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Starting a web business is already massively cheaper than in any other industry, and that won't change anytime soon. Your innovation is not going to fail becaus

Starting a web business is already massively cheaper than in any other industry, and that won't change anytime soon. Your innovation is not going to fail because you have to pay extra money for bandwidth -- you're probably already paying Amazon's massively marked up $0.09/GB because it's slightly more convenient. If Comcast/Verizon decide they want a couple cents on top of that, you'll either optimize slightly and come out net-even, or continue not caring about bandwidth costs because you have bigger problems like building a user/customer base.

kylecordes 9y ago
It's not only about a potential small per gigabit price though. Imagine instead that in order for your new website idea to be reachable by possible customers, you had to apply and then negotiate with business-development people at a cable company prior to being able to launch at all.
- oconnore 9y ago
  This is a straw man. We're talking about video streaming. Comcast/Verizon want a cut of your video streaming business. That's it. Ethical or not, this is not a practical issue for new companies.
  - todayiamme 9y ago
    What makes you think they'll stop there? Once you give them that power, do you think they won't use it to make more and more? To squeeze every last dime from your pockets? That's what they've done in the past. They've carved up territory like drug gangs to maximise profit. (Look at the maps - notice how they don't overlap? https://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/04/01/16998/us-internet-users-pay-more-and-have-fewer-choices-europeans https://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/04/01/16998/us-internet... ). At the same time, they've often colluded to pass legislation that locks out competitors (https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/1/8530403/chattanooga-comcast-fcc-high-speed-internet-gigabit https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/1/8530403/chattanooga-comcas...). And they've gotten so good at it that even the almighty El Goog couldn't break into their territory - I mean, market. What makes you think that these rent seekers won't extract their pound of flesh and then some from you and your customers? After all, past behavior is indeed predictive of future results.
matt4077 9y ago
This comments shows a surprising lack of knowledge of the arguments for net neutrality. The threat of Non-Net-Neutrality isn't some arbitrary increase in costs for starting a business that gets paid, and filed with other nuisance. It's that by virtue of their position in the market, the providers can extract all the added value any company makes with their customers. That's because the startup isn't the one choosing their customers' internet access. What the provider charges for access to the customers that signed up with them doesn't factor into the decisions of the market, because the customer doesn't pay it, and likely will never know about it. And "the market" will not solve this. There are maybe three or four companies large enough to cause significant backlash when they can't be reached. But besides Facebook, YT and Amazon, everyone will have to pay up. And when faced with the decision to pay or not to pay, the rational decision will be to accept any price that leaves you with a single cent of profit. The power imbalance is staggering, and the potential for success with content startups on the internet will suffer dramatically. On the practical side, your startups' second to tenth employee better be contract lawyers. Because you don't just have to pay Comcast and Verizon. You will have to make arrangement with every single one of tens of thousands of providers around the world if you want to reach customers connected via their network. Of course, you probably won't bother with some of them. Or decide against, say, reaching potential customers in Montana. That will kill off several of the best features of the web. Namely the long-tail of default-accessible content that ordinarily nobody would think were interesting to someone of your age in your location.
- oconnore 9y ago
  No ISP is going to stop rural Montanaians from looking up Yelp reviews or visiting obscure ferret jousting fan pages. No one is even going to throttle video streaming, unless the ISP can demonstrate that the bandwidth consumed times some small per Gigabyte fee is worth far more than the postage and accounting costs (which for a handful of >0.1%-total-traffic-volume sites like Netflix, it will be). Your prediction is like a Terry Gilliam movie (which I love!), but it's not actually going to happen that way.
  - CamperBob2 9y ago
    You seriously need to learn about the history of the telecoms industry, going back to the days when they did exactly what you say they're not going to do. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almon_Brown_Strowger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almon_Brown_Strowger Nothing is happening now that hasn't happened before. People forget, is all.
AsyncAwait 9y ago
I don't get your argument, is it that we should be fine with paying large corporations money for something they're already paid for by their customers, just so they can improve their bottom line?
- oconnore 9y ago
  My argument was practical. Practically I think you will be fine, the title is wrong. I think the fact that many ISPs have local monopolies is not fine. I don't think net neutrality is related to that, and I think we're basically talking about a corporation billing another corporation for data transfer, which is pretty ok as business models go (and certainly doesn't justify this level of outrage).
  - AsyncAwait 9y ago
    >a corporation billing another corporation for data transfer, which is pretty ok as business models go (and certainly doesn't justify this level of outrage) STRONGLY disagree! The corporation already billed their subscribers for the data transfer, why should they be paid twice for the same thing?
    - oconnore 9y ago
      Do you normally get up in arms about large scale B2B arrangements? Are you upset that magazines and newspapers collect payment (twice!) from both readers and advertisers?
      - AsyncAwait 9y ago
        > Do you normally get up in arms about large scale B2B arrangements? No but this is not 'B2B arrangements' were talking about here, this is 'pay us protection money or we'll effectively eliminate your business' I do get up in arms when a company buys a drug that used to cost $10, makes no improvements to it and ramps up the price to $700, but this is even worse, since in the former case there's at least still only the customer being charged for the product, not also the delivery driver for the right to deliver it. What value are the ISPs adding that the customers are already not paying for? > Are you upset that magazines and newspapers collect payment (twice!) from both readers and advertisers? The cost of a newspaper doesn't usually cover all its production costs via customer sale, so the ads fill the rest, whereas here Comcast is already a hugely profitable company from customer sales anyway. There's Amazon Kindle 'with special offers (ads), but the device is cheaper than the version without ads. I don't think the plan is for ISPs to make broadband any cheaper for customers by starting to charge businesses for the thing they already were paid for. I don't think my argument should be this hard to understand, unless you're a Verizon lawyer.

