7 ms·

Verizon made an enemy tonight

133 points by sudonim 12y ago

tweakz 12y ago
If I were him, I would change ISPs.
- Yhippa 12y ago
  To who? TWC? Comcast Xfinity?
- brianbreslin 12y ago
  Many Americans don't have that option. The physical wires either in your house or connecting your house to the street trunks are often owned by the telco themselves. That's right the copper wires in your house you own, might be property of Verizon or comcast. They get exclusivity to these wires.
kaeawc 12y ago
Wonder what location he tunneled from / to to get around Verizon's bottleneck.
- sudonim 12y ago
  Hi! OP here. I'm in NYC. I tunneled to Washington D.C. and that seemed to do it. I figured I'd try a location as close as possible first.
  - kaeawc 12y ago
    Tried the same thing on TWC from NYC with no difference in speed. Will experiment with other setups. Also would like to note we pay for (and can get) 50 Mbps down. Netflix comes in at ~560 kbps and just stays there.
    - sudonim 12y ago
      Cool. You may want to test different VPN services in case that's it. I've been using vyprvpn and I'm quite happy with it, but there are probably a few others that would work well.
    - cnst 12y ago
      It's not the location that matters, it's which uplink to Verizon a given VPN goes though.
- toast0 12y ago
  If Verizon's recently released data is accurate, location probably doesn't make much of a difference. The key is that packets from the VPN provider to the user need to not arrive via the congested Level3 <-> Verizon interconnections.
kentonv 12y ago
I think this issue may be more subtle than we want it to be. I'm no fan of monopolistic ISPs, but it is true that when you have a peering point with unbalanced traffic flows, the side sending more traffic is supposed to pay the side receiving more traffic. You pay per byte sent, just like how the sender of a letter pays postage. This has always been the case, and as long as Verizon charges Level 3 the same amount per-packet as they do any other sender, there's no violation of net neutrality. So Level 3/Netflix is making the argument that all Verizon has to do is install some additional network cables and everything would be fixed. Well that's a convenient argument, given that Level 3 sends way more traffic than it receives on that link, and currently (it seems) isn't paying for that difference. I hate to say it, but I think Verizon may actually be in the right here, at least insofar as that Level 3 should in fact be paying for that peering arrangement. Level 3's blog post seem deceptive on this point. That said, Verizon has a video service that competes with Netflix. Verizon's video service presumably doesn't have to pay transit fees to reach Verizon customers. So what's to stop Verizon from charging unreasonable fees in order to stamp out competition? Presumably, this is the real problem: Verizon and Level 3 cannot agree on a price, because Verizon has no reason to offer a reasonable price. So Level 3 and Netflix are waging a public campaign to shame Verizon, presumably as a bargaining chip to get the price lower. But neither side is really being truthful with us. I'm just happy that in my area I can get sonic.net, an ISP whose only business interest is delivering packets.
- pwarner 12y ago
  I don't understand why ISPs can just be ISPs? Especially the telco ones are investing a lot of money to try to move up the value chain into things like video, IaaS, home security, probably more that I can't think of. Meanwhile they fail to innovate at actually being an ISP. Google seems to be the leader there with Google Fiber and their clever sofware for managing their data center networks.
- djchen 12y ago
  > Well that's a convenient argument, given that Level 3 sends way more traffic than it receives on that link, and currently (it seems) isn't paying for that difference. That is true if Level3 was sending traffic through Verizon to say Cogent or HE. But in this case, the OP is requesting this traffic through VZ and he is paying VZ to carry this traffic for him.
djchen 12y ago
I do the same thing as the OP, I use an OpenWRT router with OpenVPN back to a VPS I have and it improves streaming video quality and speed for Netflix and more. Highly recommend it.
Maxious 12y ago
They have trained their agents on how to respond to complaints about speed... https://twitter.com/CyrisXD/status/489950468483731458/photo/1 https://twitter.com/CyrisXD/status/489950468483731458/photo/...
- _m_ 12y ago
  The funny thing is even though the rep claims that speedtest.net is fake, the Verizon speedtest service at http://my.verizon.com/services/speedtest/ http://my.verizon.com/services/speedtest/ is powered by Ookla, the company behind speedtest.net
awalton 12y ago
"Verizon, you're my enemy, I'm going to continue paying you every month while I work around your stupidity with my VPN..." That's just how fucked up this situation is.
- mobiplayer 12y ago
  This is clearly a "dame pan y dime tonto" situation (“Dame pan y dime tonto” literally translates to “give me bread and call me fool”. The idiomatic meaning is “I don’t care what people say as long as I get what I want”.)
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- x0x0 12y ago
  I think everyone, at least here, is perfectly aware of this. The problem is verizon wants to have their cake and eat it too: bill people for (a quite large) profit margin on last mile access, then turn around and tax content providers. As if asymmetric access wasn't already part of the deal when selling last mile internet pipes. This is a textbook example of why monopolies are bad, or verizon exists to fuck us and is happy to purchase legislators to that end.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- simonh 12y ago
  Asymmetric data flow is intrinsic to the service Verizon sells to the majority of it's last mile customers. It's pretty much intrinsic to DSL that the download bandwidth you get is vastly higher than the upload bandwidth. When you buy that download bandwidth from Verizon, there's nothing in the fine print that says what you may or may not fill it with. If you fill it with Netflix video, that's your business because you paid for it. It's not Verizon's because they have sold it to you, and it's not Netflix's because you requested the data. It's your data that you paid Netflix for traveling to you on your bandwidth you paid Verizon for.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
jpgvm 12y ago
Verizon, TWC, Comcast. All of these providers are local monopolies. This is the root of the problem. Here in Australia I can choose any number of retail ISPs that will service my Fibre to the Home connection. If I was not living in the building I am now I would be able to choose any number of ADSL ISPs. This creates competition and fixes the problem. Funnily enough this access is legislated here in Australia. Yes. Legislated. There can be no ISP monopolies in Australia. Better yet we have embarked on building a Fibre to the Home national network called the National Broadband Network which functions under the same scheme, ensuring we won't have any bullshit monopolies for the foreseeable future. Americans should campaign for the same solution, enforce last-mile wholesale and legislate separation of ISP retail from ISP wholesale business units. Everyone wins.
- grecy 12y ago
  Everyone wins. No. The rich can't get obscenely richer.
- jedrek 12y ago
  I firmly believe markets should be regulated for competition. I'm sure there are examples of companies merging and creating an improved experience for their customers, but I can't think of any. On the other hand, I can list half a dozen companies I've done business with, where a merger has reduced the quality of service and while increasing its price. Tons of markets that have been "deregulated" have become more competitive - national airlines in Europe, Ma Bell in the US - but they are almost all about breaking up a government sponsored/created monopoly. The US market telecom market has done an amazing job re-merging, to the point that a few more mergers and it'll be Ma Bell all over again.
- Veratyr 12y ago
  > Better yet we have embarked on building a Fibre to the Home national network called the National Broadband Network Just feel I should add that while we did embark on building a Fibre to the Home network, after the last election we're switching to a Fibre to the Node network instead.

