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Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

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Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#101

Post by rhino369 »

nathan_long wrote: post #65
jstalin wrote: post #58

I have experienced exactly this on Comcast. Suddenly, about two months ago, Netflix and Hulu became terrible to watch. I thought maybe it was my cable modem, so I upgraded it and still no luck. So I signed up for a VPN service and tested watching Netflix and Hulu both on the VPN and off. Sure enough, when on the VPN, I get the highest quality picture. When I disconnected the VPN, Netflix dropped down to about 500kbps…

An excellent test. If a VPN makes something faster, despite the fact that it adds overhead to the process , that seems like proof that it's being throttled.

It's not being throttled. There is a peering dispute between netflix's CDNs and the ISPs. Netflix's CDN's don't want to pay for delivery to the ISP. Normally CDNs peer with each other for free if the balance in each direction is equal. The problem is that any CDN that delivers netflix is hugely unequal since it's a huge one way stream.

The ISPs could just eat the cost, and let it be delivered for free. Or Netflix's CDNs could just pay the peering fee. Or Netflix could use different CDNs.

The reason the VPN works is because it sends the data over a different CDN that isn't saturated because of the dispute.

At least that is how I understand it, but I'm not an expert (or even a novice).

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#102

Post by [deleted] »

nathan_long wrote: post #65
jstalin wrote: post #58

I have experienced exactly this on Comcast. Suddenly, about two months ago, Netflix and Hulu became terrible to watch. I thought maybe it was my cable modem, so I upgraded it and still no luck. So I signed up for a VPN service and tested watching Netflix and Hulu both on the VPN and off. Sure enough, when on the VPN, I get the highest quality picture. When I disconnected the VPN, Netflix dropped down to about 500kbps…

An excellent test. If a VPN makes something faster, despite the fact that it adds overhead to the process , that seems like proof that it's being throttled.

[deleted]

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#103

Post by alphadogg »

waps wrote: post #59
RyanZAG wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By far the most correct observation. These guys are just following a script - they probably don't even know what half of the words mean. Please don't read anything into it or assume the outsourced support is somehow privy to anything at all that goes on inside Verizon other than what the FAQ system he's using tells him on screen.

The netflix data itself points to a gradual lowering of bandwidth to their service. Now here's 2 scenarios : 1) Verizon decided to enter some router configurations that affect the packet forwarding to Netflix (well, most likely FROM netflix, as the internet is not actually symmetrical). What we should see as a result of this is a sudden change in bandwidth. 2) The load on the interfaces in between is changing, either…

So, how does this analysis account for the fact that, in many reported cases like this, other services work just fine at high-speed? Your point 2 is that more consumers and producers are flooding the net as a whole, but that would cause widespread issues, not just premier services issues, right?

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#104

Post by edent »

jusben1369 wrote: post #94

I'm not sure I believe any of this for reasons others have pointed out. But let's say it's true. Is this an argument for or against Net Neutrality? By most accounts I read NetFlix is responsible for 30% + of evening internet traffic. Kind of staggering. If an ISP actively throttled Netflix people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix Netflix is clearly a hugely popular service with enough…

Well, there are two problems with that scenario.

1) There may not be other services in the area - or all services throttle. Your only solution is to move house.

2) The user may not realise it is their ISP which is the problem. "NetFlix sucks - it's so slow. But TimeWarnerCastPlayer is awesome - it's so fast!"

NetFlix isn't "squeezing" anyone. Customers are requesting data through their ISP, NetFlix are sending it as asked.

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#105

Post by ohyes »

jusben1369 wrote: post #94

I'm not sure I believe any of this for reasons others have pointed out. But let's say it's true. Is this an argument for or against Net Neutrality? By most accounts I read NetFlix is responsible for 30% + of evening internet traffic. Kind of staggering. If an ISP actively throttled Netflix people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix Netflix is clearly a hugely popular service with enough…

How is it squeezing out other traffic? A packet is a packet, under the net neutrality model all packets are routed equally. Capping packet flow from a provider would be like Subaru owning chunks of the national highway and setting a limit on the number of Toyotas that are allowed to be driving at a time. If Verizon doesn't have the capacity to support the evening demand, they should increase their shitty infrastructure so they can deliver the service that they sold to their customers.

