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Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

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Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#291

Post by mynameisvlad »

notdonspaulding wrote: post #210
toomuchtodo wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excellent question. Anything that doesn't have a natural monopoly. I can say with certainty that the following should be socialized or delivered in non-profit ways: * Water * Sewer * Power * Internet * Healthcare * Fire * Police * Roads * Education (added per /u/CodeMage) Feel free to chime in if you can add anything I forgot.

Education, Police, Fire, Healthcare do not have natural monopolies. Still a good list to have around so we can argue about where the line should be drawn. Kudos!

I'd definitely argue that Police and Fire have natural monopolies. It's definitely more efficient for one agency to manage the entire police force for a city, rather than having multiple. Imagine having cops from 5 different services go out to one call, possibly mistaking the others for an armed civilian. You can see where that would lead, given how trigger happy some cops are already. Imagine 5 different fire trucks arriving at a scene. They wouldn't have enough space to do their job with all the others around them. Keeping track of the people at both of these scenes is also nearly impossible with several forces (and it's critical to know who's in the burning building or who's armed in a crime scene.)

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#292

Post by flavor8 »

massysett wrote: post #280
flavor8 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, same here. I was watching a movie on Roku/Netflix 6 weeks or so ago. Quality was 2* (out of 4, meaning OK, but visible encoding artifacts now and again) and yet it still fell back to the buffering screen 8 times in 30 minutes. I got fed up and rented the same movie on Amazon (still on Roku) and watched it in HD without a single instance of buffering. After it was done I switched back to Netflix and tried to wat…

Funny how Amazon works fine but Netflix doesn't, yet the groupthink here blames Verizon rather than Netflix.

Note that I said "somewhere in the Netflix -> Verizon connection".

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#293

Post by Natsu »

josh2600 wrote: post #54
Arjuna wrote: post #46

Awesome response to the C&D, via spokesman Jonathan Friedland: "This is about consumers not getting what they paid for from their broadband provider. We are trying to provide more transparency, just like we do with the ISP Speed Index, and Verizon is trying to shut down that discussion."

Playing Devil's advocate here for a second: If Netflix is 35% of global internet traffic at peak capacity (as per the Akamai CEO's comments at a number of events), is it really fair to treat them like every other company? That is to say, if Netflix is really the sole driver of Network upgrades, why does Verizon have to subsidize their costs of business? I'm not taking the stance that this is correct, only querying as…

> if Netflix is really the sole driver of Network upgrades, why does Verizon have to subsidize their costs of business?

Verizon is paying to provide its own customers with what they want (speed that enables access to Netflix and other entertainment), not to subsidize Netflix.

Netflix pays its for its own high-speed internet access already. Verizon offers high-speed access and then doesn't pay for it. Therein lies the conflict.

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#294

Post by fekberg »

sliverstorm wrote: post #277
fekberg wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The traffic exchange would only occur once a customer routing data over a Verizon network uses Netflix, no? Meaning that the 35% of the Verizon network usage that Netflix uses, is due to customers actually using the connection they pay for, no? As an ISP, I think if you are offering 100Mbps unlimited in/out, you should Expect full thrust from every connection, or at least be capable of delivering that. I know it's no…

Do you have any idea what internet service would cost if they built every node to handle 100% of the Internet's traffic?

Hence why I said "I know it's not really realistic". To answer your question though, I have no idea. Do you? I'd love to know what an ISP builds to expect in the terms of constant traffic..

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#296

Post by res0nat0r »

res0nat0r wrote: post #240
dkhenry wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is going under the false assumption that when I bought bandwidth from my ISP they didn't _really_ need to provide me with that bandwidth for realzies. This isn't netflix driving network upgrades this is Verizon customers driving network upgrades. If VZ didn't promise the customers the bandwidth they wouldn't need to upgrade their backhaul to provide it. I mean it would be like Verizon wireless charging apple to…

This is a two way street. Verizon customers are demanding content from Netflix. Peering agreements are based on a mutual benefit, in that both sides will use relatively the same amount of bandwidth. Now the bandwidth usage is lopsided towards Netflix, and Verizon is stating this is no longer a mutually beneficial relationship.

