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Your comment is indicative of why this discussion is so difficult to have and why it's even tougher for the general public to understand or even care. The way

Your comment is indicative of why this discussion is so difficult to have and why it's even tougher for the general public to understand or even care. The way this has always works, and is not changing based on anything 'network neutrality' related, is that generally the sending network (Netflix) pays the receiving network (Comcast) based on something like the 95th percentile of their sending rate. It maybe not be linear, but if Netflix starts sending 2x traffic, they will pay something like 1.8x-2x. That's not changing, and nobody is disputing this. What we're talking about here is that Comcast could take a user's 20Mbps connection and decide that even though it's fully provisioned in the last mile for 20Mbps, and they have plenty of pipe to get the Netflix data to the Comcast side of the last mile, that Comcast can just decide that Netflix will only get 5Mbps of that 20Mbps, that is unless Netflix pays the ransom money to Comcast to change that arbitrary limit.

JoshTriplett 12y ago
> What we're talking about here is that Comcast could take a user's 20Mbps connection and decide that even though it's fully provisioned in the last mile for 20Mbps, and they have plenty of pipe to get the Netflix data to the Comcast side of the last mile, that Comcast can just decide that Netflix will only get 5Mbps of that 20Mbps, that is unless Netflix pays the ransom money to Comcast to change that arbitrary limit. On the other hand, that's not what happened in the recent Comcast/Netflix dispute, so spinning it that way does not make a good case for net neutrality.
twoodfin 12y ago
It maybe not be linear, but if Netflix starts sending 2x traffic, they will pay something like 1.8x-2x. That's not changing, and nobody is disputing this. Are you arguing that Netflix's costs to scale traffic into Comcast are commensurate with Comcast's costs to scale the delivery of that traffic to consumers? I don't think that's true. Didn't Level 3 just blog[1] that they largely operate on a settlement-free basis? Prior to their deal with Comcast, Netflix may have been paying Level 3, and Level 3 may have been paying Comcast, but neither could have been paying the order-of-billions Comcast would need to spend to support, say, doubled Netflix primetime traffic. [1] http://blog.level3.com/global-connectivity/observations-internet-middleman/ http://blog.level3.com/global-connectivity/observations-inte...
- mschulkind 12y ago
  Well, there's no gold standard for how any of the contracts are setup, but if I had to guess, it's because you're talking about Level 3 <-> Comcast. The profile of Netflix is far different from Level 3. Generally the fee is based on the net (as in net total, not net internet) traffic. If Level 3 sends 100Mbps to Comcast, and Comcast sends 100Mbps back to Level 3, or at least approximately even most of the time, they very well may have a settlement free agreement. This is believable because Level 3 is a transit provider, as in if you send them traffic bound to anywhere on the internet, they'll get it there, so the amount of traffic that Level 3 receives from everybody to get to Comcast could be roughly equal to the amount of traffic Comcast wants/needs to route through Level 3 to the rest of the internet. In the Netflix<->Comcast case, it's not a transit peering. Netflix can only send traffic over that link that is destined for Comcast customers. These peering arrangements are generally drastically cheaper per Mbps than the transit peering. The difference here though is that the only think Comcast sends to Netflix is HTTP request for the most part, and then Netflix sends a video stream back, so there's a HUGE imbalance in the traffic going each direction. All that said, what Netflix pays to Comcast may scale with Comcast's costs, but there's no direct relationship. To simplify it a bit, Netflix is paying to get traffic to the Comcast central brain. Customers are paying Comcast to get a pipe laid connecting them to the central brain. The two costs are not very directly related.

JoshTriplett 12y ago

> What we're talking about here is that Comcast could take a user's 20Mbps connection and decide that even though it's fully provisioned in the last mile for 20Mbps, and they have plenty of pipe to get the Netflix data to the Comcast side of the last mile, that Comcast can just decide that Netflix will only get 5Mbps of that 20Mbps, that is unless Netflix pays the ransom money to Comcast to change that arbitrary limit. On the other hand, that's not what happened in the recent Comcast/Netflix dispute, so spinning it that way does not make a good case for net neutrality.

twoodfin 12y ago

It maybe not be linear, but if Netflix starts sending 2x traffic, they will pay something like 1.8x-2x. That's not changing, and nobody is disputing this. Are you arguing that Netflix's costs to scale traffic into Comcast are commensurate with Comcast's costs to scale the delivery of that traffic to consumers? I don't think that's true. Didn't Level 3 just blog[1] that they largely operate on a settlement-free basis? Prior to their deal with Comcast, Netflix may have been paying Level 3, and Level 3 may have been paying Comcast, but neither could have been paying the order-of-billions Comcast would need to spend to support, say, doubled Netflix primetime traffic. [1] http://blog.level3.com/global-connectivity/observations-internet-middleman/ http://blog.level3.com/global-connectivity/observations-inte...

mschulkind 12y ago
Well, there's no gold standard for how any of the contracts are setup, but if I had to guess, it's because you're talking about Level 3 <-> Comcast. The profile of Netflix is far different from Level 3. Generally the fee is based on the net (as in net total, not net internet) traffic. If Level 3 sends 100Mbps to Comcast, and Comcast sends 100Mbps back to Level 3, or at least approximately even most of the time, they very well may have a settlement free agreement. This is believable because Level 3 is a transit provider, as in if you send them traffic bound to anywhere on the internet, they'll get it there, so the amount of traffic that Level 3 receives from everybody to get to Comcast could be roughly equal to the amount of traffic Comcast wants/needs to route through Level 3 to the rest of the internet. In the Netflix<->Comcast case, it's not a transit peering. Netflix can only send traffic over that link that is destined for Comcast customers. These peering arrangements are generally drastically cheaper per Mbps than the transit peering. The difference here though is that the only think Comcast sends to Netflix is HTTP request for the most part, and then Netflix sends a video stream back, so there's a HUGE imbalance in the traffic going each direction. All that said, what Netflix pays to Comcast may scale with Comcast's costs, but there's no direct relationship. To simplify it a bit, Netflix is paying to get traffic to the Comcast central brain. Customers are paying Comcast to get a pipe laid connecting them to the central brain. The two costs are not very directly related.