133 points by sudonim 12y ago

tweakz 12y ago

If I were him, I would change ISPs.

Yhippa 12y ago
To who? TWC? Comcast Xfinity?
brianbreslin 12y ago
Many Americans don't have that option. The physical wires either in your house or connecting your house to the street trunks are often owned by the telco themselves. That's right the copper wires in your house you own, might be property of Verizon or comcast. They get exclusivity to these wires.

kaeawc 12y ago

Wonder what location he tunneled from / to to get around Verizon's bottleneck.

sudonim 12y ago
Hi! OP here. I'm in NYC. I tunneled to Washington D.C. and that seemed to do it. I figured I'd try a location as close as possible first.
- kaeawc 12y ago
  Tried the same thing on TWC from NYC with no difference in speed. Will experiment with other setups. Also would like to note we pay for (and can get) 50 Mbps down. Netflix comes in at ~560 kbps and just stays there.
  - sudonim 12y ago
    Cool. You may want to test different VPN services in case that's it. I've been using vyprvpn and I'm quite happy with it, but there are probably a few others that would work well.
  - cnst 12y ago
    It's not the location that matters, it's which uplink to Verizon a given VPN goes though.
toast0 12y ago
If Verizon's recently released data is accurate, location probably doesn't make much of a difference. The key is that packets from the VPN provider to the user need to not arrive via the congested Level3 <-> Verizon interconnections.

