it will be just terrible," they said. "We'll all die of Silicon Valley ennui!" When asked how many startups would die anyway of unrealistic optimism and poor management, they just glared and sullenly shuffled away, whispering under their breath.
Sadly, we never got the chance to ask them how accurate their other predictions of the future were.
Always surprising that people are still taking Trump-selected members of the administration at their word, or treat them as someone who would listen to their concerns with a fair mind. These are hard right Republicans. They're in it for the money, not for you peons. Give him a bigger bribe than the next guy if you want him to listen.
...the cable companies might slow down Uber & Breitbart news.
support net neutrality.
Maybe you missed the memo, but almost every company listed in FTS is a gateway and vocal point of hundreds to thousands of businesses each.
YC by itself: http://yclist.com/
Nah, they're worried that the telco cartel will see their profits and slow down their packets unless they pay extra.
i.e. "tortuous interference in business" made legal by cash to Republican Congressmen.
And before you go all defending and parisan, those same Republicans just legalized selling your browser history.
...always split the comment between the subject and body?
.
The FCC's Obama-era net neutrality rules were far too weak and failed to protect net neutrality when there was a chance. And now that Trump is in place, the window of opportunity will probably be closed for quite some time.
During the whole time that the current regs were in place (since 2015), Verizon and AT&T violated net neutrality about as blatantly as you could imagine with their zero-rating policy that promotes and benefits their own streaming services to the exclusion of all others. The FCC did squat. Of course, things will only get worse now, but the situation was certainly not rosy up until this point.
If you think these companies don't pay for their Internet connections, you are deluded.
Pai is fully bought and paid for by the entrenched incumbent telecom providers,and is going to do exactly what they tell him to do no matter what the facts are.
meanwhile Comcast, leader of the Cabal, experienced revenue growth of 7.91% from 74.51bn to 80.40bn while net income improved 6.52% from 8.16bn to 8.70bn.
With a gross margin of a mere 69.5%, the CEO could be heard screaming blocks away "MORE MORE MORE", as the board room followed in his lead and a chant broke out.
So, rather than tell ISPs to stop lying about the level of service they provide, you would prefer that they be able to shake down the providers of the only reason people buy the ISPs' service in the first place? Do toll operators charge a different rate depending on where you're going?
This. It is a crushing cost that would put us out of business.
Same here. The old government reports cost us more than we made.
I think network neutrality is a good thing. And I'm willing to bet most republicans and even slightly right-leaning people that will read these comments on /. feel the same way. Now might not be the best time to alienate them/us further with "Moscow Donald" remarks and more demonization.
Just a thought, guys.
I had a sucky sig.
Honestly, do you think the lawmakers in charge are idiots? They know exactly what they're doing. Telling them that they'll kill startups and small business is like telling them that anti-drug laws as they're written will put disproportionately more innocent black men in jail.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Come on, really? You really think they're asking for a free ride? It's more like, "Please don't tamper with our highways and interstates if you don't like what we're driving, or where we came from. We DID pay our taxes you know..." (connection fees/monthly rates)
I had a sucky sig.
They are sending data to me. I paid comcast to get it. COmcast can't say what data I should be able to get. They are a common carrier not a gate keeper.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I bought this 750ml bottle of wine, it had only 300ml of wine in it, and when I complained to the store, they told to me they gave some of the bottle I paid for to Bob because THEY DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH WINE to fill all the bottles they sold.
How dare I demand a full bottle of wine according to the label I read!
How dare I demand a free 450ml of wine from them! How could I be so selfish!
Remember 13 years ago when we all posted links to our American representatives and with their phones and email exploding the DRM trusted PC requirements went away from a potential bill.
Can you all afford 3 minutes of your life
Ok most senators and congressman are too stupid to know what net neutrality is. They gain their information from experts ... experts brought to by lobbyists from Cox, Comcast, Time Warner, to educate our politicians what this issue is. They are simply ignorant.
So here is the link for your congressman. Here is the link to your senator. The people who read these are called scriptwriters and if they get thousands of angry emails I can guarantee you it will at least get your politicians attention.
When I linked this in 2003 or 2004 here Slashdot posted a story a few days later stating congress was confused, dumbfounded, and shocked. The bill died :-D
If you have a Republican write professionally that you do not want big brother government to trample innovation and stop jobs. Explain your I.T. position and career and explain your employer and startups already pay extra for bandwidth and this amounts to a bribe. End it off with if the United States won't allow us to be a leader in technology another cheaper country like China or India will who do not have these problems with Net Neutrality and can operate simply on bandwidth uses without double and triple dipping.
If your senator and or congressman is a democrat explain politely that this is a terrible bill that will hurt lower income internet users and new startups. Explain your I.T. position and career and explain your employer and startups already pay extra for bandwidth and this amounts to double dipping which will hurt America's competitive advantage. Also mention the top 5 technology companies are active Democratic donors to your party including Facebook, Google, and Microsoft and that if America fails to take initiative for regulating tax payer infrastructure then another country with more freedoms like India or China will take the jobs instead and this will help lower income consumers by keeping prices lower.
http://saveie6.com/
They pay their entire share, all of them, killing net neutrality will let the bigger guys force them to pay multiples of that until they cant pay at all and get absorbed or liquidated. You're an imbecile.
Any sort of government control hurts the little guys and helps the monopolies.
Make it a government regulated utility service so it actually has a quality of service, like telephones. Net neutrality is a continuing BS-saga that should become part of law, to avoid this drama in the future.
All government control helps larger companies and hurts small ones.
"Our business model depends on the fact that we don't pay for network infrastructure upgrades." - Internet content companies.
Only people who don't understand net neutrality would say that. How do you think these 800 start-ups get the Internet? They pay for it just like every other business. What they can't pay for is privileged or special access because ISPs want more money.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
If your app needs a big commercial grade internet pipe to get it tested, pay for it.
Dont just use a collection of consumer grade accounts.
Stop with the juice machines, company cars, fancy chairs and wasting investors cash on renting in CA.
Move to a cheaper state with low cost power, low cost local workers, low taxes and spend the savings on bandwidth and testing.
Put all the effort into the app, test it with real bandwidth and get it to market.
Happy investors, happy local workers and the internet provider gets paid for the bandwidth too.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
They pay to deliver to Comcast, I pay Comcast to deliver to me.
If I wanted content without paying for delivery, I'd use an antenna.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
You are bad at trolling. You are discriminating based on content and against a class of businesses out of misguided deference to entrenched communication monopolies (that only exist by mandate, and thus owe their existence to the public). There is no excuse for billing based on destination for Internet packets. Consider simple movement which has costs. Information flow is also movement and has costs, but they are very different. For physical goods those costs include maintenance of particular roads and compatible rail gages, transport containers, etc. For information none of that applies and costs depend only on the existence of a network which is in place, telecommunications equipment which is in place, and electricity which is widely available and already paid for by all parties: the host, the user, and by the ISP which is billing the user already. Sending packets to fox.com or espn.com or buttfuck.ru is all the same. Local caches that mirror remote content and thus speed up access are paid by serving ads that are viewed by users. Either make access free and charge providers, or realize the bed is made instead of burning down the house.
