5 ms·

"Brainwashing has caused people to believe in network congestion caused by high bandwidth usage."

by naoqj 4y ago

mordae 4y ago
Because of the bloated buffers along the way. It was empirically the truth.
jtbayly 4y ago
Do networks not fill up and get congested?
- naoqj 4y ago
  That's the joke. People and corporations streaming HD video use a disproportionate amount of bandwidth which require more hardware capacity and peering deals. I think it's not crazy to ask that they pay a fair price for it. As someone who doesn't stream HD video I would like to have cheaper connections available if I don't want to pay for the bandwidth usage of other customers.
  - sambull 4y ago
    There are. There are 5Mbps/10Mbps connections, that while being unusable for streaming HD are FAR cheaper and usable for other services. The consumer is paying the price of what they can get out of the connection. Conversely I pay extra (higher bandwidth pipe) so I can stream more HD videos, and even extra so I can do so without a overages fee per GB after a TB. The consumer in this case just paid to have a bigger pipe (more HD videos) and a use more data (unlimited bandwidth fee extra). Over $100 a month extra to stream more HD videos, and to not get double the bill just for going over on bandwidth.
    - hansel_der 4y ago
      typical hd-steam (720p) is around 2Mbps
  - smachiz 4y ago
    Hah. That isn't really the issue. Ballpark FMV for 1Mbps for a month is currently around $0.08/Mbps in the US at scale in carrier neutral datacenter. If you watched a Netflix HD stream all month long, it would cost maybe $1. But of course it doesn't actually cost Verizon or ATT or Cox that - Netflix almost assuredly *pays them* to carry that stream. Blaming the users is a ridiculously bad take - the issue is that the ISP didn't invest in fixing their last mile, or is needlessly congested at their head end, and they could fix it for trivial amounts of money.
    - naoqj 4y ago
      Increasing bandwidth in the last mile is not cheap at all.
      - smachiz 4y ago
        Depends on the technology and where that limit is. Increasing bandwidth to the cable head end or FTTN? Trivial. Replacing DOCSIS 2 equipment with 3.2 equipment? More expensive. Running actual FTTH? Hard, large upfront costs, but you have an asset with a 30+ year life span that’s cheaper to maintain than copper.
  - imtringued 4y ago
    >I would like to have cheaper connections available if I don't want to pay for the bandwidth usage of other customers. The anti net neutrality argument is all about taking that freedom away from you. ISPs don't want to change their business model. They want to offer up to X mbit/s but they don't even want to guarantee 5 mbit/s. If there was net neutrality ISPs would be forced to offer plans that are only partially oversubscribed not 100% oversubscribed. If you wanted a 5mbit/s plan the ISP would still oversubscribe and you would get screwed over by them.
- odshoifsdhfs 4y ago
  Yes, but the problem is on the ISP side. For example, lets assume a building with 10 apartments has guaranteed 100Mbit connection to the building. If ISP was honest, they would sell 10Mbit connection to each apartment. What they do (at least here) is sell 100Mbit to each apartment and hope their usage isn't all at the same time since it can't support it. I ended up paying more for a 200mbit connection straight to my apartment because of this. I was on a 500mbit connection before when working from home, then lockdowns started and everyone started to work from home and during work hours, if I would get 10-20mbit I would be happy. They sold me 500 but never had that capacity, so they 'blame' netflix and not them selling only what they can (like gyms, they sell over capacity and if for some reason all show up, they are screwed)
  - imtringued 4y ago
    Yeah the real problem is that ISPs aren't offering partially dedicated connections like 10mbit/s "guaranteed" * and up to 100mbit/s. ISPs are basically lying to you and they blame the users that actually use what they are owed. * not oversubscribed
  - jaywalk 4y ago
    There isn't a consumer ISP anywhere that doesn't oversubscribe bandwidth. It makes zero sense to give a residential connection dedicated bandwidth.
    - Karunamon 4y ago
      Maybe regulators should look into that? Common practices or not, it’s nothing short of fraudulent to sell something you know you can’t provide.
      - hansel_der 4y ago
        isp contracts usually include something called an Service Level Agreement (SLA) that gives room for this sort of service degredation. maybe there should be some discussion over statistical properties of that degredation and minimum service levels, because ppl tend to watch tv at roughly the same time.
- rstuart4133 4y ago
  > Do networks not fill up and get congested? In theory they can, obviously. In practice if you pool 100's of users, the "regression towards the mean" kicks in with a vengeance and it almost never happens. How do we know this? Well in other jurisdictions like Australia say (which is where I live), ISP's are required to guarantee a minimum peak period bandwidth. If their customers don't get it, they can complain to the government and _the government_ will prosecute the ISP. The ISP's squealed like stuck pigs when this rule was implemented. What actually happened when it was introduced was nothing, apart from a few prosecutions when the ISP's lied. When I say "nothing" I don't mean absolutely nothing as every ISP had to label their wares with the real bandwidth and cap they would give you. For example, if you had a nominal 100Mbps internet link (which is the number they always quoted before the rule) an expensive ISP might say it was 95Mbps guaranteed. The cheap ISP, surprise surprise, might say they only guarantee 85Mbps on that same link. But no prices changed, and mostly no speeds changed. "Mostly" because a few liars had to stop lying and once the truth was visible the were driven out of the market. Economic textbooks tell you a well informed market functions better than when there is an information imbalance between buyer and seller. All Australia did is correct that imbalance in the internet market, so it functioned a little better at matching buyer to seller. But Australia went much further than that. There are no ISP monopolies in Australia, so there _always_ many alternatives for every retail purchaser. I won't going into how they achieved that, but I will tell you one consequence you might not expect. It means there is no need for net neutrality in Australia either. An ISP might advertise Netflix gets preferential treatment, perhaps Netflix traffic doesn't contribute to caps. That's all fair, but if an ISP penalised a customers Netflix viewing because Netflix didn't pay them a bribe - well churning to a new ISP is just a few clicks on a new ISP's web page. You don't have to ring up Comcast and plead your case - being able to change ISP's without contacting the old one is the law. Australia solved it's internet delivery problems, including thorny problems like net neturality using the most basic of capitalist tools - putting systems and laws in place to ensure there is a highly functional market. It is remarkable how well capitalism works. It's amazing to many of us that the USA seems to prefer crony capitalism instead.

