I've been a "prominent poster" (as you call it) on the "Network Neutrality Squad" mailing list because I have to be to represent my industry. As far as I can tell, I am the only person who has ever posted to that list who is actually a provider of broadband Internet service. Virtually all of the other members (and all of the posters, for sure) on that list are zealots who are lobbying for what is most properly called "Network Neutering" -- turning the Internet into a regulated duopoly. Sort of like the old Bell System, but with only two options: your local monopoly telephone company and your local monopoly cable company. With only one type of service, one possible set of terms of service, and no opportunity for new or innovative providers to offer you an alternative which is different or better. And because none of them have ever been ISPs, the denizens of that list have no idea what they're talking about. Often, they act like spoiled children, asking for infinite resources at zero price. Anyone who has the slightest grounding in reality understands that this is not possible, but this does not stop these people from calling ISPs "evil" whenever they suggest that users cover the cost of the resources they consume.
While most of what you've said is incorrect or naive, you are correct, above, when you characterize the zealots who post to that mailing list as being "against" ISPs. They are no going to convince me of the "fallacies" of my "position," because what I'm posting to that list isn't a matter of opinion. I'm posting facts about the Internet business. And many of those facts apply to large and small providers alike (though I am quick to point out when they do not). What's more, you will likely never find an ISP who is more pro-user, pro-consumer, pro-free speech, or obsessed with being fair to users or giving them great service than ours.
Rather than refute your points here, I invite readers to read my postings to that list. Or, better, to read a good summary at http://www.brettglass.com/remarks.html, where I have posted the text of the remarks I made to the FCC Commissioners at their Stanford meeting .
Finally, your false and misleading claim above that my ISP is experiencing "bottom line problems" is not only wrong but libelous. We are not raking in tons of money, because being ISP is not a "get rich quick" business. However, we do make payroll and continue to reinvest in our infrastructure. Most small businesses fail, but we've been going strong for 15 years -- despite the anticompetitive tactics of the telephone and cable companies. I think we're doing well in part because we're doing good for people.
If a content provider is using the ISP's network and bandwidth to serve content, it ought to pay for the resources it is using. That's the thing about P2P; the recipient of the content is NOT just downloading. His machine is -- in many cases, unbeknownst to him -- becoming the content provider's server. This costs the ISP a lot more in resources than a simple download would, for two reasons. First of all, the ISP has to backhaul that bandwidth from the backbone, often at a cost of hundreds of dollars per Mbps per month. And after getting it into its point of presence, the ISP must deliver that bandwidth through the "last mile" to the customer. The resources to do this are also expensive and labor intensive to build. Secondly, instead of just the bandwidth that's needed for a single download, P2P sends out dozens -- even hundreds -- of additional copies of the file. So, overall, the cost of sending the file is not only shifted to the ISP but multiplied by a factor of several hundred.
Who should cover this cost? It's only fair that the party who benefits should do so. And that party is not the user who did the download -- it's the content provider -- like Vuze or Blizzard -- who distributes content via P2P. Because it is using up the ISP's very costly "edge of the Net" bandwidth, it should pay for that bandwidth.
Actually, "all you can eat" service is analogous to an "all you can eat" buffet. There are rules: You can't take food out; you can't waste it; you can't give it to someone who hasn't paid. The same is true of "all you can eat" broadband. P2P takes bandwidth from the ISP for the benefit of a third party that has not paid: the content provider. And it wastes it, because P2P is much less efficient than a straight, simple download. An ISP has every right to prohibit this sort of behavior, just as the buffet owner does. If you don't like it -- well, you can go to a place where you pay by the plate. Or by weight. But rules and limits are fundamental to any "all you can eat" service. Otherwise, the buffet owner (or ISP) goes broke.
Yes, WiMAX can operate in the 5.8 GHz band. But there's no point, because it's never going to be less expensive than existing 802.11a equipment for that band.
With flat rate pricing, P2P shifts the cost of distribution from the content provider to the ISP... AND multiplies it several hundredfold in the process, because bandwidth at the edges of the network is much more costly than bandwidth at a server farm or NAP. While congestion is also a concern, this cost shifting is the main reason why ISPs throttle or block P2P. Why should an ISP let a content provider like Blizzard, which is already rolling in the dough, set up a server on its network without permission or compensation and take its expensive bandwidth and capacity without paying?
