You are familiar with the concept of digital cable, yes? Short of literal broadcast TV, we are no longer saving bandwidth with multicasting. In short, we might as well have everyone doing a separate download of the program. At least that way, if they want to watch it a second time (or pause, rewind, etc...), it's already at their home. A torrent-type system would be fantastic for the content producers. They could pass the costs of distribution straight over to the "net"... which in this case would be the connection providers (cable ISP's). And we wonder why the cable companies are against this?
Except that the concert hall can't expand easily to provide more seats... However, there's nothing preventing the telcos from improving their networks, save for their profit margins.
You obviously weren't paying very close attention in economics, or you would know the difference between "supply and demand" and "artificially inflated prices".
Sure, 300GB is a lot of data, but it's not *that* much data. We're talking about TWO FREAKING YEARS worth of work from multiple companies and NOBODY had enough sense to back the whole thing up offline?? $50 at Fry's would easily buy you a terabyte drive. Forget the ISP, it's a total FAIL on the part of all involved I'd say.
Don't you know, corporations in the U.S. are treated like people now. But that works both ways. I can't rob a convenience store and then say, "No, it was my HAND! Punish my hand, but you can't hold the rest of my body accountable for the action of one part..."
No, that's incorrect. You would be right if density were not a factor. A radio signal can only be split into so many distinct parcels at any given time, so simply adding more towers (that are all using the same spectrum range) in an already saturated area does *not* in fact give you more bandwidth. If the full range of signal space is being actively utilized, then your infrastructure no longer matters. This is happening in some of the larger, denser cities (New York, San Fransisco) at peak times. During non-peak, when the signal space is not fully utilized, yes, your can split the signal onto multiple towers and effectively increase bandwidth, but that's a little like the cable company offering 25 Mbps internet connections but failing to mention that 25 Mbps is split across the whole local node. So when you (and fifty of your nearest neighbors) all come home and watch Netflix after work, the individual bandwidth drops into the toilet.
I have never really understood having a "super fast" mobile network. Sure, I can get that web page to load a few seconds faster, but so what? If the overall bandwidth cap is the issue, then who really cares how fast I can exceed it? Yes, if I wanted to download that 12 gig video to my phone, having a zippy network would be nice, but our current mobile technology isn't really set up for those kinds of features yet, regardless of the claims of Verizon and AT&T. Maybe someday we will have the infrastructure for that, but it's incredibly unrealistic to think you can stream full video to your phone without seriously impacting overall performance.
The problem is that they offered "unlimited" data plans and still (stupidly) honor them. People tethering with an unlimited plan would be a huge drain on their network. The solution is to finally face the music and drop the pretense of "unlimited data". Like you said, if you're paying for the service (the "service" being a set amount of data per month 2/4/6 gig etc) then what's the big deal? If I only have 2 gigs of data to burn through, tethered or not, I'm not going to waste it on Netflix. Maybe some people are willing to pay $200 a month for 20 gigs of data to their phone... but if they allow that kind of plan then they're idiots. They need to stop offering what they can't support. Period. Unlike wired services (cable, fibre, dsl) overall mobile bandwidth *does* have a limit. More towers only makes for better coverage, not more bandwidth to split between the users in that area, so carriers need to realistically sell that bandwidth so as to not overload their networks.
Oracle isn't third party content, and Microsoft isn't a piece of hardware. I said it above, and it applies here as well -
Both Apple and Amazon are both content and device distributors. Amazon has lots of books, and Apple has a really nice device that also happens to be a reader. The difference is that Apple's device allows others to put up a storefront right inside the device (or it did, prior to this change), while Amazon's doesn't. Period. Apple saw this and decided they were getting a raw deal. So, "want a storefront? Fine. Give us our cut." It makes sense to me. I may not agree with the model, but it hardly seems unfair from a business perspective.
The "competing products" are not the books, they're the devices, or possibly the storefronts. Either way, saying that what Apple is doing is "anti-competitive" or "repugnant" is stupid. Of course it's anti-competitive, *they're a competitor*. As for repugnant - for who? Amazon? What possible reason does Apple have NOT to do this? Playing nice while someone *else* dominates the ebook market that they would very much like to be a major player in? The user could care less where they get their digital book. They're going to be looking at price and convenience. If they can get it right on the device without having to go to a laptop and shove it through iTunes, then they probably will.
