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Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

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Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#131

Post by georgemcbay »

cmircea wrote: post #85
k-mcgrady wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "Many areas only have Comcast service!" Do a lot of people in the US only have access to one or two ISP's?? If so why? I'm in a not particularly urban part of Ireland and I can choose between at least 5 ISP's, decent speeds, and a good variety of prices.

You have to remember that, compared to the US, Ireland is tiny. The majority of the US population does not live in large urban areas, who while New York for example might have lots of choices, Spokane probably doesn't.

While this is true, it doesn't really explain the situation in the US, IMO, since the very populous urban centers here suffer as badly, if not more so, than the more rural areas.

If you live in a sparsely populated area the excuse is "well, it is expensive to wire you up because of distances". If you live in a densely populated area the excuse is "well, it costs a lot of money to put new infrastructure into a densely populated area".

In both cases, lots of other countries are managing to do both of those at far lower cost to the consumer than occurs here in the US. Ultimately the ISPs here in the US are just greedy, duopolistic fucks.

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#132

Post by valas »

ffk wrote: post #97
scelerat wrote: post #20

And so the precedent is set. This is the direction I see things going: For $70 a month from Comcast you can get Amazon, Google, and Facebook. For only $10 more a month you can add Netflix and Spotify. Want Pandora? Sorry, you'll have to switch to AT&T for that. The broadband providers are used to this type of packaged service given their history as cable television providers. It's how they make their money beyond pro…

The deal was a paid-peering deal, which would likely drive down Netflix costs. We don't have any information on whether net neutrality was harmed. Hopefully netflix will provide information on this. Peering is a practice where two sides agree to maintain their side of the infrastructure and not charge for metered bandwidth. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peering

Why do you think it would drive down Netflix costs?

In old world there were a dozen of "tier1" providers who would all peer with each other more or less settlement free. It is conceivable that one of these providers (I think it was Cogent in this case) was offering "low rates" to take Netflix traffic and deliver that traffic to Comcast over their settlement free peering. As traffic flow between Cogent and Comcast was increasing, Comcast refused to upgrade the interconnect to accommodate the flow. Then: links get hot, traffic gets dropped, customers complain, Netflix+Cogent asks Comcast to behave, Comcast offers to unblock the pipes via direct NetflixComcast peering for a "fee".

Now I don't know whether that "low rate" that Cogent was charging Netflix was lower than a "fee" that Comcast is charging. It might be that you are right and the fee overall reduced Netflix costs. What I do know however, is that Comcast is a monopoly and if unregulated, they can start extracting higher and higher rent from Netflix (or any other content provider for that sake).

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#133

Post by ffk »

null_ptr wrote: post #115
ffk wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The deal was a paid-peering deal, which would likely drive down Netflix costs. We don't have any information on whether net neutrality was harmed. Hopefully netflix will provide information on this. Peering is a practice where two sides agree to maintain their side of the infrastructure and not charge for metered bandwidth. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peering

Is it really peering in this case between Comcast and Netflix? How would Comcast leverage Netflix's infrastructure?

Comcast will likely get better customer retention, less service calls for higher quality netflix streams, a direct line to Netflix's core networking team to resolve problems, and a transfer of cash for the initial peering.

Comcast will also likely work with Netflix to estimate traffic growth and make sure their infrastructure scales before they have problems.

Again, we don't know the details of the deal. Assuming net neutrality was not damaged is also speculation. We need more information to know what is going on.

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#134

Post by SwellJoe »

tylermac1 wrote: post #117
philwelch wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's already the case if you want websites like ESPN3 or NBC Sports Live Extra.

You don't have to pay extra for those services though. They come with your cable subscription.

My cable subscription is "Internet". I do not have a cable television subscription, and have no desire to have one; even back when Comcast was offering cable TV for $1 added to the Internet price and seemed shocked that I wouldn't want it...I replied, "I don't have a TV. WTF would I do with it?"

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#135

Post by cdash »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #55
middleclick wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as I hate the ISPs, calling them terrorists is a bit too much.

It is too much to compare them to what terrorists do, but let's face it - this could lead to more damage to the internet than terrorists could ever do.

I don't know. The word terrorism already doesn't mean anything anymore thanks the government and media so I think it fits just fine.

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#136

Post by matthewmacleod »

nailer wrote: post #77
k-mcgrady wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "Many areas only have Comcast service!" Do a lot of people in the US only have access to one or two ISP's?? If so why? I'm in a not particularly urban part of Ireland and I can choose between at least 5 ISP's, decent speeds, and a good variety of prices.

Ireland and Britain enjoy better competition since they're a smaller area. Australia and the US OTOH are terrible since the population is so spread out (Australia's slightly better as the population is mainly coastal).

That's a cop-out. Services in the UK are either over the Virgin cable (HFC) network, or BT-owned copper/FTTC. The reason there's competition is a solid system of regulation which ensures fair and reasonable access to the infrastructure.

Re: Netflix Agrees to Pay Comcast to End Web Traffic Jam

#139

Post by zackmorris »

w1ntermute wrote: post #71

I refuse to play this game - I'm back to torrenting.

Or better yet, let someone else do the work for you:

http://watch32.com

I'm curious to see how this plays out because the endgame for the internet is free-fast-failsafe. I wonder how long it will take for companies to litigate themselves into irrelevance. I actually feel kind of bad for netflix in this case, because when you make a deal with the devil, he always wins, and I hate to see them go someday :-(

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