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Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

arstechnica.com

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Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#61

Post by noselasd »

epa wrote: post #2

While it may be true that there are some outstanding ISP issues that lead to slow internet, I think the more pressing issue is the behaviour of the new(ish) youtube player acting erratic. For instance, you cannot fully load a video anymore, it will only load a portion as you continue watching. If you wish to rewind the video, for some reason youtube will want you to rebuffer the entire from where you have rewinded to…

This is driving me crazy. I've only a 1mbit connection, so I frequently used to pre-buffer as much as possible of a video. And I could watch the video without hitches and pauses at a good quality as it was already downloaded.

Moreover, the little that is prebuffered seems to behave oddly, you skip forward well within the indicated area that have been buffered, yet the player seems to reset and start re-downloading that part -> unueably slow.

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#62

Post by bane »

Youtube was almost unwatchable on my 50/30 FiOS till I did this http://mitchribar.com/2013/02/how-to-stop-youtube-sucking-wi.... This completely transformed my youtube experience to one that's fine compared to waiting 10 minutes for a 1 minute 240p video to buffer enough I could watch it all the way through.

Now the only problems I have are with the semi-broken new player, fast forwards and rewinds are often broken, full screen doesn't always full screen etc.

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#63

Post by conradfr »

epa wrote: post #2

While it may be true that there are some outstanding ISP issues that lead to slow internet, I think the more pressing issue is the behaviour of the new(ish) youtube player acting erratic. For instance, you cannot fully load a video anymore, it will only load a portion as you continue watching. If you wish to rewind the video, for some reason youtube will want you to rebuffer the entire from where you have rewinded to…

I use the SmartVideo add-on.

It helped a lot, especially when YT was slow as hell on Free in France.

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#64

Post by IgorPartola »

As a temporary workaround I access YouTube over an IPv6 tunnel through Hurricane Electric. Since I set it up almost two years ago I have had no issues with YouTube. The only downside has been the IRS's quarterly tax site which seems to be misconfigured for IPv6 access but works if r over IPv4 (/etc/hosts FTW).

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#65

Post by jeroen »

saint-loup wrote: post #40
revelation wrote: post #12

This is just one of the many fights surrounding net neutrality. We desperately need to break up ISP monopolies and enact strict net neutrality regulation and bandwidth (even latency/routing) guarantees. The idea that a single ISP is in a position to charge both YouTube and its customers is bizarre. By any basic reasoning, an ISP that doesn't enable access to YouTube should be out of customers within a few months. Tha…

Google is publishing data on the quality of operators: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=e9krd11m38onf_&... Besides, one nitpick: the Google News story was in Belgium, not in France.

Actually, both:

Belgium http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-13/google-belgian-news...

France http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21302168

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#66

Post by crazysaem »

chii wrote: post #24
zanny wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This thing is amazing, thanks for the script link! My slow 1.5mbps Internet has had awful youtube experience since the player change. I have been downloading most of the videos directly to avoid using it.

how do you download the video? is it a browser plugin? I use chrome, and the old youtube downloader extension no longer works after their UI revamp (and the extension is no longer updated as far as i know).

Video-DownloadHelper[0] is also a good choice if you need to download videos often, and from different sources (e.g. blip.tv). However, it only works with Firefox. Jdownloader can also download Youtube Videos (and many others).

[0] https://addons.mozilla.org/de/firefox/addon/video-downloadhe...

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#67

Post by jlgaddis »

randomfool wrote: post #23
revelation wrote: post #12

This is just one of the many fights surrounding net neutrality. We desperately need to break up ISP monopolies and enact strict net neutrality regulation and bandwidth (even latency/routing) guarantees. The idea that a single ISP is in a position to charge both YouTube and its customers is bizarre. By any basic reasoning, an ISP that doesn't enable access to YouTube should be out of customers within a few months. Tha…

Your ISP wanting money to install caching servers for Netflix and YouTube is not something which has been covered ny net neutrality in the past. It would be great if there was a fixed colo fee for caching servers. That said, I pay my ISP for bandwidth and service. It's bullshit if they refuse free installation of caching servers which improves my service and frees up upstream bandwidth for others.

FWIW, if Netflix agrees to install one of their appliances in your network, they do it completely free of charge.

If you don't meet their requirements (which are based upon average aggregate traffic levels), you can't even pay them to get one.

If your ISP meets the requirements and is refusing, well, it's their own damn fault -- they're simply wasting money.

Personally, I am happy to peer with anyone with whom I share a presence, even if they're an "eyeball network" like me and we'd only be passing a few megabits of traffic.

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#68

Post by jaynos »

Qantourisc wrote: post #45

The internet used to be ran by engineers. Now it's ran by suits ... The former does what needs to be done, and all pitch in to move traffic. Suits on the other hand only see $$$. As for the suits: either your are overselling your bandwidth and you don't have enough money to make the necessary changes REGARDLESS of where the traffic is going/coming from. Or your just being greedy ! To fight this, I think it's best to…

Not sure if that last part will work. I can definitely see Comcast allowing speed test to work to it's fullest and then buffering youtube and other sites where performance matters.

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#69

Post by jlgaddis »

revelation wrote: post #12

This is just one of the many fights surrounding net neutrality. We desperately need to break up ISP monopolies and enact strict net neutrality regulation and bandwidth (even latency/routing) guarantees. The idea that a single ISP is in a position to charge both YouTube and its customers is bizarre. By any basic reasoning, an ISP that doesn't enable access to YouTube should be out of customers within a few months. Tha…

> The idea that a single ISP is in a position to charge both YouTube and its customers is bizarre.

Some even go a step further, inspecting unencrypted HTTP traffic and replacing referrer IDs and such on advertisement links (e.g. links to Amazon).

Re: Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make and break online video

#70

Post by hobs »

kibibu wrote: post #44
justinmk wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "public" doesn't own anything. You can demonstrate that by trying to sell your share of the thing you supposedly own.

I'm not allowed to sell my own body parts, does this mean they're not mine?

Depends on where and who you ask. There are definitely people who will take your body parts in sale. (Think iPhone craze + China and remember back to people selling kidneys.)
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