Due to massive hype -- much of which is false -- by the WiMAX Consortium, much of the public doesn't understand one simple thing: WiMAX is just another kinda radio. One that's only slightly better than some of the other kinds. There's nothing particularly wonderful about it.
But it does have one real drawback that doesn't really have to do with the nature of the standard itself. That is that it's intended and manufactured for use on licensed spectrum, which -- due to poor spectrum management policy -- is expensive and scarce. So scarce that even many of the big telecommunications providers failed to win it in recent auctions. And so expensive, due to speculation and pre-emptive bidding, that once you've bought the spectrum you're unlikely ever to break even on that investment no matter what kind of radio you use.
So, WiMAX is at best slightly better than other kinds of radios and is tied to an impossible business model.
WISPs that ignore WiMAX and use other technologies will do better.
(That's more than 50 per state, so if you don't patronize one, it's not their fault.) That's hardly a duopoly situation. However, independent ISPs often pay more for bandwidth than the cable and telephone monopolies. Some pay as much as $300 per megabit per second per month for their backbone connections. They are thus even more susceptible to being harmed if greedy content providers -- such as Vuze -- siphon off their bandwidth using P2P, or if bandwidth hogs overrun their networks. So, the issue is not one of duopoly, nor is it one of greed on the part of the providers. (Many of them are just scraping by.) Rather, it's greed on the part of some bandwidth hogging users (5% use 80% of the bandwidth) and on the part of content providers which use P2P to avoid paying the freight for delivering their content to users. See http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html for more on this issue.
No ISP could afford to do that. Currently, the practice has been to sell "all you can eat, subject to certain rules." These rules say that you can't, for example, run a server or engage in P2P.
And these rules make sense. Think about an "all you can eat" buffet. There's virtually always a sign, posted prominently, that says you can't take food out to other people and can't stay all day. They also say that everyone who eats must pay.
The rules for bandwidth are analogous. They vary between ISPs, but generally say that you can't do P2P (which amounts to smuggling food out to a thousand of your closest friends) or stream day and night.
This sort of rule is fundamental and necessary in any "all you can eat" pricing model. If you won't accept such rules, the only other choice is metered pricing.
Can we really trust a tool that is developed and published by Google not to produce results that promote Google's interests? (Remember, this is the same company that claims to be in favor of a "neutral" net, but helps the Chinese government to censor and filter.) Very likely, the tool will sound an alarm if the network isn't optimized to get you to Google or YouTube. But what will it do if your ISP has a deal with Google that degrades a Google competitor? Hmmmm.
Many of the posters here, including the one who authored the original article, seem to be forgetting a very simple but important point: bandwidth costs money. A lot of money, in fact, if you're an ISP outside a major city. Many ISPs pay $100 to $300 per megabit per second per month for their bandwidth. Can they afford to give bandwidth hogs unmetered, unrestricted access to it? Of course not! Add to this the fact that TCP/IP is the most inefficient way yet devised to distribute media (a simple analog TV tower is millions of times more spectrally efficient) and that P2P is designed to eat up many times the bandwidth required to transfer the data to the user (because the user's computer becomes a server), and it's no wonder that providers are concerned. Regulations that prohibited ISPs from throttling P2P, or from implementing pricing tiers, would sting the telcos and cable companies (which can cross-subsidize from their other services) but would flat out kill their smaller, independent competitors, leaving a cable/telco duopoly. So, be careful what you wish for. We all like to get a good deal, but if you ask the government to legally mandate that people give you expensive stuff for nothing, do not be surprised when they go broke in a hurry. For more, see my remarks to the FCC at http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html.
I'm a wireless ISP (in fact, I was the first wireless ISP, started back in 1992), and do this sort of link nearly every day. I'll sell him a pair of LEGAL (not illegal, like the Cantenna) radios that will do the trick nicely for $400, including all accessories. Slightly more than an illegal link, but it'll last for decades and is FCC certified.