I'm no Apple fanboi, but quit being such a fucking tool and blindly bashing one of the most successful business models of this decade. Apple may be the devil in a Sunday dress, but a shitload of consumers seem to like what they're doing.
I've gone back and re-read TFA, which is pretty sparse to say the least (and which I can no longer access), and from what I can see, we're both right. "if Amazon wants to sell ebooks through an *app*, then they have to give Apple a cut." - yes. But, Apple is mandating that any app that allows purchasing outside the app (ala browser) *must* also include the ability to purchase *within* the app (and Apple gets it's share). I'm not seeing anything about *only* including content in-app, so one would have to think that it would be up to the user, who is probably going to go for the cheapest or most convenient method. I don't recall anything about outside content loaded through iTunes, which makes me think that if Kindle removed all access to the store, there would be little Apple could do about it. Of course, that's a pretty shitty way to do business, but I don't blame them for wanting a piece of the pie. Both Apple and Amazon are both content and device distributors. Amazon has lots of books, and Apple has a really nice device that also happens to be a reader. The difference is that Apple's device allows others to put up a storefront right inside the device (or it did, prior to this change), while Amazon's doesn't. Period. Apple saw this and decided they were getting a raw deal. So, "want a storefront? Fine. Give us our cut." It makes sense to me. I may not agree with the model, but it hardly seems unfair from a business perspective.
No, what Apple is doing is saying that if Amazon wants to sell ebooks through an *app*, then they have to give Apple a cut. There's a difference. If Kindle wants to pull their app and *just* sell ebooks through a browser on the ipad, then no problem. If anything, they are leveling the playing field. You said it yourself, Kindle doesn't have apps... it's fundamentally different than the iPad.
Turn it around again... I could just as easily say that Amazon is leveraging their dominance in the ebook market to harm their competitor in the ebook reader market. Amazon has FAR more of a monopoly on ebooks than Apple has on ebook readers.
Not that I agree with what Apple is doing, but isn't Amazon a direct competitor in the ebook market? Forget for the moment that there's a Kindle App. Amazon sells ebooks for the Kindle. As far as I can tell, there's no in-device "app" or tool within the Kindle to buy Apple ebooks, right? And yet, when Amazon takes advantage of the fact that they can actually sell ebooks within the very popular device of their competitor - everyone jumps on Apple for wanting a cut?
Maybe the solution is to let the owner of the page define what kind of page it is with restricting keywords, for example, they can label their own site as a "shopping" site, or "product review" site, but NOT BOTH. Yes, yes, I know there are many shopping sites that DO have both, (such as Amazon) but perhaps we need to get them to commit. If you can simply pick up a bunch of semi-random keywords and plaster them into your meta tags regardless of your actual content, it sort of kills the whole point for the rest of the tagged web. But Google could figure out what tags are conflicting and require owners to actually own their content.
Unfortunately, Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh compose a major percentage of where conservatives get their "news". Add FOX to that mix and I bet you cover close to 95%. Any conservative who reads outside the problem networks already correctly knows the issues for and against Net Neutrality, but they're not the ones the GOP is going to be listening to when it comes down to saving their seat.
Replace "TSA" with "Microsoft", and "security vulnerability" with "software exploit". Now we're back to the discussion about posting live vulnerabilities to the net. If we have a problem with that, we should certainly have a problem with this pilot.
I understand what you're saying, but I have two problems with your analysis.
The first is that unlike the electrical grid, telephone and internet are *unlimited* resources, or more accurately, they are only limited by the infrastructure in place, and even then, it's usually only the last hop that limits the connection, not the backbone. So while my local cable company may indeed have trouble between 5-6 PM, that trouble is entirely within their infrastructure - it's not that "the net" is "busy".
That being said, it leads me to the second problem I have, which is that by allowing the access provider to define the last hop total bandwidth, and then partition it according to a tiered pricing plan, you are basically allowing them to set the scarcity of a 'resource' to fit whatever price they want to charge for it. It gives them absolutely no incentive to improve upon their infrastructure, just the opposite in fact. Why would they increase their overall bandwidth and reduce the scarcity that they charge a premium for?
Perhaps I am misinterpreting your sarcasm, but... It really doesn't matter what *you* do with your cell phone connection to the internet. If someone pays for access (usually up to a given Gb amount - unlimited is a whole different animal here) they should be able to use that allotment however the hell they want and not get charged yet again because they like Netflix. I'm not about to waste my allocation on a freaking video on my phone, but if someone wants to *pay* for that bandwidth then they should be able to. And your access provider should be able to charge whatever amount they feel they can justify for that bandwidth allocation, *but NOT twice*.
