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Comcast response to Netflix

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Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#51

Post by hanley »

clavalle wrote: post #34

I am surprised AT&T left the comment section open in their Public Policy Blog that this Comcast response links to: http://www.attpublicpolicy.com/consumers-2/who-should-pay-fo... They get raked over the coals (and rightly so, IMHO), by people pointing out that they already pay for their bandwidth, so why should they pay twice (once through AT&T and once through the costs Netflix would have to pass through to them). I…

Looks like Comcast left their comment section open too, although you have to scroll past the 2 large paragraphs of legal matters to get to the comments.

I thought it was interesting that they have more legal content than actual content on the post.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#52

Post by vonklaus »

Comcast gets paid IN 3 WAYS FOR THE SAME CONTENT, AT LEAST. 1. They get tax money to subsidize their infrastructure costs.

2. They sell the utility their infrastructure provides.

3. They sell the ability for content creators to create content, that they again sell to their users.

They get paid to build a distribution channel, and then charge people the ability to create and distribute content through their stream, then charge for the content. Also, they have no competitors.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#53

Post by _greim_ »

MichaelGG wrote: post #26
click170 wrote: post #4

You lost me at "No ISP in the country has been a stronger supporter of the Open Internet than Comcast" I'm sorry Comcast but if you can't fullfil our agreement (Internet access) then you aren't an ISP in my mind. I pay you for an Internet connection, not for the ability to send packets at someone else -- they get to respond to me as well, that's part of our deal.

And is Comcast supposed to wire up every server for free? If I stick up a box and slap on a 1Gbps uplink to some hosting company that only bought 100Mbps from Comcast, should Comcast now give my and my hoster free access because you decided to download a video file from my server?

If the ISP was a customer buying bandwidth from Comcast like anyone else, then Comcast has zero obligation to increase their bandwidth for free.

If the ISP is Comcast, then when you pay for that 1Gbps uplink, you are paying Comcast and you have a right to expect that your packets will be delivered at that rate.

If the ISP is a peer of Comcast, then it seems like when you pay that ISP, you ought to know the exact details of the agreements and bandwidth arrangements between the ISP and Comcast, and both parties ought to abide by that contract. I don't know enough details in this case to know whether that's what happened.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#54

Post by Aloha »

sbd wrote: post #39
dangrossman wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what's expected. What's expected is that you get what you pay for, whether you're a customer on the hosting end or the residential end. If you're paying your data center for 1Gbps, then they ought to have at least 1Gbps capacity to the major residential ISPs. If you're paying your residential ISP for 15Mbps, then they ought to have at least 15Mbps capacity to their peers. If there are 100 people trying to…

Unfortunately you don't buy an always open 15 Mbps pipe, you buy "15 Mbps peak speeds", or at least that's how it is worded for me. Which means at peak usage times you expect to get lower than 15 Mbps.

Which means deciding what an acceptable QoS is for those peak times - many of us think they decided too low - I personally think you should be able to get between 1/3 and 2/3rds (ideally around half) of 'peak' speeds on a sustained level at any time for any amount of time.

It's just like the telephone network of yore, no single trunk was ever capacitied to mothers day call traffic - there were reroutes, and more than one path to any large point, so you'd get a lower quality of service, but the traffic would still get thru.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#55

Post by AnthonyMouse »

MichaelGG wrote: post #30
srj wrote: post #22

"Internet interconnection has nothing to do with net neutrality; it’s all about Netflix wanting to unfairly shift its costs from its customers to all Internet customers, regardless of whether they subscribe to Netflix or not." Really it's Comcast's customers who are using Netflix and those customers are paying them for an X Mbps connection. I don't see what difference it makes if the data comes from Netflix or some o…

No it's not like that. You're sort of implying that Netflix/Cogent should get free peering with Comcast because subscribers want to access Netflix. With this logic, why should anyone have to pay for hosting bandwidth?

