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Carriers must be having such a wonderful time with this new FCC. Uhhh unlimited but it'll never be fast! Uhhh we can re-encode your video, unless it's streamed

by atonse 9y ago

Carriers must be having such a wonderful time with this new FCC. Uhhh unlimited but it'll never be fast! Uhhh we can re-encode your video, unless it's streamed from Verizon (you know this part's coming...), deal with it! Can't wait for VPN technology to become more widespread, so we can keep these crooks from altering our traffic.

shedlight 9y ago
What do you mean by "new FCC" and what do they have to do with it? Also, was the old unlimited truly unlimited in all ways? If so, how can every single customer of any company actually get unlimited data, all the time without unlimited hardware appearing from nowhere and radio wave spectrum that expands to unlimited use for unlimited people?
- shedlight 9y ago
  Seeing down votes but no comments? This is why Reddit beats HN in every single way.
- awinder 9y ago
  New FCC refers to the party switch in the WH changing the FCC voting commissioner makeup from 3D-2R nominees to 2D-3R. The old plans and the new plans both defined “unlimited” as a number of GB of full speed which could degrade after so much use, so that’s never been at issue. That was a usage plan but the network traffic was not treated differently (or wasn’t supposed to be). Now the plans also perform content-based network degradation at all times, regardless of data usage, which is a shot at net neutrality for sure.
- pjschlic 9y ago
  I think the 'new FCC' comment is a reference to the current FCC Commissioner being a former general council at Verizon (though it was awhile ago). Additionally, he's been strongly opposed regulation of the telecoms and opposed net neutrality for awhile. It's not all him, but the FCC has sharply changed course on net neutrality since December.
  - runjake 9y ago
    I think you mean the new FCC chairman: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajit_V._Pai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajit_V._Pai
  - praneshp 9y ago
    > I think the 'new FCC' comment is a reference to the current FCC Commissioner being a former general council at Verizon This is a somewhat silly argument. I remember the same concern over Wheeler; everyone was tripping over themselves to praise him when he turned out to be pro-net neutrality.
    - atonse 9y ago
      While many of us were delighted to be wrong about Wheeler, Ajit Pai has ended up being exactly the kind of spineless corporate shill that you'd expect him to be. Wheeler was the exception. Pai will be handsomely rewarded for all the billions he's generated for the telcos.
      - praneshp 9y ago
        Oh, I'm not questioning if Pai is/will continue to be a shill. Let's call him that for being a spineless shill, not because he worked at Verizon once. Sorry if I'm nitpicking, but it's an important distinction to me.
dogma1138 9y ago
This isn't a net neutrality issue. Come to Europe and let's compare datacaps.
- awinder 9y ago
  Treating video bits differently from image and text bits is exactly a net neutrality issue, it’s content-based filtering
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - derekp7 9y ago
    But the question then becomes, is it a good or bad thing? Is it better to pay $10 per GB, or is it better to not have to worry about gigabytes, with the caveat that video (which happens currently be a high bandwidth consumer) gets throttled? Then add onto it that the video quality for many consumers is still more than adequate for the size of screen they are dealing with. Personally, I don't do video over LTE, but I would like to use the mobile hotspot feature on my phone more often without having to worry about going over. And as long as it is enough for me to use ssh, RDP, or VNC, then I'm good. Other people, of course, have different requirements.
    - atonse 9y ago
      But RDP and VNC are essentially streaming video over the internet. How would they make that distinction?
      - derekp7 9y ago
        As long as I can get 10 frames per second on a remote desktop, I'm good.
      - rmwaite 9y ago
        You can identify traffic flows based on any number of characteristics, port number, protocol, and data payload to name a few.
marklawrutgers 9y ago
That is until the multi-billion dollar lobbyists decide to push for VPN bans in Congress because only terrorists and child pornographers need privacy like that. Basically what's already happening in China, Russia, and the UK.
- DKnoll 9y ago
  How is this already happening in the UK?
  - 0x5f3759df-i 9y ago
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/20/theresa-may-crackdown-snoopers-charter-encryption-terror-backdoor https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/20/theres... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_blocking_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_blocking_in_the_United_Kin...
    - DKnoll 9y ago
      Neither mention VPNs, also first link is an opinion piece.
TheAdamist 9y ago
They're traffic shaping to certain MBps, not re-encoding according to some of the articles, so a vpn wouldn't help depending on how they detect "streaming video".
- atonse 9y ago
  But that's not what they're doing. Judging by their marketing language, it's likely their contract language does enforce caps on the TYPE of content. If they just started somehow throttling all VPN traffic, this is easy to detect, and they'd be in breach of contract. It still won't matter with the current crowd in the White House. Nobody will enforce anything.