So all these startups tried to fukk up Trump, and when he won they did what? Kept fuking with him?
Only a complete idiot would not think that he will retaliate somehow. Paytime bithes.
I stand up a server in a datacenter. Then I pay for throughput, do I not?
I install a computer in my home. Then I then pay for throughput, do I not?
Then we've got Tier 1,2 and 3 ISP's all motivated to build a fair and honest market for clearing throughput. If Netflix wants to consume 50% of a data centers throughput, it's all already paid for, lock stock and barrel.
Let me tell you what this debate really is about.
In a world where everyone has a 100Mbps bidirectional internet connection, you can download 3TB of data, or 360, 8GB DVD's, in 3 Days; that's a year's worth of movie watching. What happens when someone torrents the last 50 years of TV and an app to organize it all? That's the hard death of their business model.
I am seeing 2PB (2048TB) of storage in a 2U rack, today; in 8GB DVD's, that's 262,144 DVD's. An 80 year old has 29,200 days in their life. Today, that storage is a million bucks. What happens in 10 years when it's $150? Someone goes into business cloning and selling them for $200. The collapse of their model is inevitable.
We've changed from connecting residential properties to the internet over a public utility, POTS, to connecting residential properties to the internet using a private utility, cable. And these companies want to charge pay-per-page-view pricing to their customers, as well as keep them from blocking ad's. They want to dice and slice the internet and serve it up piecemeal. They want to be the content billing service. Once they have done that, then they own the distribution channel lock stock and barrel, they can do anything they want.
We literally have rural customers none of these companies want to touch with a 10 foot pole being sued for running their own municipal fiber. Why are they so afraid? How does a community running their own internet lines affect them in the slightest? This kind of activity only makes sense in a 3rd world country, and that's exactly where we are headed. If we were getting away from ad's, everyone would have a voluntary supercookie they'd use for billing. Bam. Done. I Guarantee you, you'll pay per page view, and you will still have ad's, but the ISP will prevent you from blocking them. You will have zero privacy, your comments and user-generated content will be confiscated or censored at their whim. All just like a 3rd world country.
Agreed. We need ISPs to be classified as common carriers. That will solve this problem AND the selling-your-browsing-habits problem.
Oh the irony with Y Combinator. They were in the headlines over Peter Thiels support of Trump.
Better to just make sure the big companies rake in the cash! MAGA!
...back when I worked there. (Not that I ever met him or anything, but when we got bought by Verizon I'm positive he was one of the suits.*)
I haven't looked into Net Neutrality. My issue here is "Truth in Labeling" -- is it REALLY what it says it is (All packets are normally treated equal, with the commonly expected QoS overrides and NAKs and squelches needed for normal operation? -- vs -- Packet loss because we're funneling Netflix thru a single 300 baud modem while it's racked neighbors connect 10G links to V's internal movie servers. You can connect; let's see you actually do it), or is it like the Patriot Act and others, a misnamed law with weird effects? I'm thinking that it IS what "everyone" wants (a level packet paying field) but not positive.
I _DO_ think Pai is not evil -- he's a lawyer after all, it's just his nature to stretch, improve, and (Hi Lisa!) bend all existing laws to his will. I think he is trying to get all of those pesky regulations out of the way so Business can be done. That being said, why bother with any laws at all -- they just get in the way and slow things down.
Here's my take of him after hearing that 800 startups might be shut down: Picture, or Action.
(* OT: during one of the group meetings where our company was being bought out and they were fielding questions, one was: "So what's the name of the new company?" McAdams, the CEO, looked puzzled so the guy continued: "You keep saying this is a merger between equals, so I wanted to know if you had thought up a name for the newly combined company." McAdam scowled at him and said "Verizon." The guy didn't ask a follow-up question.)
If the universe is someone's simulation -- does that mean the stars are just stuck pixels?
So, we had a long period where ISPs were classified as Information Services rather than Telecommunication Services. This allowed them to not have to be treated as common carriers and thus not have to be neutral or share their lines. They loved that and this decision is an attempt to bring that back. But why on earth would the courts allow this classification when it's so clearly a lie? Why did they let them be classified this way for a decade?
An Information Service is a service you pay so that they will themselves provide you with information. For example, if you subscribe to a stock ticker service which provides you with information about what stocks have sold at what prices, that's an Information Service. A Telecommunications Service is a service you pay so that they will connect you to a network where you can contact other parties which may be distant from you and communicate with them. For example, a telephone company. It's very, very clear that no one signs up for an ISP to get information from the ISP. We sign up to use the internet to communicate with servers the vast majority of which are not owned or operated by the ISP. When Comcast attempted to argue that they shouldn't be classified as a Telecommunications service, they cited the fact that they provided information to customers because they ran DNS servers. The idea that most customers are paying their ISP primarily because they want DNS service is laughable. So why is the FCC even allowed to classify these services as something they aren't?
Ok most senators and congressman are too stupid to know what net neutrality is.
The head of the FCC is saying it needs to be done away with. Pai isn't ignorant, he knows exactly what he's doing. This isn't an accident, this is malicious.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
I'm all for it then!
30 years of experience? Yeah, I agree with you there.
But squeaky clean? She's been corrupt as shit for a long time dude.
If net neutrality goes it will be like trying to start a transport business if the roads were owned by a consortium of existing providers - who were allowed to charge you or impose travel and route restrictions as they liked
Everybody pays for their internet connection... The rules that are being retracted prevent the ISP's from double (triple?) dipping by charging 3rd parties again
Talking about extremists...
Do you get paid to write all those replies to yourself, or is this just a hobby?
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
That all sounds perfectly credible and I reckon something a lot like that will be attempted.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
If they'll lie about that, what else might they lie about in their own interest?
That has never been the way the Internet has worked, and it has worked fine for decades. You can push for a rule like that, but make no mistake that this would be a massive change in the way Internet connectivity is paid for, and it would be forced on the market by government regulation. The companies arguing for net neutrality understand that, and that's why they support it so heavily.
Net neutrality does redistribute the cost of providing bandwidth. But it does it from content providers (who would pay less) to ISPs (who would pay more). That's why content providers are in favor of it and ISPs are against it.
> That has never been the way the Internet has worked, and it has worked fine for decades.
Outside of peering agreements, that is _exactly_ how pushing bits across the Internet has worked for decades. People pay their edge provider for a connection at a given speed and volume, and that edge provider pushes packets at that speed and volume that are handed to it by that customer, _regardless of the contents of those packets_.
You expect someone with the name ajit to care what americans think?
Perhaps these guys don't care and are trying to destroy the Internet, to protect the outdated and ineffective business model of the cable and media giants.
Joke's on you, Comcast, RIAA, and friends: I didn't buy your media before, and I won't after your shenanigans, either. If the ISPs want to degrade their own service, I'll simply cut the network cord. My generation knows how to live without the Internet. You can always swing by the library if you need to download or otherwise access something. With a full GNU/Linux distro, there's a ton of things you can do with a computer and a few tarballs.