> With this logic, why should anyone have to pay for hosting bandwidth?

Because you still have to get the traffic from the datacenter to the peering point. That's what you're buying when you pay for hosting bandwidth -- transit. You're paying somebody to get the traffic to all the networks in the whole world.

The last mile provider isn't providing transit. You peer with them at their facility. The connection from their customers to their facility was paid for by their customers. The connection from their facility to yours is provided by you (or by the actual transit provider you paid). So what would you be paying them for?

It's nothing but a monopoly rent you have to pay because there is no other way to reach their customers.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#56

Post by betterunix »

sbd wrote: post #39
dangrossman wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what's expected. What's expected is that you get what you pay for, whether you're a customer on the hosting end or the residential end. If you're paying your data center for 1Gbps, then they ought to have at least 1Gbps capacity to the major residential ISPs. If you're paying your residential ISP for 15Mbps, then they ought to have at least 15Mbps capacity to their peers. If there are 100 people trying to…

Unfortunately you don't buy an always open 15 Mbps pipe, you buy "15 Mbps peak speeds", or at least that's how it is worded for me. Which means at peak usage times you expect to get lower than 15 Mbps.

It is worse than that. "15 Mbps peak speeds" is actually "15 Mbps bursts."

I am fine with getting less than my maximum speed; I understand that the connection is shared and that my neighbors' service can interfere with mine. TCP can deal with congestion. What grinds my gears is that ISPs are not content to sell me a maximum speed; they want to oversubscribe, then claim that they are selling burst service, then call it "unlimited super-awesome Internet!! 15Mbps!!" then penalize customers who fail to limit their use of the supposedly unlimited service.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#57

Post by conroe64 »

Comcast's stock is up over 250% over the last few years and has made me a lot of money... so whatever they've been doing has been working and IMO they should keep at it.

It's a dirty game and no one is completely clean, so we should all come down from our high horse. Fluid and evolving business strategies are not the devil's spawn that people make them out to be.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#58

Post by pedrocr »

Here's a suggestion on how to implement a fair interconnect market. The world's regulators designate a few physical locations as public interchange points governed by the following rules:

1) If you are an ISP you need to be present in all the interchange points of the geographical areas where you are licensed to operate in.

2) Any ISP can connect to any other ISP at those points with no charge.

3) Whenever an ISPs link is above 90% peak usage for X days he has to upgrade.

That way everyone pays their own way. If suddenly Comcast customers sign up for Netflix in droves both Netflix and Comcast need to invest to upgrade the links on their side of the interchange, Netflix because they're being paid for the streaming service, Comcast because they're being paid for internet service. If you can come to some other arrangement with interchange at some other point, more power to you, but to be an ISP you are obligated to interchange freely with anyone at these points.

What am I missing?

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#59

Post by Touche »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #55
MichaelGG wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No it's not like that. You're sort of implying that Netflix/Cogent should get free peering with Comcast because subscribers want to access Netflix. With this logic, why should anyone have to pay for hosting bandwidth?

> With this logic, why should anyone have to pay for hosting bandwidth? Because you still have to get the traffic from the datacenter to the peering point. That's what you're buying when you pay for hosting bandwidth -- transit. You're paying somebody to get the traffic to all the networks in the whole world. The last mile provider isn't providing transit. You peer with them at their facility. The connection from the…

You're paying for sending traffic one-way. Peering agreements are free when both sides are sending an equal amount of traffic to the other.

Re: Comcast response to Netflix

#60

Post by lern_too_spel »

naviwins wrote: post #38
togasystems wrote: post #5

What are other examples of companies that have agreements with Comcast?

Google, Microsoft, Twitch, all directly peer with Comcast. They are willing to do this because the transit providers can not handle their traffic efficiently. So why is Netflix complaining?

Netflix isn't complaining about peering directly. That's exactly what they want. They're complaining because according to anybody with common sense, that peering should be settlement-free.
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