"Brainwashing has caused people to believe in network congestion caused by high bandwidth usage."

by naoqj 4y ago

"Brainwashing has caused people to believe in network congestion caused by high bandwidth usage."

mordae 4y ago

Because of the bloated buffers along the way. It was empirically the truth.

jtbayly 4y ago

Do networks not fill up and get congested?

naoqj 4y ago
That's the joke. People and corporations streaming HD video use a disproportionate amount of bandwidth which require more hardware capacity and peering deals. I think it's not crazy to ask that they pay a fair price for it. As someone who doesn't stream HD video I would like to have cheaper connections available if I don't want to pay for the bandwidth usage of other customers.
- sambull 4y ago
  There are. There are 5Mbps/10Mbps connections, that while being unusable for streaming HD are FAR cheaper and usable for other services. The consumer is paying the price of what they can get out of the connection. Conversely I pay extra (higher bandwidth pipe) so I can stream more HD videos, and even extra so I can do so without a overages fee per GB after a TB. The consumer in this case just paid to have a bigger pipe (more HD videos) and a use more data (unlimited bandwidth fee extra). Over $100 a month extra to stream more HD videos, and to not get double the bill just for going over on bandwidth.
  - hansel_der 4y ago
    typical hd-steam (720p) is around 2Mbps
- smachiz 4y ago
  Hah. That isn't really the issue. Ballpark FMV for 1Mbps for a month is currently around $0.08/Mbps in the US at scale in carrier neutral datacenter. If you watched a Netflix HD stream all month long, it would cost maybe $1. But of course it doesn't actually cost Verizon or ATT or Cox that - Netflix almost assuredly *pays them* to carry that stream. Blaming the users is a ridiculously bad take - the issue is that the ISP didn't invest in fixing their last mile, or is needlessly congested at their head end, and they could fix it for trivial amounts of money.
  - naoqj 4y ago
    Increasing bandwidth in the last mile is not cheap at all.
    - smachiz 4y ago
      Depends on the technology and where that limit is. Increasing bandwidth to the cable head end or FTTN? Trivial. Replacing DOCSIS 2 equipment with 3.2 equipment? More expensive. Running actual FTTH? Hard, large upfront costs, but you have an asset with a 30+ year life span that’s cheaper to maintain than copper.
- imtringued 4y ago
  >I would like to have cheaper connections available if I don't want to pay for the bandwidth usage of other customers. The anti net neutrality argument is all about taking that freedom away from you. ISPs don't want to change their business model. They want to offer up to X mbit/s but they don't even want to guarantee 5 mbit/s. If there was net neutrality ISPs would be forced to offer plans that are only partially oversubscribed not 100% oversubscribed. If you wanted a 5mbit/s plan the ISP would still oversubscribe and you would get screwed over by them.
odshoifsdhfs 4y ago
Yes, but the problem is on the ISP side. For example, lets assume a building with 10 apartments has guaranteed 100Mbit connection to the building. If ISP was honest, they would sell 10Mbit connection to each apartment. What they do (at least here) is sell 100Mbit to each apartment and hope their usage isn't all at the same time since it can't support it. I ended up paying more for a 200mbit connection straight to my apartment because of this. I was on a 500mbit connection before when working from home, then lockdowns started and everyone started to work from home and during work hours, if I would get 10-20mbit I would be happy. They sold me 500 but never had that capacity, so they 'blame' netflix and not them selling only what they can (like gyms, they sell over capacity and if for some reason all show up, they are screwed)