by atonse 9y ago

shedlight 9y ago

What do you mean by "new FCC" and what do they have to do with it? Also, was the old unlimited truly unlimited in all ways? If so, how can every single customer of any company actually get unlimited data, all the time without unlimited hardware appearing from nowhere and radio wave spectrum that expands to unlimited use for unlimited people?

shedlight 9y ago
Seeing down votes but no comments? This is why Reddit beats HN in every single way.
awinder 9y ago
New FCC refers to the party switch in the WH changing the FCC voting commissioner makeup from 3D-2R nominees to 2D-3R. The old plans and the new plans both defined “unlimited” as a number of GB of full speed which could degrade after so much use, so that’s never been at issue. That was a usage plan but the network traffic was not treated differently (or wasn’t supposed to be). Now the plans also perform content-based network degradation at all times, regardless of data usage, which is a shot at net neutrality for sure.
pjschlic 9y ago
I think the 'new FCC' comment is a reference to the current FCC Commissioner being a former general council at Verizon (though it was awhile ago). Additionally, he's been strongly opposed regulation of the telecoms and opposed net neutrality for awhile. It's not all him, but the FCC has sharply changed course on net neutrality since December.
- runjake 9y ago
  I think you mean the new FCC chairman: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajit_V._Pai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajit_V._Pai
- praneshp 9y ago
  > I think the 'new FCC' comment is a reference to the current FCC Commissioner being a former general council at Verizon This is a somewhat silly argument. I remember the same concern over Wheeler; everyone was tripping over themselves to praise him when he turned out to be pro-net neutrality.
  - atonse 9y ago
    While many of us were delighted to be wrong about Wheeler, Ajit Pai has ended up being exactly the kind of spineless corporate shill that you'd expect him to be. Wheeler was the exception. Pai will be handsomely rewarded for all the billions he's generated for the telcos.
    - praneshp 9y ago
      Oh, I'm not questioning if Pai is/will continue to be a shill. Let's call him that for being a spineless shill, not because he worked at Verizon once. Sorry if I'm nitpicking, but it's an important distinction to me.

dogma1138 9y ago

This isn't a net neutrality issue. Come to Europe and let's compare datacaps.

awinder 9y ago
Treating video bits differently from image and text bits is exactly a net neutrality issue, it’s content-based filtering
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- derekp7 9y ago
  But the question then becomes, is it a good or bad thing? Is it better to pay $10 per GB, or is it better to not have to worry about gigabytes, with the caveat that video (which happens currently be a high bandwidth consumer) gets throttled? Then add onto it that the video quality for many consumers is still more than adequate for the size of screen they are dealing with. Personally, I don't do video over LTE, but I would like to use the mobile hotspot feature on my phone more often without having to worry about going over. And as long as it is enough for me to use ssh, RDP, or VNC, then I'm good. Other people, of course, have different requirements.
  - atonse 9y ago
    But RDP and VNC are essentially streaming video over the internet. How would they make that distinction?
    - derekp7 9y ago
      As long as I can get 10 frames per second on a remote desktop, I'm good.
    - rmwaite 9y ago
      You can identify traffic flows based on any number of characteristics, port number, protocol, and data payload to name a few.

marklawrutgers 9y ago

That is until the multi-billion dollar lobbyists decide to push for VPN bans in Congress because only terrorists and child pornographers need privacy like that. Basically what's already happening in China, Russia, and the UK.

DKnoll 9y ago
How is this already happening in the UK?
- 0x5f3759df-i 9y ago
  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/20/theresa-may-crackdown-snoopers-charter-encryption-terror-backdoor https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/20/theres... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_blocking_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_blocking_in_the_United_Kin...
  - DKnoll 9y ago
    Neither mention VPNs, also first link is an opinion piece.

TheAdamist 9y ago

They're traffic shaping to certain MBps, not re-encoding according to some of the articles, so a vpn wouldn't help depending on how they detect "streaming video".

atonse 9y ago
But that's not what they're doing. Judging by their marketing language, it's likely their contract language does enforce caps on the TYPE of content. If they just started somehow throttling all VPN traffic, this is easy to detect, and they'd be in breach of contract. It still won't matter with the current crowd in the White House. Nobody will enforce anything.