I don't think a lot of these companies understand that for some people, the Internet is how they interact with the world. They won't suddenly start spending a bunch of money on the big businesses if it's taken away. They'll just completely leave the market.
Of course it will kill them; that's the idea.
With net neutrality dead the robber barons get additional profits--always nice...
And even better a barrier to entry.
Petitioning thieves not to steal isn't going to work. We need to kick them out and get new thieves whose interests are more aligned with our own.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Content owners have to pay for bandwidth too.
Without net neutrality isps want content owners to pay twice. First for their own outbound connections, and again to distribute those connections to the people who asked for them.
Right now Netflix was to pay their isp. Comcast wants to charge Netflix money for delivering Netflix content to Comcast customers who want to watch Netflix as oppsoed to Comcast own services
Netflix then has to back charge you the customer who ends up paying three times for the same bandwidth to watch a show on Netflix.
That is net neutrality. And only idiots are against it
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Your understanding is correct, but your conclusion is not.
Imagine if two companies wanted to exchange physical packages. And assume that each package exchanged equally benefited both companies. Should each company bear their own costs in exchanging the packages?
Well, if the costs were roughly equal, sure. But what if they were wildly unequal? Say one company had to carry them across an ocean and the other only had to carry them across town. And yet each package carried benefited both companies equally. Then wouldn't it make sense for the company that has to carry the packages across an ocean to also get some money from the company who only has to carry them across town?
Yes, each bear their own costs. But where those costs are wildly unequal, the one with a higher cost is entitled to some compensation from the one with the lower cost.
Netflix can put their servers where the cost of bandwidth is the lowest. They're like the company that only carries the packages across town.
Comcast can't ask their customers to move into datacenters. Comcast is like the company that has to carry the packages across the ocean.
And the Internet has worked this way for decades, with a free market where settlements are negotiated between companies to ensure that the costs are divided fairly.
In sum, I see net neutrality as companies that got a perfectly fair deal from the free market trying to get the government to strong arm them a better than fair deal. And suckers are for falling for it.
It's not really double dipping. Again:
Imagine if two companies wanted to exchange physical packages. And assume that each package exchanged equally benefited both companies, say each company made $10 for each package exchanged. Should each company bear their own costs in exchanging the packages?
Well, if the costs were roughly equal, sure. But what if they were wildly unequal? Say one company had to carry them across an ocean and the other only had to carry them across town. And yet each package carried benefited both companies equally. Then wouldn't it make sense for the company that has to carry the packages across an ocean to also get some money from the company who only has to carry them across town? (Roughly half of the difference in their costs to carry the packages.)
The company that only has to carry the packages across town could say, "The other company already makes $10 for every package exchanged, paying us would be double dipping". But that's clearly nonsense.
Content providers like YouTube and Netflix can locate their servers in datacenters where bandwidth is absurdly cheap. They're like the company that only carries the packages across town.
ISPs like AT&T and Comcast can't ask their customers to move into datacenters. They have to build massive networks that cover cities. They're like the company that has to carry the packages across the ocean.
And it's reasonable to assume that data exchanged between a Netflix server and a Comcast customer benefits both companies equally.
This is the rationale for settlement based peering. And this is the arrangement the free market has worked out over decades. It's been reliable and stable and has fostered the growth of the Internet with relative freedom from regulation, fairly splitting costs between content providers and access providers. Now, one side wants the government to strong arm the other side into getting them a better deal than the fair deal the free market got them.
That's a red herring. If that was all net neutrality was about, it wouldn't solve anything. What good would it do for, say, Comcast to treat traffic with Netflix the same as traffic to Google if they had big, fat pipes to Netflix and small, slow pipes to Google? If net neutrality doesn't regulate peering agreements, ISPs will still be able to demand however much money they want from content providers or access to that content will be slow for their customers.
So which is it? Does net neutrality still let ISPs demand however much money they want from content providers or access will be uselessly slow for their customers? Or does net neutrality regulate peering agreements? There is no third option.
Ever been to Houston? The Sam Houston Parkway (aka Beltway 8 Toll Road) allows you to get on for free, then the tolls go up at each exit until you get off...
The fundamental requirement for a free market to function, is it has to be free.
There is a large problem in the US that this is blatantly not the case. As a consumer, you don't get much choice to churn ISPs if the one you're with now isn't providing good value for you by arranging good peering agreements. This is unlike Netflix or Google, where I can simply not visit their site if they don't offer a compelling reason. The reason for legislative protection is to try and counteract the monopoly that consumer ISPs have.
I'd be willing to drop the net neutrality requirements if we can also drop all municipal / council regs that prevent local-grown broadband from being developed, and force ISP transparency around how and where interlink congestion occurs.
An end of net neutrality is the best outcome for big businesses. They no longer have to invest in new features and content and can milk their current offerings to the nth degree, same way phone and cable companies do it with their local or regional de facto monopolies. Net neutrality is not an all or nothing, it needs to be service dependent. If a tweet or an email comes through a few seconds later might not matter much as long as it helps keeping video streams from dropping out. Loading a web page half a second slower is likely not that big of a deal as long as VoIP connections are stable. Making an email as important as a block of a video stream is neutral, but that neutrality does not help anyone. For startups the barrier of entry needs to be as low as it can be, otherwise it shuts the door on innovation.
Speaking of third world countries: Here in Uganda, we have nationwide infrastructure sharing that includes towers, 2.4/5G meteo WIFI APs, metro fibre, and backhaul fibre. We have MVNOs, nearly ubiquitous mobile coverage, an extremely competitive market, a healthy interconnection ecosystem, and a growing amount of local traffic. We're in a race to the bottom for prices, and a race for the top in service quality. Glad I don't live in America.
Some roads are "free" (paid for by tax-payers) and some roads have tolls (also paid for by tax-payers...toll changes is just free money for the State). Some roads have "special" lanes that you can use for carpooling (charging people based on content being delivered) or pay above and beyond all the taxes people already pay. If you don't do either, the police will chase you down and ticket you.
Tolls are MUCH higher if you are a truck delivering goods to people (again, content based charging). The excuse is trucks cause more wear and tear on the roads so the money is needed for infrastructure. Sounds just like what ISPs tell us...
I just get tired of the political hypocrisy (both sides). Toll roads are fine but ISP tolls are bad. I guess companies cannot increase profits but it's perfectly fine the government gets richer and bigger.
Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not after you!
Except it really is double dipping and analogies using real-world physical goods don't apply well. The user pays their ISP to allow them to send and receive a certain number of "packages" (packets) containing anything they want to and from anyone else connected to the global network, with these "packages" numbered in (and rate-limited at) the millions per second. The ISP takes the money and agrees to do what they must do to handle the logistics of this agreement.
Netflix also pays their ISPs and data centers for the same thing: to send and receive a certain number of "packages" (with anything they want inside those packages) per second. The same logistical responsibility then applies. Both sides pay their service provider(s) to move digital boxes around.
