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Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

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Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#271

Post by elithrar »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #97

There is an interesting unbalance because Comcast has so much leverage by owning the last mile, they can push around Tier 1 providers. I'd like to fix that, mostly by creating a public policy around municipally owned Layer 1 infrastructure between customers in their cities and a city exchange building. Conceptually it would be no different than the city owning the sewers and outsourcing the water treatment plant to a…

> by creating a public policy around municipally owned Layer 1 infrastructure between customers in their cities and a city exchange building. Conceptually it would be no different than the city owning the sewers and outsourcing the water treatment plant to a contractor (or two). Creating a new "ISP" would involve installing equipment in the City Exchange(s), providing compatible customer premises equipment to subscribers, and then patching their 'port' at the City Exchange to the ISP's gear.

This is precisely what we're attempting to do in Australia with the National Broadband Network—with the delays, technical changes and cost estimating issues you'd expect from a project that's survived across two federal governments.

NBNCo installs the fibre, the termination devices, the optical splitters, and brings it back to a POI where ISPs then bring in their own transit or purchase backhaul capacity from NBNCo (as needed).

It also, in my view, makes the critical process of engaging local councils, utilities, and ripping up roads, footpaths and driveways much more 'palatable' to the average householder, because it's seen as a public infrastructure project and not as a private organisation expanding their 'own' reach (even if it would achieve the same end goal).

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#272

Post by danielweber »

rosser wrote: post #186
zokier wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is that we're not starting from scratch But actually we did have an opportunity to reboot last-mile networks from scratch, because FTTx is essentially all-new network.

And FTTx could be done at considerably lower cost, if we simply had the will to do it, and the patience to leverage existing work. For example, last week, they were tearing up the street in front of my building to put in new sewer lines. I don't even want to speculate what that might have cost. But now that the work is done, to lay fibre, they'll have to do it again . If, instead, they'd said, "Well, while we're here…

You think people who tear up the street to put in sewers have never thought "hey, while we are at it, let's build some conduit down here and then sell that?"

I know they literally work on sewers, but they aren't dumb. They understand their business better than random people on the Internet do.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#273

Post by gph »

runeks wrote: post #267
gph wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I would venture the guess that the price you pay per megabit has decreased. For me personally or on average? I'm a heavy usage user, but most my neighbors pay the same as me for using a lot less. My grandparents have basically the same service as me and all they use it for is email, some web games, and the occasional VOIP call and video. Considering that nowadays almost everyone has high-speed unlimited plans for th…

I can't speak for you, of course, but 10 years ago my parents paid more for a 256kbit/256kbit DSL connection than I pay now for a 35mbit/5mbit connection now. My (parents') connection back in 2003 (256/256 Kbit/s for 395 DKK per month): http://web.archive.org/web/20040604100538/http://www.cyberci... My connection now (35/5 Mbit for 279 DKK per month): http://www.fullrate.dk/privat/bredbaand/priser That's 7.97 DKK per…

That's all bandwidth, not total data usage. I'm talking about price per actual megabit transmitted by the ISPs. It's not like you actually do 35/5 mbps every second of the day for the entire month.

I'm in an east coast city in the US. I remember having had maybe 5/1 mbps 10 years ago. I wasn't paying the bills but I'm pretty sure it was like $50 per month from the TV commercials. Now I've got 25/10 for closer to $70 per month. Bandwidth wise it's risen a bit, but not really that much. Course I'm pulling down a lot more megabits per month in streaming content (though I was big into Napster/Torrents back then).

But my point was that most people have upgraded to broadband from dial-up even if they don't really use it that much. Only the ISPs would really have the data, but I'd be surprised if the cost per megabit transmitted for them has gone up dramatically.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#274

Post by bsimpson »

CalRobert wrote: post #15
bsimpson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google's ability to print money in conjunction with its generally high PR ratings give it the cache to take on a project like fiber. I can't imagine it's cheap or easy to lay fiber if you don't have substantial financial backing as well as a political goal you're trying to achieve. That said, I've used both Sonic.net and MonkeyBrains here in San Francisco. Never had to rely on a major ISP in this town, and I like it…

I was unaware these problems were addressed with a large cache. It's a good thing Google has sufficient cachet to persuade public officials to work with them, though!

