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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?

#221

Post by dragontamer »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #99
waps wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> The basic problem is that a linear increase in bandwidth for the customer results in an exponential increase in costs for the ISP > N * (N - 1) =~ N^2 (assuming full duplex links, which would be generally correct for the internet) 1) N^2 is not exponential, it's polynomial. 2) Expanding capacity isn't even N^2, it's just linear. If you double each residential customer's bandwidth, you "only" have to double the capa…

Giving everyone a guaranteed connection is a theoretical networking problem. The brute force solution as you've mentioned, is a crossbar switch, which is implemented in O(n^2).

However, theoretical networking problems like this have been solved many years ago. The Clos Network can provide full duplex links at significantly better big-O

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clos_network

I don't fully remember the details, but I believe you grow at approximately N*log(n). The problem is that the original Clos paper was published before big-O notation was invented... and that this was just "one other homework problem" that a professor gave to me about 5 years ago when I was in college.

So my memory is fuzzy, and the math is undocumented on the internet :-(

The internet is built on top of unreliable datagrams, which means the connectivity problem is even simpler. It satisfies the conditions of a Rearrangeably nonblocking Clos network. So the Big-O is even smaller than the above networking problem.

Clos wrote his paper specifically for phone connections. You cannot disconnect people for no reason while they're in the middle of a conversation. However, unreliable IP packets can be disconnected and rearranged, allowing you to use a cheaper form of the Clos network.

Either way, (like my professor from half a decade ago...), I'm going to leave the asymptotic complexity of "Strict Clos networks" and "Rearrangeably nonblocking CLOS networks" as an exercise up to the reader.

Mostly because I don't remember the solution... As a hint, replace the crossbar switches (in the wikipedia page) with a recursive Clos network and solve for the Recurrence relation. Use a 2x2 crossbar as the base case.

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

#222

Post by tim333 »

Verizon denies it to the Washington post:

"We treat all traffic equally, and that has not changed," the statement read. "Many factors can affect the speed of a customer’s experience for a specific site, including that site’s servers, the way the traffic is routed over the Internet and other considerations. We are looking into this specific matter, but the company representative was mistaken. We’re going to redouble our representative education efforts on this topic."

Although in the comments there's a guy who differs:

"Chris Walsh wrote: Verizon is absolutely doing this, at least in Silver Spring. I stumbled on the daveblog's post via a facebook friend and was amazed because if finally explains what has happened to my home FIOS connection over the last few weeks, even down to the exact 40 kbps speed. ..."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/02/05...

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

#223

Post by NoPiece »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #168
lrem wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is, it's not even close to doubling. I recently exchanged my 30Mbps ADSL to a 100Mbps fiber. In practice this means a jump from 0.8Mbps (yay long copper links!) to 50Mbps, which is most probably limited by the core. Thus, for vast residential areas (this is near the center of a 80k people town in a metro are of about a million), we are talking about multiplying the last mile by a factor of roughly 100x.

Ask yourself whether that ISP allowing speeds to languish for more than a decade such that they provide one ~100x increase instead of six or seven generations of ~2x increases has made their total costs lower or higher. The fact that they've been screwing over their customers to save a buck for a long time is not a thing that should inspire sympathy for their expenditures.

What are the 6 or 7 generations of upgrades that you think should have been implemented between 30mbs ADSL and 100mbps fiber?

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

#224

Post by talmand »

chwahoo wrote: post #198
talmand wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see it more as an opportunity for more VPN services. I can imagine the ads proclaiming something along the lines of getting the bandwidth you're already paying for.

Those VPN services better pony up to Verizon then. ;)

Yeah, I suppose that's true.

Maybe there's something in the transition to IPv6 that might help with this? But then I guess they could do the opposite and throttle everything but what's on their ransom list.

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

#225

Post by AnthonyMouse »

sologoub wrote: post #217
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Peak load is what you have to design capacity for, but that is hardly unique to Netflix. They seem to have it sorted for FiOS/U-verse/etc, don't they? The argument they might make is that their services keep the data closer to the users, but that's such a cop out. They could do the same thing for Netflix with transparent proxies if they wanted to (but the result would be to make Netflix more usable instead of less, w…

It sounds like what we need is the equivalent of local loop unbundling for internet services: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local-loop_unbundling In the UK, I believe the main practice revolves around broadband, whereas in US it's all around phone (VoIP or otherwise). If you could enable competition within the same last mile service, you'd a)give a definite incentive to make sure the entire network delivers the best e…

What we really need is the equivalent of Glass-Steagall for internet services. Prohibit the company that operates the last mile from owning or being owned by anybody that offers end-to-end connectivity or over the top services to end users.