kylecordes 9y ago

It's not only about a potential small per gigabit price though. Imagine instead that in order for your new website idea to be reachable by possible customers, you had to apply and then negotiate with business-development people at a cable company prior to being able to launch at all.

oconnore 9y ago
This is a straw man. We're talking about video streaming. Comcast/Verizon want a cut of your video streaming business. That's it. Ethical or not, this is not a practical issue for new companies.
- todayiamme 9y ago
  What makes you think they'll stop there? Once you give them that power, do you think they won't use it to make more and more? To squeeze every last dime from your pockets? That's what they've done in the past. They've carved up territory like drug gangs to maximise profit. (Look at the maps - notice how they don't overlap? https://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/04/01/16998/us-internet-users-pay-more-and-have-fewer-choices-europeans https://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/04/01/16998/us-internet... ). At the same time, they've often colluded to pass legislation that locks out competitors (https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/1/8530403/chattanooga-comcast-fcc-high-speed-internet-gigabit https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/1/8530403/chattanooga-comcas...). And they've gotten so good at it that even the almighty El Goog couldn't break into their territory - I mean, market. What makes you think that these rent seekers won't extract their pound of flesh and then some from you and your customers? After all, past behavior is indeed predictive of future results.

matt4077 9y ago

This comments shows a surprising lack of knowledge of the arguments for net neutrality. The threat of Non-Net-Neutrality isn't some arbitrary increase in costs for starting a business that gets paid, and filed with other nuisance. It's that by virtue of their position in the market, the providers can extract all the added value any company makes with their customers. That's because the startup isn't the one choosing their customers' internet access. What the provider charges for access to the customers that signed up with them doesn't factor into the decisions of the market, because the customer doesn't pay it, and likely will never know about it. And "the market" will not solve this. There are maybe three or four companies large enough to cause significant backlash when they can't be reached. But besides Facebook, YT and Amazon, everyone will have to pay up. And when faced with the decision to pay or not to pay, the rational decision will be to accept any price that leaves you with a single cent of profit. The power imbalance is staggering, and the potential for success with content startups on the internet will suffer dramatically. On the practical side, your startups' second to tenth employee better be contract lawyers. Because you don't just have to pay Comcast and Verizon. You will have to make arrangement with every single one of tens of thousands of providers around the world if you want to reach customers connected via their network. Of course, you probably won't bother with some of them. Or decide against, say, reaching potential customers in Montana. That will kill off several of the best features of the web. Namely the long-tail of default-accessible content that ordinarily nobody would think were interesting to someone of your age in your location.

oconnore 9y ago
No ISP is going to stop rural Montanaians from looking up Yelp reviews or visiting obscure ferret jousting fan pages. No one is even going to throttle video streaming, unless the ISP can demonstrate that the bandwidth consumed times some small per Gigabyte fee is worth far more than the postage and accounting costs (which for a handful of >0.1%-total-traffic-volume sites like Netflix, it will be). Your prediction is like a Terry Gilliam movie (which I love!), but it's not actually going to happen that way.
- CamperBob2 9y ago
  You seriously need to learn about the history of the telecoms industry, going back to the days when they did exactly what you say they're not going to do. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almon_Brown_Strowger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almon_Brown_Strowger Nothing is happening now that hasn't happened before. People forget, is all.

AsyncAwait 9y ago

I don't get your argument, is it that we should be fine with paying large corporations money for something they're already paid for by their customers, just so they can improve their bottom line?

oconnore 9y ago
My argument was practical. Practically I think you will be fine, the title is wrong. I think the fact that many ISPs have local monopolies is not fine. I don't think net neutrality is related to that, and I think we're basically talking about a corporation billing another corporation for data transfer, which is pretty ok as business models go (and certainly doesn't justify this level of outrage).
- AsyncAwait 9y ago
  >a corporation billing another corporation for data transfer, which is pretty ok as business models go (and certainly doesn't justify this level of outrage) STRONGLY disagree! The corporation already billed their subscribers for the data transfer, why should they be paid twice for the same thing?
  - oconnore 9y ago
    Do you normally get up in arms about large scale B2B arrangements? Are you upset that magazines and newspapers collect payment (twice!) from both readers and advertisers?
    - AsyncAwait 9y ago
      > Do you normally get up in arms about large scale B2B arrangements? No but this is not 'B2B arrangements' were talking about here, this is 'pay us protection money or we'll effectively eliminate your business' I do get up in arms when a company buys a drug that used to cost $10, makes no improvements to it and ramps up the price to $700, but this is even worse, since in the former case there's at least still only the customer being charged for the product, not also the delivery driver for the right to deliver it. What value are the ISPs adding that the customers are already not paying for? > Are you upset that magazines and newspapers collect payment (twice!) from both readers and advertisers? The cost of a newspaper doesn't usually cover all its production costs via customer sale, so the ads fill the rest, whereas here Comcast is already a hugely profitable company from customer sales anyway. There's Amazon Kindle 'with special offers (ads), but the device is cheaper than the version without ads. I don't think the plan is for ISPs to make broadband any cheaper for customers by starting to charge businesses for the thing they already were paid for. I don't think my argument should be this hard to understand, unless you're a Verizon lawyer.