The double dip happens when User's residential ISP, with whom Netflix does not have any sort of business relationship, starts putting boxes with Netflix return labels in the corner and processing them at a rate lower than User's agreement grants User, unless Netflix gives them extra money. The result is that if User is only using Netflix, User is not getting what they've already paid for because of ISP's malicious treatment of only Netflix packages. Remember, User is already paying ISP to deliver those Netflix boxes to User's house at a rate up to the package-per-second limit they've paid for.
Ajit Pai calls the ability to do this double dip "freedom." What I think would turn opinion on this around is if the threat of normalization causing the reverse behavior to happen: Netflix's ISP could throttle Netflix routing to User unless User pays Netflix's ISP off. If this retarded ass "logic" from Ajit Pai is allowed to continue unabated, this is pretty much guaranteed to start happening.
Or, to use your package analogy, let's say UPS Mail Innovations required that Billy pay for shipping a box of widgets. (UPS Mail Innovations is cheap because it is delivered to the nearest US Postal Service post office and their carriers do the actual delivery. UPS and USPS have "peering" agreements in place for this, so to speak, and UPS already pays USPS to do it.) Using this real-world analogy, Ajit Pai wants USPS to have the "freedom" to show up at Jimmy's house with no package and ask for extra shipping money from Jimmy, otherwise they'll hold the package for an extra week at the post office and delay the delivery. Then let's say Jimmy pays for a return package using the same service; his return doesn't arrive until two weeks later because Billy didn't want to pay USPS extra money for "not-shit-tier delivery." This analogy is imperfect but isn't far off from the concept being discussed. This is where we are going with neutered net neutrality.
FREEDOM!
Net neutrality should regulate peering agreements indirectly; that is, the Verizon vs. Netflix and Level3 situation ought to be a flagrant violation because Verizon intentionally crippled its service in a specific way that would choke off Netflix without choking off most other high-volume websites. On the other hand, direct regulation of those agreements would lead to disaster, as we'd then be bureaucratically deciding the number of ports etc. etc. and that sort of micromanagement by bureaucracy always ends with a highly creative and damaging yet totally legal workaround.
1. Make sure Big Business wins over the Little Business
2. Concentrate power to the Big Business over time
3. Take over the Big Business to protect the national security
4. Communism!!!!!!
In order to enforce "net neutrality" the government will have to monitor and regulate and that is the plan. Even if it isn't necessary, they are evil enough to use the pretext. It always sounds innocent. There are evil people in the world.
So .. this group of companies want to use other company's infrastructure in order to make money. And want to do so without having to pay for that ability.
Sucks to be you .... that's not how free enterprise works.
If you want to use someone's labor, be it Facebook or AT&T, there is always a price to pay whether it's up front in expenses or ads for 'free' service'. You pay your provider only to get you to the rest of the network, you don't pay for the 'rest of the network'. But your provider pays for that ability, and some of that gets pushed down to you.
If you want to use the 'best of the network', I don't have any issues with those providers charging something for that privilege. Either through fees on your end for improved throughput or fees to my provider for the same thing.
And if you didn't plan for that in your business plan or can't adapt, it's your own fucking fault.
Businesses are hit with all types of changes in expenses throughout their lifecycle. Adapt or die.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
They might pay for their Internet connection. The thing is if they paid for the law. After all, you get what you pay for.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I reckon something a lot like that will be attempted.
You mean it isn't happening already?
They need to collectively get the job rolls for those companies and make this a jobs issue. That's a topic that has traction these days and will make it a political issue that has to be discussed.
Warning: Teh poster of this messaeg is lysdexic
To any of these 800 'startups'. They'd demand that the larger spaces be broken up so all spaces were the same size. then they'd probably demand the established businesses pay a higher rent, anyway, to make a 'fair' playing field so they can prosper. Just another socialist/communist economy model straight out of academia.
If you can't afford to grow, get out of the garden.
Of course they care if net neutrality will kill off 800 startups. The government loves to kill off small corporations, small business, etc. Big corporations lobby for laws which benefit them and harm new players. These 800 startups would have better stayed quiet, because all they've done is just give just one more reason to kill net neutrality.
Only a total cuck dumbfuck could believe that our government supports free trade.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
If you want it regulated write it into law. Why would I want a group of un-elected officials declaring what you can and can't do with regards to the internet. I don't and neither should you. They are removing FCC overreach and allowing congress to write it into law instead.
If you think these companies don't pay for their Internet connections, you are deluded.
Likewise, if you think Github is going to go out of business if net neutrality is overturned, you are similarly deluded.
Do you have ESP?
I kid, I kid. 760 would fail anyway.
But really "startups" in the technology sector are supposed to be "disruptors" so wouldn't it be the job of a startup to take the current situation (be it net neutrality or Cable-Company controlled blood-letting) and turn that into a surprising profit model that exploits some weakness or failing of the status quo?
The tighter Comcast squeezes the rock, the easier it should be to wriggle through the cracks in their failing business model.
I have seen it both ways, yes.
IIRC I-90 in NY and I-95 in ME charge you for distance traveled.
I-93 in NH does not because I think it's not cost-effective to put up toll booths at every exit.
These startups need to realize that the internet infrastructure a) doesn't belong to them and b) doesn't belong to the government. Neither of them paid for its development, ongoing maintenance, and upgrading. Besides, many of these companies existed before the reclassification. They also need a little history lesson in the fact that deregulation of telecommunications in the 80s lead to the internet as we know it today. Prior to 1985, use of the internet for commercial purposes was "frowned upon in this establishment!"
If net neutrality is such a good idea, then why is AT&T building FirstNet?
How is it going to kill them? Y Combinator, Etsy, Foursquare, GitHub, Imgur, Nextdoor, and Warby Parker are going to die because some ISP gives a higher priority to traffic to someone else? That's not going to happen. The websites for these companies aren't going to get blocked by anyone.
What I think would turn opinion on this around is if the threat of normalization causing the reverse behavior to happen: Netflix's ISP could throttle Netflix routing to User unless User pays Netflix's ISP off.
These rules are being made to protect the high profits cable companies by placing obstacles against Netflix. How would lack of Net Neutrality affect companies that don't stream video, for example jpg/gif companies life imgur.com? Do they still have to pay the customer's ISP for every image uploaded?
GitHubs mother put subversion repos in her CVS! She was mercurial by nature! She so ugly, she used RCS.
You miss the part where Comcast is also a media content owner. It _definitely_ does pay to slow down amazon video to make xfinity video more attractive to the user. Unless you know, amazon ponies up.
The net neutrality issue is more about content providers also owning the pipes using that advantage to strangle the next Netflix in the crib.
I only visit by today's standards low bandwidth websites. I am happy with a 1 megabit/sec internet connection. Frankly, I think mediocre DSL is prevalent, because that is only what most people need, and people tend to be cheap. I have been hearing the warnings of 'net neutrality' for over a decade. The only thing which has been blocked, are high bandwidth websites, such as Netflix. That's it. Yes, LTE has more restrictions, but last mile cell phone data is expensive.
I will support Net Neutrality when websites like the dailykos, or beitbart gets blocked.
