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> Why is the website down when it's up for other people? Why is my BitTorrent being disconnected? Why is the video stuttering? Where is this lagg coming from? W

> Why is the website down when it's up for other people? Why is my BitTorrent being disconnected? Why is the video stuttering? Where is this lagg coming from? Why is Netflix look like crap? Literally all of these things are very commonly last mile problems. (but again, not always.) Consider what happens when a connection on the last mile network starts to get congested and/or underperform due to a physical problem (like an old/degraded copper line.) The provider can either upgrade/fix the network (expensive, time consuming, not profitable in the short term) or they can implement traffic control on that segment. The traffic control could be a high burstable rate with a much lower committed rate. In that situation browsing will feel snappy and speed tests will be good, but downloads and video streams will be slow and buffer. Problem solved from the provider's end - they can point to the speed test as evidence that they're providing what you're paying for and blame the streaming provider for the buffering, and they don't need to spend anything to solve the over-congestion problem! And they're not even breaking net neutrality! But experience for the customer is bad.

Retric 8y ago
I think you're confused about what last miles means. It's the part of the network that's not shared. In cable networks it stops at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_drop https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_drop. It may in fact exist entirely inside an large apartment complex. From a networking standpoint all networks look the same at that point as it's before any form of routing. In no way can you get "Why is the website down when it's up for other people?" from a last mile segment you can see everything or nothing. PS: HD Streaming video also qualifies as low bandwith now days. Even 4K is not bad, you can run 40+ of them on a 1Gbit connection.
- grahamburger 8y ago
  I am not confused, but I do think that we are working from different definitions of last-mile. Your definition of last-mile is a fine and probably more literal one, but I don't think it's very useful when talking about municipal last-mile networks. If the municipal network only extended from the service-drop to the home then each ISP would still need lines run all through the city. In my case for example the 'last-mile' fiber access network has a pedestal in the street every few blocks across several cities - it's a very large network. The ISPs connect at the edges of that network and provide IP to any home connected to it. Also, fwiw it certainly is possible for a problem at the last mile even in your definition to cause a site to be inaccessible for you and not others. A bad route or a frame size problem for example can cause exactly that. Consider for example the recent problems with AT&T and 1.1.1.1 - AT&T customers couldn't use that site while others could and it was all because of a last-mile problem.
  - Retric 8y ago
    > In my case for example the 'last-mile' fiber access network has a pedestal in the street every few blocks across several cities - it's a very large network. The ISPs connect at the edges of that network and provide IP to any home connected to it. That network is effectively a full ISP excluding billing as it's connecting to 1000's of homes and then connecting to a few networks from that point. I understand it seems like a reasonable alternative, but think of something closer to this. Connecting to every single one of those pedestal's would take ~1-3% of the wire as going to every home. If say 10 networks did it then that's not all that much overhead compared to 2 separate last mile networks. The other approach would be to have say 2-5 networks that went to every box and then each ISP would have a device in those locations which would connect on one or more of those networks. In either of those 2 cases the ISP's would have full control over how their customers see the internet, without nearly the wiring of having N full networks.

Retric 8y ago

I think you're confused about what last miles means. It's the part of the network that's not shared. In cable networks it stops at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_drop https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_drop. It may in fact exist entirely inside an large apartment complex. From a networking standpoint all networks look the same at that point as it's before any form of routing. In no way can you get "Why is the website down when it's up for other people?" from a last mile segment you can see everything or nothing. PS: HD Streaming video also qualifies as low bandwith now days. Even 4K is not bad, you can run 40+ of them on a 1Gbit connection.

grahamburger 8y ago
I am not confused, but I do think that we are working from different definitions of last-mile. Your definition of last-mile is a fine and probably more literal one, but I don't think it's very useful when talking about municipal last-mile networks. If the municipal network only extended from the service-drop to the home then each ISP would still need lines run all through the city. In my case for example the 'last-mile' fiber access network has a pedestal in the street every few blocks across several cities - it's a very large network. The ISPs connect at the edges of that network and provide IP to any home connected to it. Also, fwiw it certainly is possible for a problem at the last mile even in your definition to cause a site to be inaccessible for you and not others. A bad route or a frame size problem for example can cause exactly that. Consider for example the recent problems with AT&T and 1.1.1.1 - AT&T customers couldn't use that site while others could and it was all because of a last-mile problem.
- Retric 8y ago
  > In my case for example the 'last-mile' fiber access network has a pedestal in the street every few blocks across several cities - it's a very large network. The ISPs connect at the edges of that network and provide IP to any home connected to it. That network is effectively a full ISP excluding billing as it's connecting to 1000's of homes and then connecting to a few networks from that point. I understand it seems like a reasonable alternative, but think of something closer to this. Connecting to every single one of those pedestal's would take ~1-3% of the wire as going to every home. If say 10 networks did it then that's not all that much overhead compared to 2 separate last mile networks. The other approach would be to have say 2-5 networks that went to every box and then each ISP would have a device in those locations which would connect on one or more of those networks. In either of those 2 cases the ISP's would have full control over how their customers see the internet, without nearly the wiring of having N full networks.