5 ms·

Do you have cites for throttling YouTube? That seems entirely terrible for retaining users.

rayiner 10y ago
I've never noticed any throttling on YouTube (I've had FiOS in Baltimore and now in D.C.). I get a rock solid 140 mbps on Netflix's fast.com, even during primetime. 140/170 on speedtest.com.
- cmdrfred 10y ago
  150 meg connection in Philly here. 155 mbps steady from fast.com and speed test both directions over WiFi. Not a single outage in a year.
rdtsc 10y ago
Other people apparently had (still have?) these issues: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/youtube/CPW7r7OY5Co https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/youtube/CPW7r... http://lifehacker.com/use-a-vpn-to-bypass-your-isps-throttling-of-netflix-or-1608538080 http://lifehacker.com/use-a-vpn-to-bypass-your-isps-throttli... You can search for more. While it could be a coincidence that somehow after switching poviders Youtube fixed their servers at the same time and got faster, I'd have to believe it was because of Verizon. Someone from a Verizon forum remember mentioned, defending them, it could have been Google not paying for peering with Verizon enough. But I consider that still Verizon's fault. I don't really care about the details, I was paying a hefty sum to Verizon for Internet connectivity and not getting it. However they setup their peering agreements is their problem, I pay to not have to know that.
monkmartinez 10y ago
Google "ISP throttle youtube"... it is not hard to imagine isp's doing this a few years ago. My perception of youtube buffering "all. the. time." wasn't that long ago. I am relatively certain Comcast was throttling at the time, but I don't think they are these days.
jballer 10y ago
Time Warner Cable in NC throttled it for me. I was only able to watch YouTube in HD through my school's VPN. How backwards is that?
dawnerd 10y ago
anecdotal but when I had fios they were doing some odd routing for youtube which made it appear that they were throttling, when in reality it was likely a bad peering agreement.
- kpil 10y ago
  As a consumer you sort of pay to get access to YouTube, Netflix etc. The money should flow from the carrier to the content providers, but they saw them initially as a nuisance and later as leechers, despite that they are essentially the product that the carriers are selling and getting paid for in the first place, and they are getting it for free.
tajen 10y ago
I can watch YouTube in real time with little latency and no buffeting on 3G. Any landline not matching that is a scam.
ma2rten 10y ago
You can check here: https://www.google.com/get/videoqualityreport/ https://www.google.com/get/videoqualityreport/
strider12 10y ago
Comcast throttled me. Basically in mid 2000's i paid about $60 for internet and no issues, then couple years ago i noticed severe throttling for youtube and other sites. Then I upgraded to their business class for about $110 a month for the same speeds and no throttling. They were playing games. It's BS.
- callalex 10y ago
  Using a VPN is a much cheaper solution with the same results, with the added bonus of less tracking from Comcast.
slv77 10y ago
Comcast and Verizion discovered they could use their monopoly position to sell both ends of the pipe. Comcast I know went through and systematically shut down private interchanges with major content providers and also refused to upgrade public peering points. There were some peering points that we're seeing 10%+ packet loss. The result was terrible performance to any provider who didn't buy "internet access" from Comcast even when the only access that was needed was to Comcast's own customers. A friend worked as a peering coordinator for a major content provider at the time and nobody had ever asked to be paid to deliver content to their own customers before. This created a standoff and I'm not sure how it ended but I believe the content providers caved. Of course I'm pretty sure this is what was the spurred Google Fiber. One thing that Google seems really good at is to ensure that nobody can use their monopoly position to cut them off from the customer (Android, Chrome, Fiber).
- hexane360 10y ago
  Yeah, Google is very good at vertical integration. Make sure it's competing a little in all areas. http://insidertestprep.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Vertical-and-Horizontal-Integration.png http://insidertestprep.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Vertic...

I've never noticed any throttling on YouTube (I've had FiOS in Baltimore and now in D.C.). I get a rock solid 140 mbps on Netflix's fast.com, even during primetime. 140/170 on speedtest.com.

cmdrfred 10y ago
150 meg connection in Philly here. 155 mbps steady from fast.com and speed test both directions over WiFi. Not a single outage in a year.

rdtsc 10y ago

Other people apparently had (still have?) these issues: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/youtube/CPW7r7OY5Co https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/youtube/CPW7r... http://lifehacker.com/use-a-vpn-to-bypass-your-isps-throttling-of-netflix-or-1608538080 http://lifehacker.com/use-a-vpn-to-bypass-your-isps-throttli... You can search for more. While it could be a coincidence that somehow after switching poviders Youtube fixed their servers at the same time and got faster, I'd have to believe it was because of Verizon. Someone from a Verizon forum remember mentioned, defending them, it could have been Google not paying for peering with Verizon enough. But I consider that still Verizon's fault. I don't really care about the details, I was paying a hefty sum to Verizon for Internet connectivity and not getting it. However they setup their peering agreements is their problem, I pay to not have to know that.

monkmartinez 10y ago

Google "ISP throttle youtube"... it is not hard to imagine isp's doing this a few years ago. My perception of youtube buffering "all. the. time." wasn't that long ago. I am relatively certain Comcast was throttling at the time, but I don't think they are these days.

jballer 10y ago

Time Warner Cable in NC throttled it for me. I was only able to watch YouTube in HD through my school's VPN. How backwards is that?

dawnerd 10y ago

anecdotal but when I had fios they were doing some odd routing for youtube which made it appear that they were throttling, when in reality it was likely a bad peering agreement.

kpil 10y ago
As a consumer you sort of pay to get access to YouTube, Netflix etc. The money should flow from the carrier to the content providers, but they saw them initially as a nuisance and later as leechers, despite that they are essentially the product that the carriers are selling and getting paid for in the first place, and they are getting it for free.

tajen 10y ago

I can watch YouTube in real time with little latency and no buffeting on 3G. Any landline not matching that is a scam.

ma2rten 10y ago

You can check here: https://www.google.com/get/videoqualityreport/ https://www.google.com/get/videoqualityreport/

strider12 10y ago

Comcast throttled me. Basically in mid 2000's i paid about $60 for internet and no issues, then couple years ago i noticed severe throttling for youtube and other sites. Then I upgraded to their business class for about $110 a month for the same speeds and no throttling. They were playing games. It's BS.

callalex 10y ago
Using a VPN is a much cheaper solution with the same results, with the added bonus of less tracking from Comcast.

slv77 10y ago

Comcast and Verizion discovered they could use their monopoly position to sell both ends of the pipe. Comcast I know went through and systematically shut down private interchanges with major content providers and also refused to upgrade public peering points. There were some peering points that we're seeing 10%+ packet loss. The result was terrible performance to any provider who didn't buy "internet access" from Comcast even when the only access that was needed was to Comcast's own customers. A friend worked as a peering coordinator for a major content provider at the time and nobody had ever asked to be paid to deliver content to their own customers before. This created a standoff and I'm not sure how it ended but I believe the content providers caved. Of course I'm pretty sure this is what was the spurred Google Fiber. One thing that Google seems really good at is to ensure that nobody can use their monopoly position to cut them off from the customer (Android, Chrome, Fiber).

hexane360 10y ago
Yeah, Google is very good at vertical integration. Make sure it's competing a little in all areas. http://insidertestprep.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Vertical-and-Horizontal-Integration.png http://insidertestprep.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Vertic...