1)GitHub's business model doesn't depend necessarily on the speed or bandwidth of their customer's ISP connection. If it takes 12 seconds or 1 second for you to download a project, as a customer you are not going to complain too much. If it takes 12 seconds as opposed to 1 second for a Netflix video to start or that it has to buffer in the middle, you wouldn't complain?
2)There are no alternatives to GitHub in many cases. If you are interested in a particular project, that's on GitHub, chances are is that it might not be on SourceForge. Most of the time the author only publishes on one of the sites. Netflix is too slow for you to stream a movie? It just happens that Comcast is also streaming that movie for twice the speed because they are your ISP as well. Because Comcast would never exploit an advantage like that at all.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Comments here are infantile at best! The lack of vision is stunning, I just wonder at it. The Internet IS NOT public domain, end of conversation. Altho is been advertise as such since it's birth, IT IS NOT!
And to prove that one has to go no further than looking at Jon Postel's saga and early demise. The notion that "winners" make history is bull shit propaganda, the TRUTH ALWAYS see the light for those that have eyes to see it.
They are the owners of this shit... and they want to implement this, so IT WILL be implemented. The answer is: bail out of it! Considering your addition to has not made you totally dependent of it. Once CAN bail out of it. The network will serve no purpose, if no one uses it.
Well, if the costs were roughly equal, sure. But what if they were wildly unequal? Say one company had to carry them across an ocean and the other only had to carry them across town. And yet each package carried benefited both companies equally. Then wouldn't it make sense for the company that has to carry the packages across an ocean to also get some money from the company who only has to carry them across town?
Your analogy breaks down because of an unequal comparison. What kind of Internet do you think Netflix pays for? Do you think they get a 30MBs cable modem connection from their ISP? No, they pay for the fattest pipes they can from a Tier 1 provider like Level 3. Their ISP can handle all the output they want. The problem is ISPs like Comcast can't handle the demand from their customers because of the choices they made in promises and infrastructure.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Imagine if two companies wanted to exchange physical packages. And assume that each package exchanged equally benefited both companies, say each company made $10 for each package exchanged. Should each company bear their own costs in exchanging the packages?
They already do. You've missed this point. Netflix pays a Tier 1 company for their Internet connection. As a customer to Comcast I am paying them for my ISP connection. As a Netflix customer, I am paying them for access to their library. I'm a customer of both companies.
Well, if the costs were roughly equal, sure. But what if they were wildly unequal? Say one company had to carry them across an ocean and the other only had to carry them across town. And yet each package carried benefited both companies equally. Then wouldn't it make sense for the company that has to carry the packages across an ocean to also get some money from the company who only has to carry them across town? (Roughly half of the difference in their costs to carry the packages.)
In your analogy which is highly flawed you've asserted that one company does more work than the other in transporting. In the real world Internet, that is not the case. Netflix has a huge pipe with their ISP to deliver the packets to the Internet. For the most part, Comcast only deals with the last mile. Other Tier 1 companies deal with the part in the middle. So neither company does more work.
Second in your analogy, the shipping company you are dealing with and paying is responsible in figuring a reasonable price in transport including paying intermediaries. If they miscalculated pricing, that's on them. They don't get to ask you for more money after you've sent the package off. The last. More importantly, the postman at the other end that is delivering the package to the recipient doesn't get to extort more money from you otherwise he will delay the delivery.
The company that only has to carry the packages across town could say, "The other company already makes $10 for every package exchanged, paying us would be double dipping". But that's clearly nonsense.
It is nonsense as it doesn't represent the real world of what is actually happening.
Content providers like YouTube and Netflix can locate their servers in datacenters where bandwidth is absurdly cheap. They're like the company that only carries the packages across town
And ISPs can't locate buildings where they want? They can't have infrastructure in places that are cheaper? Your argument falls apart because ISPs in places that have cheap bandwidth do not necessarily have better performance or cheaper Internet. As another example of how flawed your argument is, during the Netflix-Comast slowdown, several people showed that running their Netflix connection through a VPN was actually faster than Comcast directly. Comcast was throttling Netflix specifically. If it was a matter of bandwidth, there would have been little difference in speed.
ISPs like AT&T and Comcast can't ask their customers to move into datacenters. They have to build massive networks that cover cities. They're like the company that has to carry the packages across the ocean.
Two flawed premises: ISPs don't deliver across the ocean. And ISPs can build infrastructure where they want. In fact Google did so and they are not an ISP. In the early 2000s, Google bought up a lot of dark fiber for cheap because they wanted their own networks. The ISPs could have done so; they chose not to do so.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Then the shipping company sees that you're trying to ship truck parts to one of his competitors and suddenly you get your very own rate structure.
Killing Me, Killing You
Killing all we have
As our loves wither away
Burning Me, Burning You
Burning us to ash
Drowning us in a sea of flames
He's saying the 2015 rules haven't identified or fixed a single problem with the Internet so far, and they're a liability for a free and open Internet.
And he'd be right about that. The 2015 "Net Neutrality" rules contain absolutely no Net Neutrality, but they removed the Internet from classification as an Information Service, which gave it legal protections around privacy, wiretapping, and . The 2015 FCC rules actually had the effect of stripping the FTC of enforcing its privacy rules, and applying obscenity laws that normally only apply to telecommunications services.
But yes, when Pai raises these concerns about how the Government can now wiretap your search history and can't enforce privacy laws, he's being malicious. Obviously. /s
Charging for transit is unrelated to net neutrality. You don't understand the issue.
Learn to love Alaska
Startups don't pay off the politicians. They don't lobby, they don't contribute to political campaigns, they don't buy influence. They can't because they don't have any money (in relative terms).
Therefore Ajit Pai, Donald Trump and all the rest don't care about startups. They are billionaires who have already made their fortunes (maybe not Pai specifically. Trump has enough billionaires in his cabinet to justify this comment, believe me).
What is the priority of a billionaire? To keep the billions and to make billions more. To be an Important Person, a Mover and Shaker. To think Deep Thoughts and not get their hands dirty.
The Trump team doesn't care about startups, innovation, or any of that. Look at who Trump played to during his campaign. Coal workers and the coal industry. Air conditioner manufacturers. Next I expect Trump to sing the praises of onshore cotton weaving mills, steel mills and copper cable factories. Let's revive the buggy and get those buggy whip manufacturers back to work!
Trump will fail them all and still claim success.
The cities should all lay dark fiber to every house (no not crappy GPON, but dark fiber from the CO to every residence and business). Then rent that fiber to the ISP. They can run 1Mb, or 1 Tb across it, for the same price. A price just high enough to cover the costs of install and maintenance.Your phone company doesn't more to call Dominos vs Pizza Hut, so why should we expect that from our ISP? Net Neutrality shouldn't be necessary. But the companies committing the fraud of unequal access also lie about it. The market can only correct itself with informed consumers.
Learn to love Alaska
We never got Net Neutrality. We got a program for government to take control of the Internet and Obama and the FCC slapped a label on it of "Net Neutrality" but it's not what we expected.
We told you all about this previously.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7WHoqsRuxU
> They already do. You've missed this point. Netflix pays a Tier 1 company for their Internet connection. As a customer to Comcast I am paying them for my ISP connection. As a Netflix customer, I am paying them for access to their library. I'm a customer of both companies.