The problem comes when content providers refuse to pay their freight.
That's the advantage of it, Yes
The Internet has always been about freespeech
...which does not include theft of service or theft of intellectual property.
and allowing others to voice there [sic] opinions.
Which has nothing to do with P2P, since P2P is not used to voice one's own opinion. It's used to make illicit copies of others' work or to distribute content which should be distributed via other means.
Why should only the rich be allowed to distribute their content?
This is the same straw man argument we see again and again from groups like "Save the Internet," which rave that the Internet and free speech will be under some sort of imminent threat if kids can't pirate music and videos. The fact is that anyone can publish on the Internet now. You don't need very much bandwidth at all to publish your ideas; in fact, many companies will give you a Web site for free. It's corporations and pirates that are trying to use P2P to shift their costs or cover their tracks.
Do you know what it cost to run a server? I don't know many people who could afford to do so
This is Slashdot, so I'll wager that there are thousands of readers who do know. And it's not much. What's more, you don't have to run your own (see above). Register a domain name for $15 a year nowadays, and you get a free Web site with it.
let alone have the knowledge to manage the server.
If you don't have the knowledge to publish something, or the knowledge that you don't have to manage a server to do it, well... sorry, ignorance is no excuse.
The ISP doesn't pay anything, unless they are providing FREE service.
Nonsense. The ISP is paying more because Internet service in this country is flat rate. If its costs go up, it does not get to collect more, It must therefore limit what users can do to run up its costs. And it must especially prevent those who are not its users from taking its service.
Hang on, are you saying that the ISP shouldn't have to provide the service their customer paid for?
The customer did not pay to operate a server (see the terms of service for virtually all residential Internet service). And the content provider did not pay for any service from the ISP at all.
I pay for my connection to the backbone and if my ISP doesn't let me use 100% of what I pay for they must compensate me in some way, or else they have committed fraud!
Again, unless you are paying for a connection on which a server is allowed and whose bandwidth you are allowed to saturate 24x7, you are not paying to run a server. Sign up for a more expensive class of service, and you can give that expensive bandwidth away to anyone you want. But you might think twice once you see how expensive it actually is.
Where did this idea come that it's OK to make the user pay and than not deliver?
Where did this idea come that you can pay for a gallon of gas and then take enough to fill not only your tank but 1000 of your friends'? And then complain like a spoiled child when the owner of the gas station says, "no?"
he ISP doesn't pay anything, unless they are providing FREE service.
Yes, it does, because it is providing flat rate service. The user pays it no more money, but its costs go through the roof. Hence, the distributor of the content is setting up a server on their networks and taking service from them without compensation.
How is a content provider who uses bit torrent NOT paying for distribution?
It is not paying its freight to transport its content to the Internet backbone. This is the fundamental contract of the privatized Internet: everyone pays his or her way to the backbone.
I know people who are paying hundreds of dollars a month to distribute via bit torrent.
While ISPs are no doubt absorbing hundreds of thousands of dollars per month, as they are the ones who actually do the distributing.
Bandwidth cost's money and if the user is happy to contribute some bandwidth towards distribution, then why shouldn't they?
Let them pay for the bandwidth, then. Right now, they are taking it from ISPs.
Bit torrent provides an Equal opportunity for content distribution, now you don't have to be Rupert Murdoch to deliver media to the masses.
No; it's the Web that does that. P2P is a method of (a) shifting costs and (b) avoiding the establishment of centrally located sites which can be shut down to stop the distribution of pirated material. These are its two purposes.
It's the best way to allocate limited resources. P2P breaks the asymmetrical bandwidth model not because it is any more efficient but rather because it allows the content provider's costs to be shifted from the content provider to the ISP. The original and explicit contract of the Internet, since its inception, has been simple: each side pays for its connection to the backbone. But some content providers don't want to pay their freight. They want to shift the cost of distributing their content to someone else. So, they turn users' computers into servers for their content. This has the additional advantage that since they aren't serving the content themselves, they can avoid being shut down if the content is illegal (which most of it is).
