NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] "There's something rotten in the state of online video streaming ..."
"There's something rotten in the state of online video streaming ..."
http://j.mp/1lfJmpP (Gigaom)
"That is the heart of the debate with issues such as the lack of
broadband competition at the last mile, and the possibility that ISPs
who have their own pay TV businesses have an interest in blocking
competing TV services just adds more complexity. The challenge is
proving that such slowdowns are happening, show where they are
happening and then have a debate about what should be done about this.
The data from M-Lab is a start, and if it can refine the data to
deliver proof of ISP wrongdoing, then the FCC should take it into
consideration."
- - -
A few thoughts on this article. The main one is that there are so many
moving parts in play that it's very hard to understand what's really
going on, despite valiant measurement attempts. There simply isn't
enough data to work with, coming from enough appropriate points in the
networks, and how to interpret the data that is available is more of
an art than a science.
At the moment, I have Time Warner Cable 100/5 service (no, that 5 is
not a typo -- the highest upstream speed you can get is currently 5
Mb/s!) In reality, I'm paying for far slower (downstream) service --
that is still grossly overpriced -- but various short-lived promotions
and moves by TWC to push up all the speed tiers have given me an
opportunity to experiment with 100/5 for a time.
The results are that generally, I get the promised speeds and more
(topping out at around 112/5.5 for systems on gigabit interfaces and
sufficient horsepower, which isn't all of them around here). YouTube,
Netflix, and other streaming is almost always fine, even at so-called
"HD" speeds.
But what does this really mean in terms of network quality between
here and any given point? Who knows? It's all empirical based on
minimal available information, and if performance suddenly dropped I'd
have little means to understand why that was occurring.
Leaving aside what dominant ISPs might do in the future to control and
compartmentalize Internet traffic -- an outcome that fills many
observers, including me, with considerable dread -- my working
assumption is that ISPs will avoid actually lying outright about what
they are doing (though there's always room for hedging in explanations
when we can't really see inside their networks in a useful way). So I
tend currently to largely discount the story about the Verizon
customer service rep cited in this piece. To me (based on what we know
right now) it sounds more like a confused first level rep trying to
agree with whatever the customer was asking, and who wouldn't be
expected to really know more about such matters at this point. We
shall see.
But the current overall situation regarding dominant ISPs' peering,
network management practices, and all the rest, is appalling and
untenable in terms of both transparency and decision-making
capabilities. We can't allow the critical infrastructure of the
Internet to be operated on the basis of mainly guesses and whistling
in the dark.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein (lauren@vortex.com): http://www.vortex.com/lauren
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility: http://www.pfir.org/pfir-info
Founder:
- Network Neutrality Squad: http://www.nnsquad.org
- PRIVACY Forum: http://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
Member: ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Google+: http://google.com/+LaurenWeinstein
Twitter: http://twitter.com/laurenweinstein
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800 / Skype: vortex.com
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