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Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

news.northeastern.edu

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Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#51

Post by Jonnax »

hamandcheese wrote: post #24

Throttling video speeds may very well be a good thing for many (most?) users who have a fixed data cap. Throttling means Netflix/Youtube/etc react by sending lower quality video to your tiny screen, where you won’t be able to appreciate higher quality anyway.

This is ridiculous. People can tell the difference between 720p and 1080p on a mobile screen.

If they can't then they're a small subset of the population.

Also it should be up to me to select what resolution I stream at. Not the service provider making the decision.

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#52

Post by belorn »

sbr464 wrote: post #25

Years back, I operated a small ISP to serve a need until cable broadband arrived in the community. I had to monitor overall usage and throttle clients frequently with high torrent/video usage. It was also an issue with hotspots in RV Parks/campgrounds where there was a higher ratio of video usage. There are technical limitations to spectrum/bandwidth, I'm curious why this isn't mentioned more in discussions like thes…

The article brings up that. The throttling was not done in order to ease congested network traffic. It is not a response to hotspots of high traffic, nor is it even classification of data types such as torrent and video usage.

If you use Boost ISP and watching sports on NBCSport it will work fine but watching the same match later on youtube is not. If you sit at CSpire and watch a paid movie on Youtube Red you will get worse experience then if you paid and watched the exact same movie on Netflix. If you sit at GCI and have both Netflix and Amazon Prime then go and unsubscribe your netflix as it will be much worse experience than amazon thanks to your ISP throttling.

This is not small ISP that monitor overall usage and throttle clients based on high usage and hotspots of traffic. The article is not about congestion control but rather marketing choices where one streaming service is favored over the other within the captured market of an ISP customers.

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#53

Post by DougBTX »

kakarot wrote: post #49
sbr464 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, definitely. It was an interesting experiment, and the realities of the then current wireless tech were so limiting, it was eye-opening to be on the provider side for once.

Then we shouldn't have done things like spend millions pushing 4G only to bait and switch with 4G LTE once everyone had upgraded. We shouldn't claim certain capabilities that simply aren't there. The worst thing you can do for a bad product is good marketing, and that's exactly what these ISPs are doing.

Personally I’ve had a great experience with 4G LTE, but it is going to depend on lots of factors, including the ISP.

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#54

Post by benbristow »

sbr464 wrote: post #48
sbr464 wrote: post #25

Years back, I operated a small ISP to serve a need until cable broadband arrived in the community. I had to monitor overall usage and throttle clients frequently with high torrent/video usage. It was also an issue with hotspots in RV Parks/campgrounds where there was a higher ratio of video usage. There are technical limitations to spectrum/bandwidth, I'm curious why this isn't mentioned more in discussions like thes…

Just a side note while I was reminiscing about the pain of being an ISP. Here's a couple photos of the tower for this project. I got frustrated with satellite internet, and bought a 140' tower from the scrap yard before it was chopped up for about $2k. Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced. I think I was 23 in that photo. https://drive.google.com/d…

Sounds like an interesting story. You should write an article or something. I'm interested and I'm sure some other folk here would be too!

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#55

Post by sbr464 »

benbristow wrote: post #54
sbr464 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a side note while I was reminiscing about the pain of being an ISP. Here's a couple photos of the tower for this project. I got frustrated with satellite internet, and bought a 140' tower from the scrap yard before it was chopped up for about $2k. Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced. I think I was 23 in that photo. https://drive.google.com/d…

Sounds like an interesting story. You should write an article or something. I'm interested and I'm sure some other folk here would be too!

Thanks, I do need to!

Funny thing, it was located on the same road where Tabasco sauce is made. I'm sure a tour bus passenger or two randomly caught me standing on top doing the (Brazilian) Christ the Redeemer (statue) pose.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_the_Redeemer_(statue)

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#56

Post by chatmasta »

rbritton wrote: post #17
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #10

Netflix blocks PIA, a VPN, from accessing its servers. Rights holders’ unchecked power is the problem. Abstracting their power through net neutrality terminology distracts from their damage and promotes their cause. If you want a shortcut to the solution, it includes “how could I make Netflix indfifferent as to how I access their content?”

Netflix blocks virtually all VPS provider IP ranges, so you can’t even host your own VPN to work around it.

