5 ms·

Well, if you as an ISP advertise and sell subscriptions for 200mbps (with the “up to” hidden in 7pt, 10 pages down into the contract) and customers buy the serv

by eecc 9y ago

Well, if you as an ISP advertise and sell subscriptions for 200mbps (with the “up to” hidden in 7pt, 10 pages down into the contract) and customers buy the service it is none of your business how those 200mbps are being used, only to shuffle them along at the speed that has been paid for. If the sold speed is only achievable when nobody else in the neighborhood is using the service then it’s a lie, and it’s no one else’s fault but the ISP’s if they get caught

likelynew 9y ago
But decreasing the average usage of customers, despite fixing maximum will mean profit. If somehow video sites get blocked, the average internet usage will very likely drop down many fold.
- Retric 9y ago
  Pissing off customers has many failure points. Without video many people could just stick with their cellphone bandwidth and drop their cable plan entirely.
  - notyourday 9y ago
    > Pissing off customers has many failure points. Without video many people could just stick with their cellphone bandwidth and drop their cable plan entirely. Congratulations, you have just made anti Net Neutrality argument.
    - sanderjd 9y ago
      Could you expand on this a bit? I haven't heard this argument, and I just listened to a pretty long conversation with FCC Chairman Pai (on the Fifth Column podcast, if you're interested). His argument was that it will reduce the burden on small ISPs, which would then pop up everywhere, creating a pro-consumer competitive market. (Which is either magical thinking or just disingenuous, but that was his argument, such as it was.)
      - notyourday 9y ago
        Sure: "Pissing off customers has failure points" is the core of the anti-NN arguments. There's no need to regulate what ISPs can do with the traffic - if they slow down access to some websites, or stop providing access to some of them or increase prices on the access of the "entire internet", then the customers would go to competitors who do not impose such restrictions.
        nneonneo 9y ago
        Of course, that’s assuming that competitors will pop up to do that. Sadly, the airline, cable, cellular plan and ISP industries have all demonstrated that oligopolies are alive and well - you can bet that ISPs will use the new income from enhanced market segmentation to shut out competitors, not improve their service.
        notyourday 9y ago
        The lack of competition in cable/telecom is purely caused by local rules.
        sanderjd 9y ago
        What makes you say that? It is caused by the physical reality that it doesn't make sense to build the same last-mile infrastructure multiple times. We figured this out decades ago when competing cables blotted out the sky in New York. If you think there are better solutions, that might be an interesting thing to discuss, but there are physical limitations that you can't just hand wave away.
        notyourday 9y ago
        Spending first ten years building a promising local ISP, directly in the trenches. The "there's no need to do last mile infrastructure multiple times" is bunk. It is easy, it is doable and no, you won't have 100 companies running lines. You would have 4-5 and that will be enough to push Comcasts and Verizon to get their prices down.
    - Retric 9y ago
      No, I simply bounded what ISP's can do. An ISP can leach off of internet traffic by shaping it so say Netflix is limited to low quality. But, that doesn't not mean they can simply block it without getting into issues. The problem is as demonstrated by China simply degrading websites bandwidth is is massive leverage.
will4274 9y ago
It's not on page ten. It's not hidden. Comcast/Xfinity puts it directly next to the speed in their advertising materials. Just check out their website (https://www.xfinity.com/learn/internet-service/speed https://www.xfinity.com/learn/internet-service/speed). Yes, it's a slightly smaller font, but companies have been putting "FREE" in bigger letters for complimentary products forever - I'm afraid I don't see the difference.

by eecc 9y ago

likelynew 9y ago

But decreasing the average usage of customers, despite fixing maximum will mean profit. If somehow video sites get blocked, the average internet usage will very likely drop down many fold.

Retric 9y ago
Pissing off customers has many failure points. Without video many people could just stick with their cellphone bandwidth and drop their cable plan entirely.
- notyourday 9y ago
  > Pissing off customers has many failure points. Without video many people could just stick with their cellphone bandwidth and drop their cable plan entirely. Congratulations, you have just made anti Net Neutrality argument.
  - sanderjd 9y ago
    Could you expand on this a bit? I haven't heard this argument, and I just listened to a pretty long conversation with FCC Chairman Pai (on the Fifth Column podcast, if you're interested). His argument was that it will reduce the burden on small ISPs, which would then pop up everywhere, creating a pro-consumer competitive market. (Which is either magical thinking or just disingenuous, but that was his argument, such as it was.)
    - notyourday 9y ago
      Sure: "Pissing off customers has failure points" is the core of the anti-NN arguments. There's no need to regulate what ISPs can do with the traffic - if they slow down access to some websites, or stop providing access to some of them or increase prices on the access of the "entire internet", then the customers would go to competitors who do not impose such restrictions.
      - nneonneo 9y ago
        Of course, that’s assuming that competitors will pop up to do that. Sadly, the airline, cable, cellular plan and ISP industries have all demonstrated that oligopolies are alive and well - you can bet that ISPs will use the new income from enhanced market segmentation to shut out competitors, not improve their service.
        notyourday 9y ago
        The lack of competition in cable/telecom is purely caused by local rules.
        sanderjd 9y ago
        What makes you say that? It is caused by the physical reality that it doesn't make sense to build the same last-mile infrastructure multiple times. We figured this out decades ago when competing cables blotted out the sky in New York. If you think there are better solutions, that might be an interesting thing to discuss, but there are physical limitations that you can't just hand wave away.
        notyourday 9y ago
        Spending first ten years building a promising local ISP, directly in the trenches. The "there's no need to do last mile infrastructure multiple times" is bunk. It is easy, it is doable and no, you won't have 100 companies running lines. You would have 4-5 and that will be enough to push Comcasts and Verizon to get their prices down.
  - Retric 9y ago
    No, I simply bounded what ISP's can do. An ISP can leach off of internet traffic by shaping it so say Netflix is limited to low quality. But, that doesn't not mean they can simply block it without getting into issues. The problem is as demonstrated by China simply degrading websites bandwidth is is massive leverage.

will4274 9y ago

It's not on page ten. It's not hidden. Comcast/Xfinity puts it directly next to the speed in their advertising materials. Just check out their website (https://www.xfinity.com/learn/internet-service/speed https://www.xfinity.com/learn/internet-service/speed). Yes, it's a slightly smaller font, but companies have been putting "FREE" in bigger letters for complimentary products forever - I'm afraid I don't see the difference.