Ironically, some of the people who are lobbying to force ISPs to carry P2P are claiming that they are advocates of "network neutrality." But P2P itself is not neutral! It dumps costs on ISPs, magnifying them hundreds or even thousands of times in the process. (For more on why this is so, see my slides at http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/pg0.html and http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/pg1.html.) As such, it violates the fundamental contract of the Internet. And it attempts to seize priority over traffic which is much more important. Should a kid downloading illegal music take priority over a life-critical telemedicine connection? Left unchecked, that's what P2P will do. It just makes sense to rein it in or block it.
Well, whatever you think of P2P, you must admit that it was designed for the purpose of piracy. That's just a matter of historical fact. Some companies that want to profiteer on it (e.g. BitTorrent, Inc.) are trying to get legitimate media outlets to use P2P, but it's unwise of them to do it; it might prevent crackdowns on piracy due to "substantial noninfringing uses."
The best thing to do about P2P is to develop client/server alternatives to it. They will be more efficient and can be made at least as fast.
One thing that many people do not think about at first (but realize when it's pointed out to them) is that mechanisms which try to identify peers on the same ISP's network are anticompetitive. (That's why only the biggest carriers, like AT&T, support them.)
Here's why. The cable and telephone monopolies have so many customers that the odds are there will be someone else on the same provider's network with the requested files. Small ISPs, on the other hand, will rarely if ever have someone with that file and so will still experience a great impact from the cost shifting and congestion caused by P2P. Hence, you can see why the big guys are cautiously embracing schemes like "P4P" as an anticompetitive weapon to block new entrants -- particularly wireless ones.
I was there -- I spoke on the second panel -- and as far as I am aware, I exist. Or at least I think I exist, therefore I exist... I think.
But I guess if you're the competition that some folks want to claim does not exist as they pursue government regulation of the Net, you don't exist even if you do exist.
My prepared remarks, of which I only got to deliver a little more than half because I was given less time than previous panelists, are at
http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html
After all, they don't have to pay for their upstream bandwidth costs. Those costs get shifted to the users' ISPs. Needless to say, if everyone follows suit, users will have to pay more for their Internet to cover the costs of all that bandwidth, and ISPs will either have to raise rates dramatically or start charging by the bit.
Actually, the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands are hardly "unregulated." They're just unlicensed. The equipment gets approved, but the users of the band don't have to obtain licenses.
Also, these bands don't have "play nice" rules. They have rules that say, "All's fair if the equipment has gotten FCC approval." Which still makes it possible to be nasty. We've seen people turn on approved wireless devices where they know they'll interfere with a competitor's service, just to mess them up. And some equipment -- Motorola's Canopy in particular -- is designed to stomp all over other users of the band to try to get them to give up and go away. (In my opinion, Motorola's gear never should have received FCC approval, because it does something similar to what the FCC has explicitly banned: using coordinated frequency hopping transmitters to monopolize unlicensed spectrum. Motorola's equipment coordinates the transmitters, but they don't hop.)
The rules for the 3650 MHz band, which requires licensing but makes the license easy to obtain, might have turned out better, but when the FCC revised them it allowed half of the band to be trashed in the same way that Canopy trashes the unlicensed band. The other half may get an effective form of interference avoidance; we don't know yet. If the FCC doesn't mandate a standard spectrum etiquette like 802.11y, that spectrum will be trashed too.
Best of all are the rules for the narrow range of frequencies used by DECT cordless phones. These rules allow spectrum to be shared and require the use of a protocol that provides interference avoidance (sometimes called a "spectrum etiquette").
We do. There's no way to enumerate everything. But in general, we'd only use it for billing matters, notices of downtime, and similar administrative issues. If users didn't like it, I'm sure we'd hear about it.
Anyway, you'd be right, in a truly competitive environment... but there are millions upon millions of users subject to a single drain-bamaged ISP with no hope of ever switching.
We are in a very rural area, and even here we have competition. Even users who are in an area reached by nothing but satellites have multiple satellite providers to choose from. Methinks you're being needlessly excited by Lauren's alarmist, one-sided propaganda.