Yes, I agree. The way it works now is with settlement-based peering. That is, companies do charge each other for peering when their bandwidth costs are asymmetric. As I said, the system the free market has built works just fine. But it does allow ISPs to demand whatever fees they want to build faster pipes to particular peers.
> In your analogy which is highly flawed you've asserted that one company does more work than the other in transporting. In the real world Internet, that is not the case. Netflix has a huge pipe with their ISP to deliver the packets to the Internet. For the most part, Comcast only deals with the last mile. Other Tier 1 companies deal with the part in the middle. So neither company does more work.
It's not flawed. A typical ISP network is way more expensive than anything Netflix does. Netflix puts their servers in cheap datacenters -- they specifically put their servers wherever the costs are the very lowest. Comcast has no choice but to take their customers where they live. You cannot deny this, it is an absolute simple obvious fact. The highest costs for moving a packet between Comcast and Netflix are born by Comcast's last mile.
> Second in your analogy, the shipping company you are dealing with and paying is responsible in figuring a reasonable price in transport including paying intermediaries. If they miscalculated pricing, that's on them. They don't get to ask you for more money after you've sent the package off. The last. More importantly, the postman at the other end that is delivering the package to the recipient doesn't get to extort more money from you otherwise he will delay the delivery.
But that's just the thing. They didn't miscalculate pricing. So long as the costs are fairly divided between all the companies that did the work, their pricing is just fine. And today, that's how their pricing works. We do have settlement-based peering today.
The situation now is that content providers do pay money that winds up flowing to access providers. That's how settlement-based peering, the norm for decades, works. The ISPs didn't miscalculate, they got it right. The content providers benefit disproportionate to their costs, so it's fair they pay some of the costs of the access providers. That's what the free market set up. Nobody miscalculated. One side just wants to use the government to strong arm a better deal.
> And ISPs can't locate buildings where they want? They can't have infrastructure in places that are cheaper? Your argument falls apart because ISPs in places that have cheap bandwidth do not necessarily have better performance or cheaper Internet.
They can, but they can't move their customers. All the costs can be fairly split but the first and last miles. Comcast has datacenters that are cheap just like Netflix does. But Netflix can put the endpoint (their servers) in those datacenters. Comcast simply can't do that. Their customers are where they are. It is a fact that the access provider almost always has higher costs than the content provider.
> As another example of how flawed your argument is, during the Netflix-Comast slowdown, several people showed that running their Netflix connection through a VPN was actually faster than Comcast directly. Comcast was throttling Netflix specifically. If it was a matter of bandwidth, there would have been little difference in speed.
Comcast wasn't throttling Netflix specifically, they just had poor bandwidth to Netflix. A VPN allowed you to avoid the congested links between Netflix and Comcast.
> Two flawed premises: ISPs don't deliver across the ocean.
I never said they did. ISPs simply have much higher per-packet costs than content providers do because content providers can put the
Yes, you say it's "more about" that. But that's the side that has no immediate, tangible effects. Why isn't it "more about" the part of it that's trying to drastically re-organize an efficient, free market?
That's not where my analogy breaks down, that's the whole point. Netflix can arrange their network to get very low per packet costs because they can move their endpoint wherever they want. Comcast can't do that. So, necessarily, Comcast's per-packet costs are higher. Yet Netflix and Comcast cooperate to deliver packets that benefit them both equally. When benefit is equal, but costs are wildly unequal, it makes sense for one side to pay the other. And that's what the free market developed over many decades.
> Charging for transit is unrelated to net neutrality. You don't understand the issue.
I agree. I'm talking about settlement-based peering. Not transit.
What good will it do if my ISP has to treat traffic to YouTube and Netflix equally if they can charge Netflix (or the tier 1 that peers them to my ISP) such a high price for peering that the pipes to Netflix are terrible while the pipes to YouTube are awesome?
Does this refer to the diluted version of net-neutrality we got in the past few years? Because unless you are a child, the information was available to see that was going to do little to help anyone of us People.
But these companies are whining about the impact of eliminating the diluted rules, while not doing anything about the 62% of the u.s. land-mass which does not have access to high-speed internet.
Hey business dip-shits - you are missing almost 2/3rds of the u.s. geography as customers. Net-neutrality will never get you any % of that business.
We need many more choices to create real competition and we need business to run better infrastructure to all those underserved consumers.
NO ONE can say we cannot serve every home in the u.s. with some decent internet connection.
Because long before computers we ran twisted pair to every fucking residence in the nation.
Silicon valley is increasingly becoming a leech on the success of the rest of country. People voted last year AGAINST retarded statist ideas like "net neutrality" but the coastal liberal elite silicon valley types now demanding ever greater big government intrusion into the free market principles that made internet possible in the first place. Is any wonder these are the people who push and profit off of scumbag Democrat party policies via things like fake news and political correctness shutting down freedom of speech?
So yeah, contrary to the violent, nazi-inspired leftist "collective rule" that undermines "net neutrality", the lack of regulation will make internet cheaper and better for everyone, and not just the wealthy left who are work hard to keep "flyover country" down.
tldr: So-called "net nautrality" is un-American and you all suck for not understanding the issue deeply enough to know that it is Soros funded conspiracy to undermine our nation.
ISPs do not provide a "free market". Many people only have a single option, and the ISPs are taking huge advantages because they're able to act in monopolistic ways. That's not a free market. Want to see a free market?...look at how competition has been heating up in the cellphone service provider market.
Just another day in Paradise
Thank you...I'd been reading all of the posts here, wondering if there might be some petition or other forum to express our anger over this change. But, I'm perfectly happy to do it the old fashioned way.
Just another day in Paradise
Not only do many people have only a single option, some people have no decent option at all.
I'm not objecting to rules that prevent ISPs that actually hold monopoly positions from exploiting them in ways that harm consumers. But as I've explained above, net neutrality doesn't do that. Instead it unfairly shifts costs from content providers to service providers.
Netflix screwed themselves. They built a Tier-1 ISP (that isn't an ISP and isn't Tier-1) and called it a CDN, then tried to peer with everyone for $0 to cut their costs.
Netflix's bad CDN isn't even the question here. There are no "pipes to Netflix" if Netflix bought "real" T1 Internet from multiple providers. Comcast not wanting to peer with a Tier-1 wannabe is again unrelated to Net Neutrality, and I think Netflix made a number of bad decisions trying to cut costs that have hurt them, and their entire industry.
Netflix used a side-channel to try to cut costs, and it worked poorly. But there are real and documented cases of DNS hijacks, and QoS penalties for competing voice services. If you are a telco that sells voice, you should block Skype and throttle SIP down to unusable levels. That will increase your profits as the people in your area have no other choice, and the other options for voice are unusable over your ISP.
If Netflix buys bandwidth from ATT and Level3, what would Comcast do? Fail to peer with them? Then their customers would get even worse service. That's how it ends up working, and generally worked well until Netflix broke the standard first.
