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Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

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Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#41

Post by jedberg »

psim1 wrote: post #36
jedberg wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check out https://fast.com from Netflix. It's a speed test based off of Netflix's servers, so it will tell you your bandwidth to Netflix at any given time. Then complain to your ISP if that doesn't match your advertised speed.

When the advertised speed is "up to XX Mbps" and you occasionally do get those speeds, then what is the proper complaint? They are providing "up to" the speed purchased. It works very well in the provider's favor.

I guess the best you can do it test it multiple times and then complain that you've never seen over XX Mpbs and then ask when exactly you'll get "up to" the advertised speed.

FWIW, even if you don't complain, it will help Netflix gather data that they can use to complain on your behalf.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#42

Post by dehrmann »

hristov wrote: post #24

I am going to say the obvious here but sometimes the obvious needs to be said. This is why we need net neutrality!

This is where net neutrality fails. I'm all for not letting vertically integrated carriers give their own services an unfair advantage, but if throttling a high-bandwidth user to improve the service of nearby users? I'm more ok with that.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#43

Post by briffle »

xur17 wrote: post #14
mikepurvis wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It surprises me that most people in the US wouldn't have at least one cable and one DSL option. After all, cable TV is available most places, and everyone has a phone line (or is at least wired for one). Or is the issue rural locations which were never wired for cable because they all just got satellite dishes?

I live 3 miles from downtown Austin, which has numerous internet options (Google Fiber, Spectrum, AT&T, and Grande), but the options in my apartment complex are: * Spectrum (up to 400mbps) * AT&T (5mbps dsl) I technically do have some choice, but given that one of these is close to 100x faster than the other, and the pricing is fairly similar... I think wireless isps and 5g are our best chance at disrupting this.

I used to live 8 miles from Madison, WI (technically, one exit south of their beltline interchange on I-90). My ONLY two choices were 2mb WISP for $65/month, or 4g hotspot, and all of them were VERY expensive for over 15GB a month. (I used about 20GB per month on the 2mb wisp because I had little kids who loved netflix cartoons, faster speed would also cause higher quality video)

There was NO cable or dsl. ATT always said DSL was available in our area, and that they would schedule the install, then 3 days later, the local guy would call, and say "oh, hell no, lol" and cancel it

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#44

Post by tcxgy »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #29
tcxqy wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. It's like going to a congested public road with a convoy of lorries just because you can. Really, don't be a dick.

> Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. Why do you think that a user that is using exactly the same amount of bandwidth as any other users (i.e., their fair share) is abusing the system? What would you say if some user was watching a video stream that used only half as much bandwidth as their fair share? Would that still be abusive?

Because in case of congestion (let's say everybody gets allotted 50 KB/s) you can't even watch video. Dozens of users trying to watch video at 50 KB/s aren't even watching video; they're just launching a DDoS attack. I'd be very happy to throttle them to 1 KB/s so I don't have to wait 10 seconds to receive a picture through Whatsapp.

You're arguing against the laws of physics here, and you're arguing that stupid users should be able to screw everybody else. No thanks.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#45

Post by JustSomeNobody »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #25
JustSomeNobody wrote: post #3

On the one hand, I can see needing the ability to throttle for network traffic handling because you'll always have that one person who goes into an all you can eat, grabs 10 plates and all the chocolate pudding because they have to feel like they got one over on ... well, everyone. On the other hand, doing this 24/7? That's just not right and I think this runs afoul network neutrality legis... oh, wait.

> On the one hand, I can see needing the ability to throttle for network traffic handling because you'll always have that one person who goes into an all you can eat, grabs 10 plates and all the chocolate pudding because they have to feel like they got one over on ... well, everyone. So, you want to allow companies to not fulfill contracts because the company has failed to fulfill contracts? Mind you, if customers in…

No, that's not what I said at all. I want someone tending the eatery telling the person scooping out all of the chocolate pudding that, sure, they may have as much as they like, but let others have some now and we have more in the back that we're bringing out. You just need to wait a few moments, so have your one plate, then come back for more.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#46

Post by zrail »

mikepurvis wrote: post #13
zacharycohn wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people do not have another reasonable option to switch to.

It surprises me that most people in the US wouldn't have at least one cable and one DSL option. After all, cable TV is available most places, and everyone has a phone line (or is at least wired for one). Or is the issue rural locations which were never wired for cable because they all just got satellite dishes?

I live in a smallish suburb (~5,000) of a small city (~150,000). I have access to Comcast. That's it. AT&T won't even sell us a DSL line, just satellite. There are no WISPs within range. LTE is far too expensive for our usage patterns.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#47

Post by gruez »

geggam wrote: post #28

Use a VPN in AWS to see the difference over the same line. It is interesting to say the least Easy way to implement one to test with here https://github.com/StreisandEffect/streisand

>VPN in AWS

at 9 cents a gigabyte, it's definitely going to be pricey.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#48

Post by mtgx »

ben7799 wrote: post #4

I keep thinking I see this on my wired (Comcast) connection too. Stuff just behaves too strangely for it to be anything else. One video provider will get slow. Switch to the mobile connection and it's fine. Switch to another site on the wired connection, that's fine too. They've made it perfectly clear they're unhappy I won't pay them an extra $100+/month for 900 channels of crap over and over.

It's been happening for some time now:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-28/comcast-d...

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#49

Post by geggam »

gruez wrote: post #47
geggam wrote: post #28

Use a VPN in AWS to see the difference over the same line. It is interesting to say the least Easy way to implement one to test with here https://github.com/StreisandEffect/streisand

>VPN in AWS at 9 cents a gigabyte, it's definitely going to be pricey.

Given the reduction in size streaming ... not really.

So that same 2 hour movie on Hulu may be as little as 1.25 GB - Yep, 1/1200th of the original…. Or as much as 5–7GB for Netflix or Youtube.

Re: Wireless Carrier Throttling of Online Video Is Pervasive: Study

#50

Post by mtgx »

larrik wrote: post #40

> AT&T Inc. throttled Netflix Inc. 70% of the time and Google’s YouTube service 74% of the time > T-Mobile US Inc. throttled Amazon Prime Video in about 51% of the tests, but didn’t throttle Skype and barely touched Vimeo > Choffnes says Verizon can’t restrict his ability to publish research and the companies that support him don’t influence his work. Yet, missing from this article: any %'s from Verizon

Anyone here remember how Google/Netflix sold us out when they made deals with AT&T and the other ISPs and suddenly became very quiet about net neutrality?

Many warned then that they it's foolish to think that they can get ahead of competitors this way, but they didn't listen. They had this coming.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/12/netflix...

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