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While most of what you've said is incorrect or naive, you are correct, above, when you characterize the zealots who post to that mailing list as being "against" ISPs. They are no going to convince me of the "fallacies" of my "position," because what I'm posting to that list isn't a matter of opinion. I'm posting facts about the Internet business. And many of those facts apply to large and small providers alike (though I am quick to point out when they do not). What's more, you will likely never find an ISP who is more pro-user, pro-consumer, pro-free speech, or obsessed with being fair to users or giving them great service than ours.
Rather than refute your points here, I invite readers to read my postings to that list. Or, better, to read a good summary at http://www.brettglass.com/remarks.html, where I have posted the text of the remarks I made to the FCC Commissioners at their Stanford meeting .
Finally, your false and misleading claim above that my ISP is experiencing "bottom line problems" is not only wrong but libelous. We are not raking in tons of money, because being ISP is not a "get rich quick" business. However, we do make payroll and continue to reinvest in our infrastructure. Most small businesses fail, but we've been going strong for 15 years -- despite the anticompetitive tactics of the telephone and cable companies. I think we're doing well in part because we're doing good for people.
If a content provider is using the ISP's network and bandwidth to serve content, it ought to pay for the resources it is using. That's the thing about P2P; the recipient of the content is NOT just downloading. His machine is -- in many cases, unbeknownst to him -- becoming the content provider's server. This costs the ISP a lot more in resources than a simple download would, for two reasons. First of all, the ISP has to backhaul that bandwidth from the backbone, often at a cost of hundreds of dollars per Mbps per month. And after getting it into its point of presence, the ISP must deliver that bandwidth through the "last mile" to the customer. The resources to do this are also expensive and labor intensive to build. Secondly, instead of just the bandwidth that's needed for a single download, P2P sends out dozens -- even hundreds -- of additional copies of the file. So, overall, the cost of sending the file is not only shifted to the ISP but multiplied by a factor of several hundred. Who should cover this cost? It's only fair that the party who benefits should do so. And that party is not the user who did the download -- it's the content provider -- like Vuze or Blizzard -- who distributes content via P2P. Because it is using up the ISP's very costly "edge of the Net" bandwidth, it should pay for that bandwidth.
I recommend that they add a trap to the plumbing, too, so that the odor of Internet sewage doesn't come back up the pipe to annoy other users. ;-)
Actually, "all you can eat" service is analogous to an "all you can eat" buffet. There are rules: You can't take food out; you can't waste it; you can't give it to someone who hasn't paid. The same is true of "all you can eat" broadband. P2P takes bandwidth from the ISP for the benefit of a third party that has not paid: the content provider. And it wastes it, because P2P is much less efficient than a straight, simple download. An ISP has every right to prohibit this sort of behavior, just as the buffet owner does. If you don't like it -- well, you can go to a place where you pay by the plate. Or by weight. But rules and limits are fundamental to any "all you can eat" service. Otherwise, the buffet owner (or ISP) goes broke.
There are dozens of commercial, FCC approved (not homebrew) 802.11a-based radios which work well at distances up to 40 miles.
Yes, WiMAX can operate in the 5.8 GHz band. But there's no point, because it's never going to be less expensive than existing 802.11a equipment for that band.
With flat rate pricing, P2P shifts the cost of distribution from the content provider to the ISP... AND multiplies it several hundredfold in the process, because bandwidth at the edges of the network is much more costly than bandwidth at a server farm or NAP. While congestion is also a concern, this cost shifting is the main reason why ISPs throttle or block P2P. Why should an ISP let a content provider like Blizzard, which is already rolling in the dough, set up a server on its network without permission or compensation and take its expensive bandwidth and capacity without paying?
Believe it or not, properly engineered 802.11a has the same or better range, throughput, and scalability.
Due to massive hype -- much of which is false -- by the WiMAX Consortium, much of the public doesn't understand one simple thing: WiMAX is just another kinda radio. One that's only slightly better than some of the other kinds. There's nothing particularly wonderful about it. But it does have one real drawback that doesn't really have to do with the nature of the standard itself. That is that it's intended and manufactured for use on licensed spectrum, which -- due to poor spectrum management policy -- is expensive and scarce. So scarce that even many of the big telecommunications providers failed to win it in recent auctions. And so expensive, due to speculation and pre-emptive bidding, that once you've bought the spectrum you're unlikely ever to break even on that investment no matter what kind of radio you use. So, WiMAX is at best slightly better than other kinds of radios and is tied to an impossible business model. WISPs that ignore WiMAX and use other technologies will do better.