The problem with just local loop unbundling is that the last mile provider has the incentive to favor their own services. They can operate their own ISP division at a loss or with zero margins (more than made up for by profits in the last mile division) which disadvantages competitors who have to lease the last mile and thereby maintains the status quo of no competition.

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

#226

Post by talmand »

dreamdu5t wrote: post #214
dalore wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't ISP's in the USA get a whole bunch of money in the past from the government to improve infrastructure but they didn't which now led to the current state of USA not being an internet leader?

Telcos got subsidies in the form of tax breaks to improve infrastructure. They spent their own money though. They talked about wiring America with fiber when trying to get the subsidies through congress, so that's why people claim they didn't live up to their "bargain." Today this has been twisted into a false narrative: "the teclos got paid 200 billion to build fiber and never did".

To be fair, often politicians will refer to tax breaks as a cost, as in lost revenues, to the Treasury as if something was paid out. It's common enough that it's understandable about the confusion of what the narrative actually means.

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

#227

Post by AnthonyMouse »

NoPiece wrote: post #223
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ask yourself whether that ISP allowing speeds to languish for more than a decade such that they provide one ~100x increase instead of six or seven generations of ~2x increases has made their total costs lower or higher. The fact that they've been screwing over their customers to save a buck for a long time is not a thing that should inspire sympathy for their expenditures.

What are the 6 or 7 generations of upgrades that you think should have been implemented between 30mbs ADSL and 100mbps fiber?

What 100x performance difference do you think exists between 30Mbps ADSL and 100Mbps fiber?

The answer is that there exists a box that mounts on a telephone pole. The purpose of the box is to terminate hundreds/thousands of DSL lines and connect them all to the central office with a single fiber optic cable. It allows you to get 30Mbps out of your 30Mbps DSL instead of getting .8Mbps, because the box is close enough to your house to get full speed unlike the central office. It saves the phone company from having to string a new strand of fiber to the premises of every individual customer who lives too far away from the central office for high speeds over twisted pair copper.

The first generation would have been actually installing the boxes, which they apparently never even did. Then you periodically upgrade the boxes to provide faster speeds as the technology improves and/or the cost comes down, e.g. from 1.5Mbps DSL to 3Mbps to 6Mbps to 12Mbps etc.

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

#228

Post by gnoway »

Fogest wrote: post #77
lucb1e wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Fiber is the worst idea ever. You know this company makes the vast majority of its income through advertising and collecting data about you, right? I understand that it's a great service for a great price, but the question is how long that remains sustainable. Right now they're sitting on such a pile of money that it doesn't matter whether they provide internet access in a few cities at a super cheap price. Th…

They would be stupid to allow servers. Buy your own business line if you want that. Google doesn't want others losing bandwidth because some people want to run servers.

The prohibition on servers has very little to do with network bandwidth. It has a lot to do with people bandwidth - overhead associated with support, security and compliance.

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

#229

Post by awakeasleep »

kylemaxwell wrote: post #184
awakeasleep wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people get confused by the Startup rule of Descriptive Speech which states that all growth is exponential, all interfaces are gorgeous, and all teams are composed of A players.

And all design is beautiful.

Breathtaking is the 2014 beautiful.

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

#230

Post by pikachu_is_cool »

jusben1369 wrote: post #211
pikachu_is_cool wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had no idea someone could be this naive. WE'RE AT THE MERCY OF AN OLIGOPOLY. THEY HAVE MEETINGS BEHIND CLOSED DOORS TO COLLECTIVELY RAISE THEIR PRICES AND PROVIDE MINIMUM SERVICE. THEY CAN FUCK US AS MUCH AS THEY WANT, AND WE CAN'T DO SHIT BECAUSE THERE ISN'T ANY COMPETITION. THERE ISN'T ANY COMPETITION BECAUSE THE BARRIER TO ENTRY FOR A NEW ISP IS SO HIGH THAT IT IS LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE; EXCEPT FOR COMPANIES WITH…

oh my all caps on HN. I guess there really is no where safe on the Internet.

Sorry, man.
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