Learn to love Alaska
Stumbled into tech when IBM was big and blew. Used the open modem line on the raised floors at 590 mad to make free international calls cause it was funny. PSW unlock a hex dump that distracted core or sort your list for free. Made our own index. Inside was really inside and it was funny. AtT was the next block over but still had not replaced the tone switches in deposit ny. Bouncing was bouncing and there was no other way around unless you were a ham. The big pipe is dead so find another way cows.
Yes, I agree. The way it works now is with settlement-based peering. That is, companies do charge each other for peering when their bandwidth costs are asymmetric. As I said, the system the free market has built works just fine. But it does allow ISPs to demand whatever fees they want to build faster pipes to particular peers.
Again missed the point. It is not about peering. Netflix pays their Tier 1 so that they have almost no bottlenecks. Comcast however bottlenecks their own customers so they can extract more money from Netflix.
But that's just the thing. They didn't miscalculate pricing. So long as the costs are fairly divided between all the companies that did the work, their pricing is just fine. And today, that's how their pricing works. We do have settlement-based peering today.
Again you are asserting the the ISPs do way more than they actually do. How much of the traffic route of a packet is through the ISPs network? If it is merely the last mile then what you have said is that they should get more their share whereas all the intermediate companies get nothing.
I never said they did. ISPs simply have much higher per-packet costs than content providers do because content providers can put the endpoint wherever it's cheapest and ISPs can't. The endpoint is their customer's home or places of business.
No you asserted that ISPs deliver most of the way; factually they do not.
Comcast wasn't throttling Netflix specifically, they just had poor bandwidth to Netflix. A VPN allowed you to avoid the congested links between Netflix and Comcast.
No that's idiocy. If you go through a VPN through Comcast to get Netflix, you're still going through Comcast and Netflix. You are not avoiding congested links; you are merely adding an extra step.
What the hell does that have to do with anything? Are you seriously denying that at typical Netflix->Comcast or Comcast->Netflix packet, all things considered, costs Comcast a lot more than Netflix because they have to maintain a network that goes all the way to their customer's homes and businesses?!
You are the one that argued that somehow because Netflix could build datacenters for cheap and that gave them an advantage somehow. That's not the point. ISPs could build more infrastructure should they chose; they simply do not choose to do so. Google built more network infrastructure because they saw it as an advantage to their business. Again the ISPs chose not to do so. Process that: a search company bought out dark fiber at a time when ISPs did not. Somehow it's not the ISPs responsibility for their business decisions; yet it's Netflix's responsibility for the ISP's bad decisions.
And again, it's not Netflix's responsibility that Comcast has not invested in their infrastructure. Netflix pays for it's T1 connection. If you don't think that's relevant, how about you pay for 1 month of Netflix's internet bill. I bet it's more than your annual salary.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Netflix can arrange their network to get very low per packet costs because they can move their endpoint wherever they want.
You are aware that Netflix is not an ISP? They are not a T1 company; they pay a T1 for that. Comcast could do that too.
Comcast can't do that. So, necessarily, Comcast's per-packet costs are higher.
That's on Comcast. That's part of their business.
Yet Netflix and Comcast cooperate to deliver packets that benefit them both equally. When benefit is equal, but costs are wildly unequal, it makes sense for one side to pay the other. And that's what the free market developed over many decades.
Again, Comcast is in the business of being an ISP. No one is forcing Comcast to be in this business.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Government control doesn't necessarily work for the incumbents or large companies. For example, in the UK regulations have very much favoured the ability of smaller concerns to compete via a requirement for local loop unbundling, although this was probably easier to do as some of the infrastructure predates British Telecom privatisation, although these days that's probably more the exchange buildings and poles more than anything else.
I am aware of all those things but I don't see how they're responsive to my point. Sure, Comcast can do other things if they want, but their customers will still cost roughly the same amount to service and some company will service them. So some company or other will be in the position Comcast is in, unless you think that people who are expensive to service shouldn't have Internet access.
The fact is still that every packet benefits Comcast and Netflix equally but costs Comcast more to carry than Netflix. Thus the market has worked out a system where Netflix (typically indirectly) pays some money that winds up going to Comcast. This system of paid peering was established in a mostly free market and has worked very well. Its opponents cite the one or two times it failed, even though all of those times worked themselves out just fine and were largely the result of one side trying to strong arm the other into an unfair advantage and then not getting it. (Which seems like a reasonable free market result to me.)
> No that's idiocy. If you go through a VPN through Comcast to get Netflix, you're still going through Comcast and Netflix. You are not avoiding congested links; you are merely adding an extra step.
Honestly, I don't know how I can reason with you if you're going to assert obvious falsehoods and accuse me of idiocy. There can be a congested link between Comcast and Netflix, and Comcast can have other links that have great bandwidth and there can be other paths into Netflix that have great bandwidth. A VPN can avoid the congested link. When a VPN providers better bandwidth than a direct connection, it's almost always because it avoids a congested link.
If I recall this specific situation correctly, it looked like this:
Comcast -> Level3 -> Netflix
The congestion was, I think, between Comcast and Level3. But Comcast has links to many other providers than Level 3. And Level 3 has links to many other providers than Netflix. If you used a VPN hosted at Sprint, your path would be:
Comcast -> Sprint -> Level3 -> Netflix
That would avoid the congested link. Comcast->Sprint was fine and Sprint->Level3 was fine.
I may be misremembering the specific details, but the concept is simple -- a VPN can avoid a congested link between providers and where a VPN providers a bandwidth improvement, that's typically why.
+1 Insightful
I'd be willing to drop the net neutrality requirements if we can also drop all municipal / council regs that prevent local-grown broadband from being developed, and force ISP transparency around how and where interlink congestion occurs
This is what really needs to happen. It would free up room for small business to get involved in the infrastructure, or big business like google fiber. This is the main reason google ended that program. I was hopeful that we would all have fiber internet right now. Its hard to run fiber on the poles that are owned by the state and other companies. I feel that if you build a utility pole to string wires around the city, that pole should be owned by the local city, not the state. Then the city could build out their own infrastructure also without the legislation, and small business could pay a small tax to also be allowed to string wires along those poles.
What if I am a company, startup or not, and I want to guarantee the bandwidth to my customers who are willing to pay for that SLA? Net Neutrality prevents that.
Honestly, I don't know how I can reason with you if you're going to assert obvious falsehoods and accuse me of idiocy.
Because you are advocating that Netflix -- Internet -- VPN -- Comcast is more efficient than Netflix -- Internet -- Comcast. Adding in an extra hop is more efficient to you.
There can be a congested link between Comcast and Netflix, and Comcast can have other links that have great bandwidth and there can be other paths into Netflix that have great bandwidth.
This is only true if internet routing principles are ignored. For you assertion to be true, all the following would have to occur: 1) No one in the Internet (particularly Netflix or Comcast) is capable of doing any traffic shaping or optimization 2) A VPN has some sort of dedicated peering to Comcast that Netflix does not have (most do not). 3) All other ISPs are experiencing the same problem as Comcast (they were not).
A VPN can avoid the congested link.
