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> Comcast wanting Cogent to pay more to transit all that Netflix data That doesn't make sense to me. Comcast's customer isn't Cogent; Comcast's customer is the

> Comcast wanting Cogent to pay more to transit all that Netflix data That doesn't make sense to me. Comcast's customer isn't Cogent; Comcast's customer is the end user who sends them a check every month for access to the internet, regardless of where it comes from. If Cogent is being paid by Netflix on the other side, then Cogent and Comcast are exactly aligned (each wanting to deliver the Netflix packets because their respective customers are paying them to) and should peer without any money changing hands. If Comcast wants Cogent to pay it so that Comcast's own subscribers can get access to Cogent's customers' content, then they're being shady.

Touche 13y ago
> If Cogent is being paid by Netflix on the other side, then Cogent and Comcast are exactly aligned (each wanting to deliver the Netflix packets because their respective customers are paying them to) and should peer without any money changing hands. Should Comcast cache my personal website for free so that it's super fast half way across the country? Or am I responsible for making my website faster (by using CDNs and such)? If it's the latter, why should Netflix not have the same experience I have?
- icambron 13y ago
  Your question confuses me. If your website is cached on a CDN, Comcast users still have to connect to the network that hosts that CDN, and Comcast accomplishes that by using a peering or transit relationship. The CDN won't magically speed up Comcast's network, which is still responsible for getting the content to people's homes. Netflix is already making its website faster by paying Cogent a lot of money to deliver its data to the ISPs and by (clears throat) using and even building its own [1] CDN. Where Comcast comes in is delivering that content to its customers, who, again, pay it to do exactly that. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericsavitz/2012/06/05/netflix-shifts-traffic-to-its-own-cdn-akamai-limelight-shrs-hit/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericsavitz/2012/06/05/netflix-sh...
  - Touche 13y ago
    Yes, and others in this thread believe Netflix shouldn't have to pay to peer with Comcast. What I'm saying is, I too want to peer with Comcast for free. Do you support this as well, or just Netflix?
    - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
      If you have traffic for Comcast's customers and you bring it to Comcast's facilities, what service do you imagine Comcast is providing that you should have to compensate them for? It's not transit. They're not delivering your traffic to some other ISP. They're delivering it to their own customers, which is what those customers have already paid them to do.
      - Touche 13y ago
        They're delivering it to some of their customers. Those who are also Netflix customers. Netflix wants to distribute it's costs back onto everyone else (everyone but themselves). Even though this new arrangement reduces their costs vs. using Cogent.
        icambron 13y ago
        I thought this discussion was whether it's reasonable to expect Comcast to peer for free, which it is. (AnthonyMouse's answer is exactly right.) But now somehow this discussion is about the distribution of costs across Comcast's customers? Er, OK: Comcast does have a problem there in that it charges its customers flat rates for access instead of charging them per byte. That creates all sorts of weird incentives both for those customers and for Comcast. At some level, that's the root cause of a lot of this; as an ISP its incentive should be to route as much traffic as it can as efficiently as it can, and weird stuff like this comes up because it isn't. That's messy and Comcast should fix how it distributes the cost of its customers using the internet, but what does it have to do with Netflix paying for anything? Similarly, you don't pay Comcast to route the packets from your website to your visitors, even though only a subset of them use your site, thus asking everyone else to take on those costs. How is this different?
chc 13y ago
What you're describing doesn't sound like a good description of how peering agreements normally work.
- icambron 13y ago
  How so?
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]

Touche 13y ago

> If Cogent is being paid by Netflix on the other side, then Cogent and Comcast are exactly aligned (each wanting to deliver the Netflix packets because their respective customers are paying them to) and should peer without any money changing hands. Should Comcast cache my personal website for free so that it's super fast half way across the country? Or am I responsible for making my website faster (by using CDNs and such)? If it's the latter, why should Netflix not have the same experience I have?

icambron 13y ago
Your question confuses me. If your website is cached on a CDN, Comcast users still have to connect to the network that hosts that CDN, and Comcast accomplishes that by using a peering or transit relationship. The CDN won't magically speed up Comcast's network, which is still responsible for getting the content to people's homes. Netflix is already making its website faster by paying Cogent a lot of money to deliver its data to the ISPs and by (clears throat) using and even building its own [1] CDN. Where Comcast comes in is delivering that content to its customers, who, again, pay it to do exactly that. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericsavitz/2012/06/05/netflix-shifts-traffic-to-its-own-cdn-akamai-limelight-shrs-hit/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericsavitz/2012/06/05/netflix-sh...
- Touche 13y ago
  Yes, and others in this thread believe Netflix shouldn't have to pay to peer with Comcast. What I'm saying is, I too want to peer with Comcast for free. Do you support this as well, or just Netflix?
  - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
    If you have traffic for Comcast's customers and you bring it to Comcast's facilities, what service do you imagine Comcast is providing that you should have to compensate them for? It's not transit. They're not delivering your traffic to some other ISP. They're delivering it to their own customers, which is what those customers have already paid them to do.
    - Touche 13y ago
      They're delivering it to some of their customers. Those who are also Netflix customers. Netflix wants to distribute it's costs back onto everyone else (everyone but themselves). Even though this new arrangement reduces their costs vs. using Cogent.
      - icambron 13y ago
        I thought this discussion was whether it's reasonable to expect Comcast to peer for free, which it is. (AnthonyMouse's answer is exactly right.) But now somehow this discussion is about the distribution of costs across Comcast's customers? Er, OK: Comcast does have a problem there in that it charges its customers flat rates for access instead of charging them per byte. That creates all sorts of weird incentives both for those customers and for Comcast. At some level, that's the root cause of a lot of this; as an ISP its incentive should be to route as much traffic as it can as efficiently as it can, and weird stuff like this comes up because it isn't. That's messy and Comcast should fix how it distributes the cost of its customers using the internet, but what does it have to do with Netflix paying for anything? Similarly, you don't pay Comcast to route the packets from your website to your visitors, even though only a subset of them use your site, thus asking everyone else to take on those costs. How is this different?

chc 13y ago

What you're describing doesn't sound like a good description of how peering agreements normally work.

icambron 13y ago
How so?
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]