Please excuse the typo.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#275

Post by Angostura »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #97

There is an interesting unbalance because Comcast has so much leverage by owning the last mile, they can push around Tier 1 providers. I'd like to fix that, mostly by creating a public policy around municipally owned Layer 1 infrastructure between customers in their cities and a city exchange building. Conceptually it would be no different than the city owning the sewers and outsourcing the water treatment plant to a…

Sorry to be dense, but it is not quite clear to me how ownership of the last mile affords such leverage. It would seem that if you need to buy bandwidth for end users, you would be negotiating transit like anyone else - I'm clearly missing something.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#276

Post by lugg »

wtallis wrote: post #269
exelius wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do we know that wired broadband is even the answer? Wouldn't wireless connectivity be more attractive if the goal is social justice? Many lower-income homes don't own a PC, and at this point they probably never will. How attractive is a home PC to you if all you've ever known are smartphones? Wired broadband, to me, is more of an entertainment consumption platform. Wireless serves the needs of low-bandwidth infor…

The laws of physics prohibit wireless from serving current needs in an urban density. It's not a solution for the future.

Are you able to expand? I tend to agree but dont really know why or what / where the physical limits are. Is it the 4g etc tech that can't perform with real load or WiFi that will fall over? Is a mesh network an answer?

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#277

Post by randuser »

diminoten wrote: post #52
fooqux wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Also, dropped packets isn't the end of the world. In TCP at least, the packets just get resent. Depends on what the application is, and how many are being dropped. True, standard HTTP can in theory even still work with 99% drop rate (if you're willing to wait long enough) but Netflix, multiplayer games, and any other application you can think of that demands either high-bandwidth or low-latency aren't going to work.…

Streaming services utilize a buffer, so no , it isn't the end of the world if packets are dropped. The buffer gets used while the packets get retransmitted. As for multiplayer games, most use UDP, and the ones that use TCP tend to use some tricks that allow for a certain amount of latency. This is why the Internet isn't currently down, even though this is currently a problem. No widely used Internet-based technology…

I have problems using myfreecams.com for live adult video chat because of the high rate of packets being dropped.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#278

Post by mbell »

exelius wrote: post #159
ChuckMcM wrote: post #97

There is an interesting unbalance because Comcast has so much leverage by owning the last mile, they can push around Tier 1 providers. I'd like to fix that, mostly by creating a public policy around municipally owned Layer 1 infrastructure between customers in their cities and a city exchange building. Conceptually it would be no different than the city owning the sewers and outsourcing the water treatment plant to a…

This is how it should probably be done if we were starting from scratch. A system like the one you describe would cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $300-500 billion; which isn't completely insane as far as national infrastructure projects go. The problem is that we're not starting from scratch. It's a lot harder for the government to justify that expense when there are a number of viable privately-owned alternati…

> if you had $500 billion to spend and you had to choose between overhauling the nation's education system (which desperately needs it) and providing better Internet access to people, which would you choose?

I don't think that is a hard choice at all. I've see what happens when the government tries to 'overhaul the education system', and it isn't pretty. I'd rather they stay out of that market and leave it to the local governments. Laying fiber on the other hand, that they may be able to accomplish.

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#279

Post by vertex-four »

diminoten wrote: post #239
Jtsummers wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

L3 is not the provider, Netflix is the provider. Netflix has chosen to contract with L3 so that their customers can receive the content. L3 is also an ISP and so has peering agreements with other ISPs. Netflix has customers who aren't using L3 as an ISP so L3 and these ISPs make use of their peering setup to transmit Netflix's content to the ISPs' customers. L3 is not pushing, the customers are pulling. The ISPs serv…

L3 is pushing to maintain its contract with Netflix. L3 is pushing, because L3 isn't the only CDN responsible for Netflix traffic. "Comcast" (it may not actually be Comcast and in fact I doubt it is given Netflix's recent agreement with Comcast) can just use Netflix's other CDNs, and traffic will continue to flow normally. L3 is not necessary here, and everyone who's actually involved knows it, including L3.

If Comcast can't handle the amount of data, how would using a different CDN help? Does the other CDN somehow send less data given exactly the same requests?

Or are you arguing that an ISP should be allowed to restrict which services people are allowed to access depending on how much those services pay the ISP?

Re: Level3 is without peer, now what to do?

#280

Post by mentat »

danielweber wrote: post #272
rosser wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And FTTx could be done at considerably lower cost, if we simply had the will to do it, and the patience to leverage existing work. For example, last week, they were tearing up the street in front of my building to put in new sewer lines. I don't even want to speculate what that might have cost. But now that the work is done, to lay fibre, they'll have to do it again . If, instead, they'd said, "Well, while we're here…

You think people who tear up the street to put in sewers have never thought "hey, while we are at it, let's build some conduit down here and then sell that?" I know they literally work on sewers, but they aren't dumb. They understand their business better than random people on the Internet do.

So please tell us, why is it not done? Contract provisions? Lack of profit?
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