Again you are assuming that there is only one link, one pathway. That is not how the Internet works. If anything using a VPN reduces the number of pathways that are possible because you must go through 3 fixed points: Netflix, VPN, and Comcast whereas using Netflix and Comcast only fixes the two endpoints which exist in every connection for the average ISP consumer.
When a VPN providers better bandwidth than a direct connection,
That is not factually true. VPNs may have less bandwidth than an ISP connection. In fact it's stated in many contracts their max bandwidth of which many are less than ISPs. For the most part they are wide enough for streaming video. Of course you can pay more for a higher bandwidth but it's not automatic that getting a VPN would open up your bandwidth. Second, it's not more direct. Adding an extra hop is not more direct. It's less direct. The main advantage are VPNs is security and privacy not performance.
it's almost always because it avoids a congested link.
Again not automatically true. With Internet routing it depends on where the congestion is and how it is congested. If Comcast is deliberately traffic shaping to discriminate against Netflix (which everyone thinks was happening), going through a VPN will help. If Comcast is having issues with bandwidth in general (like at the neighborhood level), going through a VPN will not help. For example if your neighborhood gets more neighbors that get broadband because of new construction, the average download speed will slow until Comcast installs more equipment.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I am aware of all those things but I don't see how they're responsive to my point.
Your point is bemoaning how terrible things are for Comcast because they are an ISP and how Netflix has some sort of responsibility to fix Comcast's problems and lack of foresight. It's like you telling me how terrible oil companies have it with car manufacturers making more fuel efficient cars and how car manufacturers should make less fuel efficient cars or pay the oil companies a subsidy.
Sure, Comcast can do other things if they want, but their customers will still cost roughly the same amount to service and some company will service them. So some company or other will be in the position Comcast is in, unless you think that people who are expensive to service shouldn't have Internet access.
And the fact that Comcast and other ISPs actively keep out other competition through multiple means has no effect on you? For example some municipalities fed up with terrible or non-existent service have been sued to prevent them from providing Internet to their constituents.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
> Your point is bemoaning how terrible things are for Comcast because they are an ISP and how Netflix has some sort of responsibility to fix Comcast's problems and lack of foresight.
It has nothing to do with how bad things are for Comcast. It's just a fact that Comcast's customers are spread out throughout cities and that means that whoever is going to serve those customers has to build a massive, sprawling network. That is the explanation for why each packet exchanged between Comcast and an access provider costs Comcast more than it costs the access provider.
> And the fact that Comcast and other ISPs actively keep out other competition through multiple means has no effect on you? For example some municipalities fed up with terrible or non-existent service have been sued to prevent them from providing Internet to their constituents.
I agree that that's a problem, but net neutrality does nothing to fix it. Again, either it regulates peering or it doesn't. If it doesn't regulate peering, it won't help because Comcast can still keep the pipes to Netflix congested unless Netflix pays it. And if it does regulate peering, then what are the proposed peering regulation rules so we can analyze if they'll provide a benefit or not? Nobody has ever explained what they'll be.
> Because you are advocating that Netflix -- Internet -- VPN -- Comcast is more efficient than Netflix -- Internet -- Comcast. Adding in an extra hop is more efficient to you.
How hard is this to understand: If, for example, Netflix is a Level 3 customer, then when you try to reach Netflix from Comcast, you will go through Level 3's peering with Comcast, period. If Level 3's peering with Comcast is congested, your traffic will suck. If you use a VPN, you can avoid Level 3's peering with Comcast.
It really is that simple. If you honestly don't get it, I don't know what to say.
It has nothing to do with how bad things are for Comcast. It's just a fact that Comcast's customers are spread out throughout cities and that means that whoever is going to serve those customers has to build a massive, sprawling network. That is the explanation for why each packet exchanged between Comcast and an access provider costs Comcast more than it costs the access provider.
All of which is part and parcel of being an ISP. However you didn't address my point that Comcast could have helped their situation by buying up dark fiber if nothing but to help with infrastructure like Google did. Also you complained specifically about what Netflix and Google did while not acknowledging Comcast could have done/can still do the exact same thing.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
> All of which is part and parcel of being an ISP.
Agreed. Historically, ISPs have been the beneficiaries of paid peering.
> However you didn't address my point that Comcast could have helped their situation by buying up dark fiber if nothing but to help with infrastructure like Google did.
I don't see why you think that's relevant. Comcast could be the best company in the world or the worst company in the world and it wouldn't change the fact that it's going to cost Comcast more money to carry its average packet than Netflix or Google. It's always cheaper when your endpoint is servers in dozens of datacenters than when it's routers in millions of homes.
> Also you complained specifically about what Netflix and Google did while not acknowledging Comcast could have done/can still do the exact same thing.
Comcast cannot move their customers into datacenters. Fundamentally, the only major, unavoidable difference between an access network and a service provider is that service providers can locate their endpoints in datacenters and access networks can't because their endpoints are homes and businesses. The reason access providers put their servers in datacenters is because that's much cheaper. An ISP *has* to build a municipal network, an access provider doesn't.
This is so absurdly simple and I can't understand why you refuse to acknowledge it.
It's this simple:
1) Fundamentally, providing Internet connectivity to homes and businesses costs more than providing connectivity to online services.
2) Every packet exchanged benefits both endpoints roughly equally.
3) Historically, service providers (like Netflix) have paid (directly or indirectly) to access providers (like Comcast) to compensate for this cost/benefit asymmetry.
4) Now, service providers want a better deal than a mostly free market has given them.
I don't see why you think that's relevant. Comcast could be the best company in the world or the worst company in the world and it wouldn't change the fact that it's going to cost Comcast more money to carry its average packet than Netflix or Google. It's always cheaper when your endpoint is servers in dozens of datacenters than when it's routers in millions of homes.
Comcast is an ISP that has their own problems of being an ISP. Why is that Netflix's or Google's problem? Specifically I pointed out things Comcast could have done to reduce their costs yet failed to do so.
Comcast cannot move their customers into datacenters. Fundamentally, the only major, unavoidable difference between an access network and a service provider is that service providers can locate their endpoints in datacenters and access networks can't because their endpoints are homes and businesses. The reason access providers put their servers in datacenters is because that's much cheaper. An ISP *has* to build a municipal network, an access provider doesn't.
And Comcast could have bought out dark fiber but didn't. Comcast could have laid out fiber themselves decades ago as proposed in the Telecom act of 1996. Instead they took the money that was allocated for those expansions and didn't do them.
This is so absurdly simple and I can't understand why you refuse to acknowledge it.
I did. I said it was moot. That's the business of being an ISP. I said it's like oil companies complaining that cars are more fuel efficient these days.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I don't understand why any of that is relevant. Comcast could be the worst company in the world, so what? What does that have to do with net neutrality?
Again, it is a simple fact that:
1) It is almost universally the case that a packet that flows from a content provider to an access provider costs the access provider more to handle.
2) Yet that packet benefits the two companies roughly equally.
3) Because of this, a mostly free market has resulted in content providers paying (directly or indirectly) access providers to compensate for the cost disparity.
Do you agree with those three things or not?