I’ve been using a VPN on an EC2 server for over a year with Netflix with no issues. I think the trick is to be the only one on the IP address and to use the same IP address frequently.

It’s an interesting problem because really, Netflix just needs to pretend to care, enough to satisfy the rightsholders they are buying licenses from. At one point, there were millions of users in Australia even though Netflix didn’t even have a presence there.

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#57

Post by pathseeker »

DougBTX wrote: post #37
sbr464 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But from a physics/technical standpoint, a radio only has so much capacity. How would you handle the situation, if you managed a provider, and 10 people at a bar started streaming an NBA game in HD? Somethings got to give.

The argument would go that if the radio has total capacity x and each user is allocated capacity y, then only x / y users should be allowed to join the service, otherwise it is "over selling". It is a super straight forward model, but obviously much more expensive to provide. I imagine most users would be happy to pay 1/10 of the cost to get a service that might drop to 10% performance in the worst case, as long as i…

What you're asking for already exists. They are dedicated business circuits. I get where you're coming from, but there is a reason that the consumer advertisements always say "up to X mbps". If ISPs didn't oversell, consumer Internet would either be unbearably slow or obscenely expensive.

A guaranteed 1 gig circuit is on the order of thousands USD month. An oversubscribed consumer fiber provider like Google Fiber is an order of magnitude cheaper because they can oversubscribe based on consumer traffic models that cover 99% of users.

Also keep in mind that your model isn't really straightforward at all. The ISP can only provide you guarantees within the lines they control. There could be any number of choke points at IXPs that mean the user can't reach site X at their guaranteed rate. So ISPs never even offer hard guarantees on connections to the wider Internet. The most you will be able to buy is dedicated circuits to their core, an IXP, some branch office, etc.

Are you okay with gyms selling more unlimited memberships than the number of machines they have?

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#58

Post by sbr464 »

DougBTX wrote: post #53
kakarot wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then we shouldn't have done things like spend millions pushing 4G only to bait and switch with 4G LTE once everyone had upgraded. We shouldn't claim certain capabilities that simply aren't there. The worst thing you can do for a bad product is good marketing, and that's exactly what these ISPs are doing.

Personally I’ve had a great experience with 4G LTE, but it is going to depend on lots of factors, including the ISP.

Curious, regarding monthly download caps, has anyone found a solution to using a 4G LTE connection for frequent Netflix consumption? It currently burns through too many gigs to be a cable internet replacement. I was looking for a solution for doing longer term domestic (US) travel.

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#59

Post by pathseeker »

sbr464 wrote: post #48
sbr464 wrote: post #25

Years back, I operated a small ISP to serve a need until cable broadband arrived in the community. I had to monitor overall usage and throttle clients frequently with high torrent/video usage. It was also an issue with hotspots in RV Parks/campgrounds where there was a higher ratio of video usage. There are technical limitations to spectrum/bandwidth, I'm curious why this isn't mentioned more in discussions like thes…

Just a side note while I was reminiscing about the pain of being an ISP. Here's a couple photos of the tower for this project. I got frustrated with satellite internet, and bought a 140' tower from the scrap yard before it was chopped up for about $2k. Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced. I think I was 23 in that photo. https://drive.google.com/d…

>Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced.

Did you have to get a license to operate on 5.8ghz in your country? If so, what was the process like to get one with permission to offer commercial service?

Re: Research shows that nearly every U.S. cell provider is doing throttling

#60

Post by sbr464 »

pathseeker wrote: post #59
sbr464 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a side note while I was reminiscing about the pain of being an ISP. Here's a couple photos of the tower for this project. I got frustrated with satellite internet, and bought a 140' tower from the scrap yard before it was chopped up for about $2k. Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced. I think I was 23 in that photo. https://drive.google.com/d…

>Got a good deal on some Tranzeo 5.8ghz equipment from a cable company and the learning experience commenced. Did you have to get a license to operate on 5.8ghz in your country? If so, what was the process like to get one with permission to offer commercial service?

I didn't have to (USA). You were able to offer 900mhz, 2.4ghz, 5.8ghz without a license. There are regulations on total output power of a device, which comes from the antenna's dB gain and the output power of the wireless radio inside. I believe there are other higher bands that are unlicensed, but I didn't use those. I built a lot of the equipment using m0n0wall/soekris/pcengines gear.
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