5 ms·

Wireless is a medium that is severely limited because of the laws of physics. I 100% support QoS. And by QoS I don't mean limiting video even if there's avail

by tcxqy 7y ago

Wireless is a medium that is severely limited because of the laws of physics. I 100% support QoS. And by QoS I don't mean limiting video even if there's available bandwidth, I mean limiting it if other people are trying to use their connections reasonably.

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
Now, please explain why, in the case of contention, the user using video should get less than their fair share of the available capacity?
- kortilla 7y ago
  If everyone got a constant equal share of capacity on LTE, it would be so slow nobody could watch video at all. Are you sure that’s what you want?
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
    I'm not sure what your question really is?! Is it whether I would want to buy an internet connection that's too slow for watching most video? Or whether I would want an internet connection that is too slow for watching most video to be offered on the market for people to buy? Or ... what?
- tcxqy 7y ago
  Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. It's like going to a congested public road with a convoy of lorries just because you can. Really, don't be a dick.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
    > Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. Why do you think that a user that is using exactly the same amount of bandwidth as any other users (i.e., their fair share) is abusing the system? What would you say if some user was watching a video stream that used only half as much bandwidth as their fair share? Would that still be abusive?
    - tcxgy 7y ago
      Because in case of congestion (let's say everybody gets allotted 50 KB/s) you can't even watch video. Dozens of users trying to watch video at 50 KB/s aren't even watching video; they're just launching a DDoS attack. I'd be very happy to throttle them to 1 KB/s so I don't have to wait 10 seconds to receive a picture through Whatsapp. You're arguing against the laws of physics here, and you're arguing that stupid users should be able to screw everybody else. No thanks.
      - scrungus 7y ago
        >You're arguing against the laws of physics here and you're arguing that stupid users should be able to screw everybody else. No thanks. i think there is a misunderstanding here. he's not arguing that ISPs shouldn' be able to bandwidth-discriminate based on customer. He's arguing that they shouldn't be able to discriminate on the type of data. what would it matter to the other users if they were slowing down the network by html5 video, VNC, or playing a game over TCP? I don't know a lot about networks, but i think a potential solution could be to discriminate between high-bandwidth and low-latency transmissions. For a video game or something you would want to have low latency, but you wouldn't need a lot of bandwidth. on the other hand, video streaming requires a lot of bandwidth but doesn't depend so much on latency as long as it has a big enough cache. images are probably somewhere in the middle. this would allow low-bandwidth applications to be prioritized.
        tcxgy 7y ago
        Cool, so you're arguing for QoS. Thanks for supporting my argument.
        mschuster91 7y ago
        If the customer specifies QoS, why not? There are 6 reserved bits after HLEN in a TCP packet header, which could be used to annotate the priority of the stream - one for low-latency but also low bandwidth (=Whatsapp, messengers, gaming, VoIP), and one for bulk transfers (=high latency acceptable, high data volume). Default would be the first so that networks may only have special treatment for apps that explicitly opt in to say "i'm ok to wait a bit" like Netflix, Youtube and friends.
  - sixothree 7y ago
    Using the amount of data you paid for is being a dick? 10 GB per month is paltry amount of data.
- toast0 7y ago
  In part, because most video sites will adapt the stream to the achievable bandwidth. In part, because if the throttle all bulk data transfers over some minimum size, all the time, most people are only going to notice on video streaming, since videos are the most frequent bulk transfers.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
    > In part, because most video sites will adapt the stream to the achievable bandwidth. Why is that a reason to force them to use less than their fair share of available bandwidth? > In part, because if the throttle all bulk data transfers over some minimum size, all the time, most people are only going to notice on video streaming, since videos are the most frequent bulk transfers. How is that a reason for anything, and what is it actually supposed to be a reason for?
    - tlb 7y ago
      In a world (like ours) with limited bandwidth, you sometimes want to limit flows in a way to produce the least harm. Throttling different streams has different effects on user happiness. For instance, if you are 100 Mbits over capacity, you could either: (a) Throttle 100 users Netflix streams, which drop from 1080p to 720p (b) Throttle email, it backs up causing hour-long email delays. One is obviously less harmful.
      - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
        > In a world (like ours) with limited bandwidth That is actually the first mistake in your argument in this context. The bandwidth limits in mobile networks are first and foremost an effect of decisions by the network operators, not an inherent property of the world. > you sometimes want to limit flows in a way to produce the least harm. Throttling different streams has different effects on user happiness. Well, maybe. But I would argue that that is both (a) prone to erroneous valuation, if only due to conflicts of interest, and (b) almost always only the case to any significant degree in very artificial scenarios, not in the real world. > For instance, if you are 100 Mbits over capacity, you could either: > (a) Throttle 100 users Netflix streams, which drop from 1080p to 720p > (b) Throttle email, it backs up causing hour-long email delays. > One is obviously less harmful. Primarily, that's a nonsensical scenario. For one, you are never "over capacity". That's what capacity means: The maximum speed at which you can transfer data. You never transfer data faster than you can. You are only "over capacity" in the sense that the link is congested, but that isn't a data rate that you are "over the limit", it's just that the queue starts to grow. But also, your scenario implies that throttling email more than its fair share somehow would cause "hour-long email delays". Now, I dunno, what would that look like? 100 users using netflix, ~ 10 Mb/s each, for a total of 1000 Mb/s, and one user sending emails at 1000 Mb/s, which would then lead to the email sender being throttled to 950 Mb/s under fair sharing, which ... still would not lead to anything remotely like "hour-long email delays", despite being a totally contrived scenario? It looks more like you just made up one bad thing and one not so bad thing, and then noted that the worse thing is worse. Which is fine. But it is completely irrelevant to the discussion if you do not demonstrate how those two options are actually options in the same situation, and how they, respectively, compare to fair sharing.