Not this again... By "free" I was referring to the idea that I am free to go where I want and not be charged yet again by my access provider. Sure, there are many (if not most) sites that individually may charge me for access (via ads or literal subscription - and thus pay for "the internet"), and I am free to pay the fee or not. But it's double-dipping by my access provider to hit me up for a specific site simply because they can't provide what they are charging me for. Either raise your price for access, or stop advertising "internet access" to your customer base. The problem is that the "access" providers, such as Verizon, want to be "content" providers, even though they aren't actually producing the content. Cable TV has been doing this for decades.
There was a time, not so long ago, when a good business strategy was to make you product as appealing as possible so that everyone would want to buy it. That's exactly the opposite of today. Today, the business models for the major carriers all focus on just how much they can screw us for before we yelp. They are literally destroying their own market. The reason the internet has been so successful is that once you have paid for access, where you go has been mostly free. This is like Disneyland going back to a ticket system. The only real question is, who will be the "E" ticket rides...
Forgive my ignorance, but why the delay? Is this "punishment" for not viewing it when it's broadcast? I mean, why wait more than 24 hours? If you are that much of a fan of a show, you're going to watch it when it airs, yes? And if you already have NetFlix, then offering it more quickly would just increase your chances of acquiring new viewers that might turn into fans who might just watch it when it airs. If you are already a fan, then it's just gravy in case you miss an episode. So where is the advantage to waiting?
Our local paper (yes, I'm local to the house. Another family member lives just beyond the evac zone) mentioned that the bomb squad HAD tried a robot, but that they felt (an so did many other experts) that they could not safely use even a robot to remove the materials. Keep in mind that there are homes to either side of the house in question. I have heard that they are going to shield the other homes, but I for one wouldn't want to be hear they are going to do a 'controlled burn' of the explosively volitile structure 10 feet away from my living room...
Slashdot Mirror
You are familiar with the concept of digital cable, yes? Short of literal broadcast TV, we are no longer saving bandwidth with multicasting. In short, we might as well have everyone doing a separate download of the program. At least that way, if they want to watch it a second time (or pause, rewind, etc...), it's already at their home. A torrent-type system would be fantastic for the content producers. They could pass the costs of distribution straight over to the "net"... which in this case would be the connection providers (cable ISP's). And we wonder why the cable companies are against this?
Except that the concert hall can't expand easily to provide more seats... However, there's nothing preventing the telcos from improving their networks, save for their profit margins.
You obviously weren't paying very close attention in economics, or you would know the difference between "supply and demand" and "artificially inflated prices".
Sure, 300GB is a lot of data, but it's not *that* much data. We're talking about TWO FREAKING YEARS worth of work from multiple companies and NOBODY had enough sense to back the whole thing up offline?? $50 at Fry's would easily buy you a terabyte drive. Forget the ISP, it's a total FAIL on the part of all involved I'd say.
Don't you know, corporations in the U.S. are treated like people now. But that works both ways. I can't rob a convenience store and then say, "No, it was my HAND! Punish my hand, but you can't hold the rest of my body accountable for the action of one part..."
No, that's incorrect. You would be right if density were not a factor. A radio signal can only be split into so many distinct parcels at any given time, so simply adding more towers (that are all using the same spectrum range) in an already saturated area does *not* in fact give you more bandwidth. If the full range of signal space is being actively utilized, then your infrastructure no longer matters. This is happening in some of the larger, denser cities (New York, San Fransisco) at peak times. During non-peak, when the signal space is not fully utilized, yes, your can split the signal onto multiple towers and effectively increase bandwidth, but that's a little like the cable company offering 25 Mbps internet connections but failing to mention that 25 Mbps is split across the whole local node. So when you (and fifty of your nearest neighbors) all come home and watch Netflix after work, the individual bandwidth drops into the toilet.
I have never really understood having a "super fast" mobile network. Sure, I can get that web page to load a few seconds faster, but so what? If the overall bandwidth cap is the issue, then who really cares how fast I can exceed it? Yes, if I wanted to download that 12 gig video to my phone, having a zippy network would be nice, but our current mobile technology isn't really set up for those kinds of features yet, regardless of the claims of Verizon and AT&T. Maybe someday we will have the infrastructure for that, but it's incredibly unrealistic to think you can stream full video to your phone without seriously impacting overall performance.
