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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?

#371

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

femto wrote: post #330
yaddayadda wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, there is an Australian corporation, Macquarie Capitol Group, that may take over the administration of UTOPIA - http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/money/57282051-79/macquarie-uto...

Macquarie Capital isn't little known here. They are famous for being able to extract maximum fees from public infrastructure. If they live up to past form [1,2], they will turn UTOPIA into a river of gold, and the source of that river will be the customers. [1] http://www.smh.com.au/travel/blogs/travellers-check/the-true... [2] http://www.smh.com.au/business/macquaries-sydney-airport-pla...

I think we can fully expect that NBN Co. will be sold to some organisation or another just like this. That is the sort of thing the Australian government does with public assets.

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

#372

Post by yebyen »

pdonis wrote: post #294
yebyen wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure Netflix just paid Comcast, and maybe I'm not keeping up with the issues as they arise and I'm really uninformed about the current state of things, but if Level3 is still having a dispute with Comcast, and Comcast blames Level3's actions on Netflix just because they need to blame someone who their customers will recognize... Forget about the gigundous case for libel Netflix would have against Comcast o…

> I'm pretty sure Netflix just paid Comcast They most certainly did; and what's more, the transit provider Netflix was using prior to paying Comcast was, IIRC, Cogent, not Level3.

So, then this whole idea that Level3 is the only one having problems with these five last-mile ISPs is bunk? Level3's wikipedia page still says they deliver Netflix. Now you're saying they don't even host Netflix. What are Level3's other major clients? I have to imagine there are bigger fish than Apple/iTunes (maybe I'm all wet), they are the only other major client mentioned on the wiki page.

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

#373

Post by toomuchtodo »

talmand wrote: post #361
toomuchtodo wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Although eminent domain is an interesting argument, not that I agree with it necessarily. Why? Public funding and a government-granted monopoly were the reasons local ILECs have the power they do; they'd be given fair value for their gear in the ground.

Well, my feeling on the matter stems from the fact that eminent domain is an incredibly powerful tool that can potentially disrupt a large number of people's lives. Like all such powerful government tools it is easily abused. It is especially terrible when it is abused because it essentially, and legally, removes people's property rights. Many think property rights are a cornerstone to personal freedom. Essentially,…

> I would rather they remove the government-granted monopoly to open competition and perform an audit to make sure the company fulfilled their part of the bargain in receiving public funds. If they fail the audit, request the money back.

We are in agreement then.

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

#374

Post by exelius »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #366
exelius wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It all depends how much bandwidth you need for a given use case. For most use cases other than video, existing wireless technologies are sufficient and will only continue to improve as things like beam shaping and micro cells become more prevalent. Wireless is easier to deploy and as its use grows, more spectrum will likely open up. Free markets have the benefit of deploying scarce resources where they are most in de…

> For most use cases other than video, existing wireless technologies are sufficient and will only continue to improve as things like beam shaping and micro cells become more prevalent. Excluding today's most demanding use case doesn't get you anywhere. If you need a wired connection for that then you need a wired connection. The installed base of smartphones and tablets is still growing significantly and that's goin…

> The cost to maintain fiber is not materially different than the cost to maintain copper.

You're right; and costs to maintain copper run about 5-10% of initial costs PER YEAR. Physical networks with lots of endpoints are very expensive to maintain.

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

#375

Post by thedufer »

diminoten wrote: post #238
thedufer wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It sounds like Level3 wants to enter into bigger-money contracts with the ISPs As the article points out, peering rarely involves money (and shouldn't ever; as the word peer implies, its a largely symmetric relationship). The ISPs' customers are paying the ISPs for bandwidth and then requesting traffic. Level3 is providing said traffic and then the ISP drops it because they don't have enough bandwidth. How can a re…

If Level3 can't give Netflix what it promised Netflix it would deliver, maybe Netflix should use a different CDN. Other CDNs aren't having this problem, because they're willing to work with the ISPs.

Yes, let's encourage people to pay ransoms. That's going to end in a rational system.

Netflix switching would, in the short term, give them more bandwidth. In the long term, encouraging ransoms will cause them to go up and Netflix will be forced to keep raising their prices. This is exactly what Netflix does not want to happen, and they are wisely refusing to play ball.

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

#376

Post by sounds »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #321
exelius wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> Fiber optics are awesome now; but what happens in 10 years when we need a new type of quantum fiber made from carbon nanotubes to go faster? Fiber optics are awesome now. Fiber optics were awesome in the 2000s, and the 90s, and the 80s, and the 70s... Quantum fiber isn't a thing. Nobody has even proposed anything to replace fiber with and copper has lasted more than a hundred years. You can get Tbps out of fiber so…

Thanks for saying this!

It's worth pointing out the economic benefit to whoever invents the Next Big Thing -- if they make it compatible with existing conduit, it can just be pulled through replacing existing infrastructure.

It turns out the only irreplaceable part is the tubes.

Think datacenters, high density offices and apartments, Level 3's long haul links, etc. They will all be looking for a way to pull Next Big Thing like it was fiber.

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

#377

Post by driverdan »

mattmcknight wrote: post #77
signet wrote: post #6

If a customer is paying for an internet connection, they are paying for access the full internet, to the best of their ISP's abilities. This is the net neutrality law we need: ISPs should be compelled to upgrade their backbone links as they become congested, to satisfy their customer's demand. Congestion can be easily monitored and often these peerings are "free". (Yes there is a non-zero cost to increase switch and…

We probably need pricing more directly based on bandwidth consumed, maybe with peak hour pricing, as opposed to just based on "speed" with high bandwidth caps.

Metered ISPs would be fine if the prices were reasonable, something comparable to data center bandwidth pricing. The problem is that they want to charge unreasonable prices.

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

#378

Post by AnthonyMouse »

exelius wrote: post #374
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For most use cases other than video, existing wireless technologies are sufficient and will only continue to improve as things like beam shaping and micro cells become more prevalent. Excluding today's most demanding use case doesn't get you anywhere. If you need a wired connection for that then you need a wired connection. The installed base of smartphones and tablets is still growing significantly and that's goin…

> The cost to maintain fiber is not materially different than the cost to maintain copper. You're right; and costs to maintain copper run about 5-10% of initial costs PER YEAR. Physical networks with lots of endpoints are very expensive to maintain.

> You're right; and costs to maintain copper run about 5-10% of initial costs PER YEAR. Physical networks with lots of endpoints are very expensive to maintain.

We already have physical networks. Maintaining them is a fixed cost.[1] You can't eliminate it because you can't reasonably expect to replace the entirety of Cable TV and U-verse with cellular, so the money might as well be going to maintain fiber rather than copper.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_cost

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

#380

Post by pdonis »

diminoten wrote: post #369
pdonis wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Other CDNs aren't having this problem, because they're willing to work with the ISPs. Do we know this?

You asked this question in like 3 places, but yes, if you read the blog post written by Level3, you'll see them mention that other backbone providers are making deals with the ISPs, but that they're refusing to.

> if you read the blog post written by Level3, you'll see them mention that other backbone providers are making deals with the ISPs, but that they're refusing to

Where in Level3's blog post does it say this? I'm not seeing it. Certainly at least one other transit provider, Cogent, doesn't seem to be making ISP deals; if it did, the Netflix-Comcast deal wouldn't have happened

(Also, in the post I was responding to in this subthread, you said CDN's, not transit providers. They're not the same.)

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