by tcxqy 7y ago

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago

Now, please explain why, in the case of contention, the user using video should get less than their fair share of the available capacity?

kortilla 7y ago
If everyone got a constant equal share of capacity on LTE, it would be so slow nobody could watch video at all. Are you sure that’s what you want?
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
  I'm not sure what your question really is?! Is it whether I would want to buy an internet connection that's too slow for watching most video? Or whether I would want an internet connection that is too slow for watching most video to be offered on the market for people to buy? Or ... what?
tcxqy 7y ago
Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. It's like going to a congested public road with a convoy of lorries just because you can. Really, don't be a dick.
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
  > Because in case of congestion the user watching video is abusing the system. Why do you think that a user that is using exactly the same amount of bandwidth as any other users (i.e., their fair share) is abusing the system? What would you say if some user was watching a video stream that used only half as much bandwidth as their fair share? Would that still be abusive?
  - tcxgy 7y ago
    Because in case of congestion (let's say everybody gets allotted 50 KB/s) you can't even watch video. Dozens of users trying to watch video at 50 KB/s aren't even watching video; they're just launching a DDoS attack. I'd be very happy to throttle them to 1 KB/s so I don't have to wait 10 seconds to receive a picture through Whatsapp. You're arguing against the laws of physics here, and you're arguing that stupid users should be able to screw everybody else. No thanks.
    - scrungus 7y ago
      >You're arguing against the laws of physics here and you're arguing that stupid users should be able to screw everybody else. No thanks. i think there is a misunderstanding here. he's not arguing that ISPs shouldn' be able to bandwidth-discriminate based on customer. He's arguing that they shouldn't be able to discriminate on the type of data. what would it matter to the other users if they were slowing down the network by html5 video, VNC, or playing a game over TCP? I don't know a lot about networks, but i think a potential solution could be to discriminate between high-bandwidth and low-latency transmissions. For a video game or something you would want to have low latency, but you wouldn't need a lot of bandwidth. on the other hand, video streaming requires a lot of bandwidth but doesn't depend so much on latency as long as it has a big enough cache. images are probably somewhere in the middle. this would allow low-bandwidth applications to be prioritized.
      - tcxgy 7y ago
        Cool, so you're arguing for QoS. Thanks for supporting my argument.
        mschuster91 7y ago
        If the customer specifies QoS, why not? There are 6 reserved bits after HLEN in a TCP packet header, which could be used to annotate the priority of the stream - one for low-latency but also low bandwidth (=Whatsapp, messengers, gaming, VoIP), and one for bulk transfers (=high latency acceptable, high data volume). Default would be the first so that networks may only have special treatment for apps that explicitly opt in to say "i'm ok to wait a bit" like Netflix, Youtube and friends.
- sixothree 7y ago
  Using the amount of data you paid for is being a dick? 10 GB per month is paltry amount of data.
toast0 7y ago
In part, because most video sites will adapt the stream to the achievable bandwidth. In part, because if the throttle all bulk data transfers over some minimum size, all the time, most people are only going to notice on video streaming, since videos are the most frequent bulk transfers.
- zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
  > In part, because most video sites will adapt the stream to the achievable bandwidth. Why is that a reason to force them to use less than their fair share of available bandwidth? > In part, because if the throttle all bulk data transfers over some minimum size, all the time, most people are only going to notice on video streaming, since videos are the most frequent bulk transfers. How is that a reason for anything, and what is it actually supposed to be a reason for?
  - tlb 7y ago
    In a world (like ours) with limited bandwidth, you sometimes want to limit flows in a way to produce the least harm. Throttling different streams has different effects on user happiness. For instance, if you are 100 Mbits over capacity, you could either: (a) Throttle 100 users Netflix streams, which drop from 1080p to 720p (b) Throttle email, it backs up causing hour-long email delays. One is obviously less harmful.
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 7y ago
      > In a world (like ours) with limited bandwidth That is actually the first mistake in your argument in this context. The bandwidth limits in mobile networks are first and foremost an effect of decisions by the network operators, not an inherent property of the world. > you sometimes want to limit flows in a way to produce the least harm. Throttling different streams has different effects on user happiness. Well, maybe. But I would argue that that is both (a) prone to erroneous valuation, if only due to conflicts of interest, and (b) almost always only the case to any significant degree in very artificial scenarios, not in the real world. > For instance, if you are 100 Mbits over capacity, you could either: > (a) Throttle 100 users Netflix streams, which drop from 1080p to 720p > (b) Throttle email, it backs up causing hour-long email delays. > One is obviously less harmful. Primarily, that's a nonsensical scenario. For one, you are never "over capacity". That's what capacity means: The maximum speed at which you can transfer data. You never transfer data faster than you can. You are only "over capacity" in the sense that the link is congested, but that isn't a data rate that you are "over the limit", it's just that the queue starts to grow. But also, your scenario implies that throttling email more than its fair share somehow would cause "hour-long email delays". Now, I dunno, what would that look like? 100 users using netflix, ~ 10 Mb/s each, for a total of 1000 Mb/s, and one user sending emails at 1000 Mb/s, which would then lead to the email sender being throttled to 950 Mb/s under fair sharing, which ... still would not lead to anything remotely like "hour-long email delays", despite being a totally contrived scenario? It looks more like you just made up one bad thing and one not so bad thing, and then noted that the worse thing is worse. Which is fine. But it is completely irrelevant to the discussion if you do not demonstrate how those two options are actually options in the same situation, and how they, respectively, compare to fair sharing.