The problem is that they offered "unlimited" data plans and still (stupidly) honor them. People tethering with an unlimited plan would be a huge drain on their network. The solution is to finally face the music and drop the pretense of "unlimited data". Like you said, if you're paying for the service (the "service" being a set amount of data per month 2/4/6 gig etc) then what's the big deal? If I only have 2 gigs of data to burn through, tethered or not, I'm not going to waste it on Netflix. Maybe some people are willing to pay $200 a month for 20 gigs of data to their phone... but if they allow that kind of plan then they're idiots. They need to stop offering what they can't support. Period. Unlike wired services (cable, fibre, dsl) overall mobile bandwidth *does* have a limit. More towers only makes for better coverage, not more bandwidth to split between the users in that area, so carriers need to realistically sell that bandwidth so as to not overload their networks.
Apple has had that as an option for about a decade.
Oracle isn't third party content, and Microsoft isn't a piece of hardware. I said it above, and it applies here as well -
Both Apple and Amazon are both content and device distributors. Amazon has lots of books, and Apple has a really nice device that also happens to be a reader. The difference is that Apple's device allows others to put up a storefront right inside the device (or it did, prior to this change), while Amazon's doesn't. Period. Apple saw this and decided they were getting a raw deal. So, "want a storefront? Fine. Give us our cut." It makes sense to me. I may not agree with the model, but it hardly seems unfair from a business perspective.
The "competing products" are not the books, they're the devices, or possibly the storefronts. Either way, saying that what Apple is doing is "anti-competitive" or "repugnant" is stupid. Of course it's anti-competitive, *they're a competitor*. As for repugnant - for who? Amazon? What possible reason does Apple have NOT to do this? Playing nice while someone *else* dominates the ebook market that they would very much like to be a major player in? The user could care less where they get their digital book. They're going to be looking at price and convenience. If they can get it right on the device without having to go to a laptop and shove it through iTunes, then they probably will.
I'm no Apple fanboi, but quit being such a fucking tool and blindly bashing one of the most successful business models of this decade. Apple may be the devil in a Sunday dress, but a shitload of consumers seem to like what they're doing.
I've gone back and re-read TFA, which is pretty sparse to say the least (and which I can no longer access), and from what I can see, we're both right. "if Amazon wants to sell ebooks through an *app*, then they have to give Apple a cut." - yes. But, Apple is mandating that any app that allows purchasing outside the app (ala browser) *must* also include the ability to purchase *within* the app (and Apple gets it's share). I'm not seeing anything about *only* including content in-app, so one would have to think that it would be up to the user, who is probably going to go for the cheapest or most convenient method. I don't recall anything about outside content loaded through iTunes, which makes me think that if Kindle removed all access to the store, there would be little Apple could do about it. Of course, that's a pretty shitty way to do business, but I don't blame them for wanting a piece of the pie. Both Apple and Amazon are both content and device distributors. Amazon has lots of books, and Apple has a really nice device that also happens to be a reader. The difference is that Apple's device allows others to put up a storefront right inside the device (or it did, prior to this change), while Amazon's doesn't. Period. Apple saw this and decided they were getting a raw deal. So, "want a storefront? Fine. Give us our cut." It makes sense to me. I may not agree with the model, but it hardly seems unfair from a business perspective.
No, what Apple is doing is saying that if Amazon wants to sell ebooks through an *app*, then they have to give Apple a cut. There's a difference. If Kindle wants to pull their app and *just* sell ebooks through a browser on the ipad, then no problem. If anything, they are leveling the playing field. You said it yourself, Kindle doesn't have apps... it's fundamentally different than the iPad.
Turn it around again... I could just as easily say that Amazon is leveraging their dominance in the ebook market to harm their competitor in the ebook reader market. Amazon has FAR more of a monopoly on ebooks than Apple has on ebook readers.
Well thought. I hadn't considered the content restriction aspect.
Not that I agree with what Apple is doing, but isn't Amazon a direct competitor in the ebook market? Forget for the moment that there's a Kindle App. Amazon sells ebooks for the Kindle. As far as I can tell, there's no in-device "app" or tool within the Kindle to buy Apple ebooks, right? And yet, when Amazon takes advantage of the fact that they can actually sell ebooks within the very popular device of their competitor - everyone jumps on Apple for wanting a cut?