And what if I want to compete with netflix myself? They have the cash to make a deal with Verizon, I don't.

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#106

Post by clavalle »

jusben1369 wrote: post #94

I'm not sure I believe any of this for reasons others have pointed out. But let's say it's true. Is this an argument for or against Net Neutrality? By most accounts I read NetFlix is responsible for 30% + of evening internet traffic. Kind of staggering. If an ISP actively throttled Netflix people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix Netflix is clearly a hugely popular service with enough…

>people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix

That assumes people have a choice for their ISP.

If I want high speed internet I have two choices. Both of them are huge national companies.

If they decide to go the throttle route, where do I go?

>Secondly, why are they throttling this service? Because they can't charge effectively for it.

That's an interesting take considering how they offered a product at a certain bandwidth and I agreed to pay for that bandwidth. If I use it to capacity, the services I receive from third parties are somehow 'exploiting' the model? I don't think so.

If the post office offers to ship anything under 10lbs for a flat rate, is a company taking advantage if they offer, say, a 10 lbs cheese of the month package using that USPS service?

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#107

Post by jusben1369 »

pikachu_is_cool wrote: post #100
jusben1369 wrote: post #94

I'm not sure I believe any of this for reasons others have pointed out. But let's say it's true. Is this an argument for or against Net Neutrality? By most accounts I read NetFlix is responsible for 30% + of evening internet traffic. Kind of staggering. If an ISP actively throttled Netflix people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix Netflix is clearly a hugely popular service with enough…

> people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix. Haha.

We dumped TWC for ATT because of constant timeouts when trying to access movies on demand at peak times.

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#108

Post by jonknee »

jusben1369 wrote: post #94

I'm not sure I believe any of this for reasons others have pointed out. But let's say it's true. Is this an argument for or against Net Neutrality? By most accounts I read NetFlix is responsible for 30% + of evening internet traffic. Kind of staggering. If an ISP actively throttled Netflix people would leave that ISP for another one that didn't throttle Netflix Netflix is clearly a hugely popular service with enough…

Verizon has special right of way access for its fiber cables and should be regulated as such. I can't change ISPs and the ISP is only able to exist because of exemptions from City, State and Federal governments.

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#109

Post by kordless »

padseeker wrote: post #55

How do we, IT savvy people capable of monitoring, testing and verifying this stuff, use our collective skills to monitor each ISP and communicate who is doing the best/worst job? As long as there is at least one ISP provider who is not throttling traffic, we should reward that ISP that does not discriminate on web traffic, and punish the ones that do. You might have to show some differences across different regions a…

I'm with you.

The primary problem we'll have is the 'reward' system in locales with only one provider. You'll have to focus on markets with multiple providers. The solution involves building an escrowed Bitcoin fund which does payouts based on provider's aggregate throughput. How that is implemented, I have no idea.

Re: Verizon Using Recent Net Neutrality Victory to Wage War Against Netflix?

#110

Post by nashashmi »

colinbartlett wrote: post #14

I would not take some offhanded remark from an outsourced, minimum wage, offshore worker as confirmation of anything.

And this is the reason why I cannot make a complaint about Verizon that will stick. Verizon purposely hires or makes it seem they hire crappy technical people. But when a person does 'know' either through some confidential/proprietary memo or through technical know-how, people begin to have doubts on the quality of the information.

I had a deep fight with Verizon over a chromebook 3g service that they no longer offered, and I tried to get a copy of the internal memo that said the service was cancelled, but they would not give it to me. And everybody thought that the person I spoke to was lying.

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