Sorry this perfectly valid and relevant quote is being down voted. Disagreeing with the hive mind on HN has consequences now days unfortunately.

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#297

Post by nitrogen »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #250
icambron wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If Netflix is 35% of global internet traffic at peak capacity (as per the Akamai CEO's comments at a number of events), is it really fair to treat them like every other company? I don't see why not. I think it might make more sense to think of it as streaming video, the category of goods, rather than Netflix, the company. So 35% of global internet traffic is people streaming videos. And who cares that it's video; fr…

To your last point, the problem with a subscription service (any subscription service) is that the more it's used, the less its profit margins. A company that is subscription based actually has an interest in their customers using the service as little as possible . It's completely backward (see: gyms, insurance, etc.) The only way to incentivize a company to provide the best service possible is to tie the use of the…

$2/GB

That's a ridiculously high price. You'd pay $2 for every hour of streaming-quality HD video watched, quite a bit more for download-quality HD.

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#298

Post by nitrogen »

sliverstorm wrote: post #155
icambron wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If Netflix is 35% of global internet traffic at peak capacity (as per the Akamai CEO's comments at a number of events), is it really fair to treat them like every other company? I don't see why not. I think it might make more sense to think of it as streaming video, the category of goods, rather than Netflix, the company. So 35% of global internet traffic is people streaming videos. And who cares that it's video; fr…

What if Comcast's network is built around the idea that traffic is exchanged relatively equally? They put in gigabit switches everywhere, a nice fair balanced network. Then Netflix comes along, and suddenly 35% of Comcast's customer traffic is all going to a handful of Netflix DSNs? Suddenly Comcast has to redo the whole connection. They have to buy top-shelf hardware just for Netflix. I don't know if this has happen…

What if Comcast's network is built around the idea that traffic is exchanged relatively equally? They put in gigabit switches everywhere, a nice fair balanced network.

Consumer ISPs have never expected symmetric bandwidth. If they had, they would sell us 50/50 connections instead of 50/10 or 50/2.

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#299

Post by mwfunk »

massysett wrote: post #283

This is exactly why I dropped Netflix. I want a high-def movie, not their whining about someone else's network. I have no problems streaming from Amazon. I have a choice of streamers. Other streamers work better. I have less choice of wired ISPs and they're harder to switch. Netflix would rather whine and preserve its profit margins than pay up. OK, fine, but since their whining does not get me the movie I want, I cu…

You are paying your ISP to move bytes to and from your home. It doesn't matter where those bytes come from or go to; you are paying for that bandwidth. It's already paid for. You either get that bandwidth per your agreement with them or you don't.

It's not like Netflix is causing you to magically download more bytes. You chose to do this, and that's fine, because that's what you're paying your ISP for. Comcast, et al want to double-dip on this transaction and you should be extremely not OK with that. Why wouldn't the ISPs do the exact same thing to Amazon that they did to Netflix as soon as they become a big enough target and the legal precedent has been established? This is something that needs to be nipped in the bud, like NOW, before this becomes an established way for ISPs to do business.

Also, it's not like all of your favorite services that will someday be paying Comcast protection money not to throttle them are just going to swallow those costs. Those costs will get passed on to you one way or another. No good can possibly come out of any of this.

Re: Netflix replies to Verizon cease and desist letter

#300

Post by aaronchriscohen »

josh2600 wrote: post #54
Arjuna wrote: post #46

Awesome response to the C&D, via spokesman Jonathan Friedland: "This is about consumers not getting what they paid for from their broadband provider. We are trying to provide more transparency, just like we do with the ISP Speed Index, and Verizon is trying to shut down that discussion."

Playing Devil's advocate here for a second: If Netflix is 35% of global internet traffic at peak capacity (as per the Akamai CEO's comments at a number of events), is it really fair to treat them like every other company? That is to say, if Netflix is really the sole driver of Network upgrades, why does Verizon have to subsidize their costs of business? I'm not taking the stance that this is correct, only querying as…

Just imagine that you had more than one choice of high speed Internet provider (unlike 95% of Americans who are stuck with the one cable company that happened to successfully bribe their local municipality) and think about what would happen to this issue. Competition would force the ISPs to knock this shit off. It's a product of their entrenched geographic monopolies. Period.
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