Seems to me, the biggest threat would be doing EXACTLY what Mubarak is doing now in Egypt.
Nobody Saw Anything
...although a long car ride with a child can be infuriating - I can't imagine what interplanetary transport would be like!
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
"Are we there yet?"
Maybe the solution is to let the owner of the page define what kind of page it is with restricting keywords, for example, they can label their own site as a "shopping" site, or "product review" site, but NOT BOTH. Yes, yes, I know there are many shopping sites that DO have both, (such as Amazon) but perhaps we need to get them to commit. If you can simply pick up a bunch of semi-random keywords and plaster them into your meta tags regardless of your actual content, it sort of kills the whole point for the rest of the tagged web. But Google could figure out what tags are conflicting and require owners to actually own their content.
Unfortunately, Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh compose a major percentage of where conservatives get their "news". Add FOX to that mix and I bet you cover close to 95%. Any conservative who reads outside the problem networks already correctly knows the issues for and against Net Neutrality, but they're not the ones the GOP is going to be listening to when it comes down to saving their seat.
Replace "TSA" with "Microsoft", and "security vulnerability" with "software exploit". Now we're back to the discussion about posting live vulnerabilities to the net. If we have a problem with that, we should certainly have a problem with this pilot.
I understand what you're saying, but I have two problems with your analysis.
The first is that unlike the electrical grid, telephone and internet are *unlimited* resources, or more accurately, they are only limited by the infrastructure in place, and even then, it's usually only the last hop that limits the connection, not the backbone. So while my local cable company may indeed have trouble between 5-6 PM, that trouble is entirely within their infrastructure - it's not that "the net" is "busy".
That being said, it leads me to the second problem I have, which is that by allowing the access provider to define the last hop total bandwidth, and then partition it according to a tiered pricing plan, you are basically allowing them to set the scarcity of a 'resource' to fit whatever price they want to charge for it. It gives them absolutely no incentive to improve upon their infrastructure, just the opposite in fact. Why would they increase their overall bandwidth and reduce the scarcity that they charge a premium for?
Perhaps I am misinterpreting your sarcasm, but... It really doesn't matter what *you* do with your cell phone connection to the internet. If someone pays for access (usually up to a given Gb amount - unlimited is a whole different animal here) they should be able to use that allotment however the hell they want and not get charged yet again because they like Netflix. I'm not about to waste my allocation on a freaking video on my phone, but if someone wants to *pay* for that bandwidth then they should be able to. And your access provider should be able to charge whatever amount they feel they can justify for that bandwidth allocation, *but NOT twice*.
Not this again... By "free" I was referring to the idea that I am free to go where I want and not be charged yet again by my access provider. Sure, there are many (if not most) sites that individually may charge me for access (via ads or literal subscription - and thus pay for "the internet"), and I am free to pay the fee or not. But it's double-dipping by my access provider to hit me up for a specific site simply because they can't provide what they are charging me for. Either raise your price for access, or stop advertising "internet access" to your customer base. The problem is that the "access" providers, such as Verizon, want to be "content" providers, even though they aren't actually producing the content. Cable TV has been doing this for decades.
There was a time, not so long ago, when a good business strategy was to make you product as appealing as possible so that everyone would want to buy it. That's exactly the opposite of today. Today, the business models for the major carriers all focus on just how much they can screw us for before we yelp. They are literally destroying their own market. The reason the internet has been so successful is that once you have paid for access, where you go has been mostly free. This is like Disneyland going back to a ticket system. The only real question is, who will be the "E" ticket rides...
Forgive my ignorance, but why the delay? Is this "punishment" for not viewing it when it's broadcast? I mean, why wait more than 24 hours? If you are that much of a fan of a show, you're going to watch it when it airs, yes? And if you already have NetFlix, then offering it more quickly would just increase your chances of acquiring new viewers that might turn into fans who might just watch it when it airs. If you are already a fan, then it's just gravy in case you miss an episode. So where is the advantage to waiting?
Our local paper (yes, I'm local to the house. Another family member lives just beyond the evac zone) mentioned that the bomb squad HAD tried a robot, but that they felt (an so did many other experts) that they could not safely use even a robot to remove the materials. Keep in mind that there are homes to either side of the house in question. I have heard that they are going to shield the other homes, but I for one wouldn't want to be hear they are going to do a 'controlled burn' of the explosively volitile structure 10 feet away from my living room...