(That's more than 50 per state, so if you don't patronize one, it's not their fault.) That's hardly a duopoly situation. However, independent ISPs often pay more for bandwidth than the cable and telephone monopolies. Some pay as much as $300 per megabit per second per month for their backbone connections. They are thus even more susceptible to being harmed if greedy content providers -- such as Vuze -- siphon off their bandwidth using P2P, or if bandwidth hogs overrun their networks. So, the issue is not one of duopoly, nor is it one of greed on the part of the providers. (Many of them are just scraping by.) Rather, it's greed on the part of some bandwidth hogging users (5% use 80% of the bandwidth) and on the part of content providers which use P2P to avoid paying the freight for delivering their content to users. See http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html for more on this issue.
No ISP could afford to do that. Currently, the practice has been to sell "all you can eat, subject to certain rules." These rules say that you can't, for example, run a server or engage in P2P. And these rules make sense. Think about an "all you can eat" buffet. There's virtually always a sign, posted prominently, that says you can't take food out to other people and can't stay all day. They also say that everyone who eats must pay. The rules for bandwidth are analogous. They vary between ISPs, but generally say that you can't do P2P (which amounts to smuggling food out to a thousand of your closest friends) or stream day and night. This sort of rule is fundamental and necessary in any "all you can eat" pricing model. If you won't accept such rules, the only other choice is metered pricing.
Can we really trust a tool that is developed and published by Google not to produce results that promote Google's interests? (Remember, this is the same company that claims to be in favor of a "neutral" net, but helps the Chinese government to censor and filter.) Very likely, the tool will sound an alarm if the network isn't optimized to get you to Google or YouTube. But what will it do if your ISP has a deal with Google that degrades a Google competitor? Hmmmm.
Many of the posters here, including the one who authored the original article, seem to be forgetting a very simple but important point: bandwidth costs money. A lot of money, in fact, if you're an ISP outside a major city. Many ISPs pay $100 to $300 per megabit per second per month for their bandwidth. Can they afford to give bandwidth hogs unmetered, unrestricted access to it? Of course not! Add to this the fact that TCP/IP is the most inefficient way yet devised to distribute media (a simple analog TV tower is millions of times more spectrally efficient) and that P2P is designed to eat up many times the bandwidth required to transfer the data to the user (because the user's computer becomes a server), and it's no wonder that providers are concerned. Regulations that prohibited ISPs from throttling P2P, or from implementing pricing tiers, would sting the telcos and cable companies (which can cross-subsidize from their other services) but would flat out kill their smaller, independent competitors, leaving a cable/telco duopoly. So, be careful what you wish for. We all like to get a good deal, but if you ask the government to legally mandate that people give you expensive stuff for nothing, do not be surprised when they go broke in a hurry. For more, see my remarks to the FCC at http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html.
I'm a wireless ISP (in fact, I was the first wireless ISP, started back in 1992), and do this sort of link nearly every day. I'll sell him a pair of LEGAL (not illegal, like the Cantenna) radios that will do the trick nicely for $400, including all accessories. Slightly more than an illegal link, but it'll last for decades and is FCC certified.
The Conyers bill didn't pass the last time for good reason. See George Ou's excellent analysis explaining why it would be very bad for the Internet, at http://www.formortals.com/Home/tabid/36/EntryID/34/Default.aspx
It's the best way to allocate limited resources. P2P breaks the asymmetrical bandwidth model not because it is any more efficient but rather because it allows the content provider's costs to be shifted from the content provider to the ISP. The original and explicit contract of the Internet, since its inception, has been simple: each side pays for its connection to the backbone. But some content providers don't want to pay their freight. They want to shift the cost of distributing their content to someone else. So, they turn users' computers into servers for their content. This has the additional advantage that since they aren't serving the content themselves, they can avoid being shut down if the content is illegal (which most of it is). Ironically, some of the people who are lobbying to force ISPs to carry P2P are claiming that they are advocates of "network neutrality." But P2P itself is not neutral! It dumps costs on ISPs, magnifying them hundreds or even thousands of times in the process. (For more on why this is so, see my slides at http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/pg0.html and http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/pg1.html.) As such, it violates the fundamental contract of the Internet. And it attempts to seize priority over traffic which is much more important. Should a kid downloading illegal music take priority over a life-critical telemedicine connection? Left unchecked, that's what P2P will do. It just makes sense to rein it in or block it.