- imtringued 4y ago
  Yeah the real problem is that ISPs aren't offering partially dedicated connections like 10mbit/s "guaranteed" * and up to 100mbit/s. ISPs are basically lying to you and they blame the users that actually use what they are owed. * not oversubscribed
- jaywalk 4y ago
  There isn't a consumer ISP anywhere that doesn't oversubscribe bandwidth. It makes zero sense to give a residential connection dedicated bandwidth.
  - Karunamon 4y ago
    Maybe regulators should look into that? Common practices or not, it’s nothing short of fraudulent to sell something you know you can’t provide.
    - hansel_der 4y ago
      isp contracts usually include something called an Service Level Agreement (SLA) that gives room for this sort of service degredation. maybe there should be some discussion over statistical properties of that degredation and minimum service levels, because ppl tend to watch tv at roughly the same time.
rstuart4133 4y ago
> Do networks not fill up and get congested? In theory they can, obviously. In practice if you pool 100's of users, the "regression towards the mean" kicks in with a vengeance and it almost never happens. How do we know this? Well in other jurisdictions like Australia say (which is where I live), ISP's are required to guarantee a minimum peak period bandwidth. If their customers don't get it, they can complain to the government and _the government_ will prosecute the ISP. The ISP's squealed like stuck pigs when this rule was implemented. What actually happened when it was introduced was nothing, apart from a few prosecutions when the ISP's lied. When I say "nothing" I don't mean absolutely nothing as every ISP had to label their wares with the real bandwidth and cap they would give you. For example, if you had a nominal 100Mbps internet link (which is the number they always quoted before the rule) an expensive ISP might say it was 95Mbps guaranteed. The cheap ISP, surprise surprise, might say they only guarantee 85Mbps on that same link. But no prices changed, and mostly no speeds changed. "Mostly" because a few liars had to stop lying and once the truth was visible the were driven out of the market. Economic textbooks tell you a well informed market functions better than when there is an information imbalance between buyer and seller. All Australia did is correct that imbalance in the internet market, so it functioned a little better at matching buyer to seller. But Australia went much further than that. There are no ISP monopolies in Australia, so there _always_ many alternatives for every retail purchaser. I won't going into how they achieved that, but I will tell you one consequence you might not expect. It means there is no need for net neutrality in Australia either. An ISP might advertise Netflix gets preferential treatment, perhaps Netflix traffic doesn't contribute to caps. That's all fair, but if an ISP penalised a customers Netflix viewing because Netflix didn't pay them a bribe - well churning to a new ISP is just a few clicks on a new ISP's web page. You don't have to ring up Comcast and plead your case - being able to change ISP's without contacting the old one is the law. Australia solved it's internet delivery problems, including thorny problems like net neturality using the most basic of capitalist tools - putting systems and laws in place to ensure there is a highly functional market. It is remarkable how well capitalism works. It's amazing to many of us that the USA seems to prefer crony capitalism instead.