Well, whatever you think of P2P, you must admit that it was designed for the purpose of piracy. That's just a matter of historical fact. Some companies that want to profiteer on it (e.g. BitTorrent, Inc.) are trying to get legitimate media outlets to use P2P, but it's unwise of them to do it; it might prevent crackdowns on piracy due to "substantial noninfringing uses." The best thing to do about P2P is to develop client/server alternatives to it. They will be more efficient and can be made at least as fast.
One thing that many people do not think about at first (but realize when it's pointed out to them) is that mechanisms which try to identify peers on the same ISP's network are anticompetitive. (That's why only the biggest carriers, like AT&T, support them.) Here's why. The cable and telephone monopolies have so many customers that the odds are there will be someone else on the same provider's network with the requested files. Small ISPs, on the other hand, will rarely if ever have someone with that file and so will still experience a great impact from the cost shifting and congestion caused by P2P. Hence, you can see why the big guys are cautiously embracing schemes like "P4P" as an anticompetitive weapon to block new entrants -- particularly wireless ones.
I was there -- I spoke on the second panel -- and as far as I am aware, I exist. Or at least I think I exist, therefore I exist... I think. But I guess if you're the competition that some folks want to claim does not exist as they pursue government regulation of the Net, you don't exist even if you do exist. My prepared remarks, of which I only got to deliver a little more than half because I was given less time than previous panelists, are at http://www.brettglass.com/FCC/remarks.html
After all, they don't have to pay for their upstream bandwidth costs. Those costs get shifted to the users' ISPs. Needless to say, if everyone follows suit, users will have to pay more for their Internet to cover the costs of all that bandwidth, and ISPs will either have to raise rates dramatically or start charging by the bit.
Al Cuttah. (Sorry, couldn't resist.)
Actually, the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands are hardly "unregulated." They're just unlicensed. The equipment gets approved, but the users of the band don't have to obtain licenses. Also, these bands don't have "play nice" rules. They have rules that say, "All's fair if the equipment has gotten FCC approval." Which still makes it possible to be nasty. We've seen people turn on approved wireless devices where they know they'll interfere with a competitor's service, just to mess them up. And some equipment -- Motorola's Canopy in particular -- is designed to stomp all over other users of the band to try to get them to give up and go away. (In my opinion, Motorola's gear never should have received FCC approval, because it does something similar to what the FCC has explicitly banned: using coordinated frequency hopping transmitters to monopolize unlicensed spectrum. Motorola's equipment coordinates the transmitters, but they don't hop.) The rules for the 3650 MHz band, which requires licensing but makes the license easy to obtain, might have turned out better, but when the FCC revised them it allowed half of the band to be trashed in the same way that Canopy trashes the unlicensed band. The other half may get an effective form of interference avoidance; we don't know yet. If the FCC doesn't mandate a standard spectrum etiquette like 802.11y, that spectrum will be trashed too. Best of all are the rules for the narrow range of frequencies used by DECT cordless phones. These rules allow spectrum to be shared and require the use of a protocol that provides interference avoidance (sometimes called a "spectrum etiquette").
We do. There's no way to enumerate everything. But in general, we'd only use it for billing matters, notices of downtime, and similar administrative issues. If users didn't like it, I'm sure we'd hear about it.
Anyway, you'd be right, in a truly competitive environment ... but there are millions upon millions of users subject to a single drain-bamaged ISP with no hope of ever switching.
We are in a very rural area, and even here we have competition. Even users who are in an area reached by nothing but satellites have multiple satellite providers to choose from. Methinks you're being needlessly excited by Lauren's alarmist, one-sided propaganda.