kentonv 12y ago

I think this issue may be more subtle than we want it to be. I'm no fan of monopolistic ISPs, but it is true that when you have a peering point with unbalanced traffic flows, the side sending more traffic is supposed to pay the side receiving more traffic. You pay per byte sent, just like how the sender of a letter pays postage. This has always been the case, and as long as Verizon charges Level 3 the same amount per-packet as they do any other sender, there's no violation of net neutrality. So Level 3/Netflix is making the argument that all Verizon has to do is install some additional network cables and everything would be fixed. Well that's a convenient argument, given that Level 3 sends way more traffic than it receives on that link, and currently (it seems) isn't paying for that difference. I hate to say it, but I think Verizon may actually be in the right here, at least insofar as that Level 3 should in fact be paying for that peering arrangement. Level 3's blog post seem deceptive on this point. That said, Verizon has a video service that competes with Netflix. Verizon's video service presumably doesn't have to pay transit fees to reach Verizon customers. So what's to stop Verizon from charging unreasonable fees in order to stamp out competition? Presumably, this is the real problem: Verizon and Level 3 cannot agree on a price, because Verizon has no reason to offer a reasonable price. So Level 3 and Netflix are waging a public campaign to shame Verizon, presumably as a bargaining chip to get the price lower. But neither side is really being truthful with us. I'm just happy that in my area I can get sonic.net, an ISP whose only business interest is delivering packets.

pwarner 12y ago
I don't understand why ISPs can just be ISPs? Especially the telco ones are investing a lot of money to try to move up the value chain into things like video, IaaS, home security, probably more that I can't think of. Meanwhile they fail to innovate at actually being an ISP. Google seems to be the leader there with Google Fiber and their clever sofware for managing their data center networks.
djchen 12y ago
> Well that's a convenient argument, given that Level 3 sends way more traffic than it receives on that link, and currently (it seems) isn't paying for that difference. That is true if Level3 was sending traffic through Verizon to say Cogent or HE. But in this case, the OP is requesting this traffic through VZ and he is paying VZ to carry this traffic for him.

djchen 12y ago

I do the same thing as the OP, I use an OpenWRT router with OpenVPN back to a VPS I have and it improves streaming video quality and speed for Netflix and more. Highly recommend it.

Maxious 12y ago

They have trained their agents on how to respond to complaints about speed... https://twitter.com/CyrisXD/status/489950468483731458/photo/1 https://twitter.com/CyrisXD/status/489950468483731458/photo/...

_m_ 12y ago
The funny thing is even though the rep claims that speedtest.net is fake, the Verizon speedtest service at http://my.verizon.com/services/speedtest/ http://my.verizon.com/services/speedtest/ is powered by Ookla, the company behind speedtest.net

awalton 12y ago

"Verizon, you're my enemy, I'm going to continue paying you every month while I work around your stupidity with my VPN..." That's just how fucked up this situation is.

mobiplayer 12y ago
This is clearly a "dame pan y dime tonto" situation (“Dame pan y dime tonto” literally translates to “give me bread and call me fool”. The idiomatic meaning is “I don’t care what people say as long as I get what I want”.)

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

x0x0 12y ago
I think everyone, at least here, is perfectly aware of this. The problem is verizon wants to have their cake and eat it too: bill people for (a quite large) profit margin on last mile access, then turn around and tax content providers. As if asymmetric access wasn't already part of the deal when selling last mile internet pipes. This is a textbook example of why monopolies are bad, or verizon exists to fuck us and is happy to purchase legislators to that end.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
simonh 12y ago
Asymmetric data flow is intrinsic to the service Verizon sells to the majority of it's last mile customers. It's pretty much intrinsic to DSL that the download bandwidth you get is vastly higher than the upload bandwidth. When you buy that download bandwidth from Verizon, there's nothing in the fine print that says what you may or may not fill it with. If you fill it with Netflix video, that's your business because you paid for it. It's not Verizon's because they have sold it to you, and it's not Netflix's because you requested the data. It's your data that you paid Netflix for traveling to you on your bandwidth you paid Verizon for.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

jpgvm 12y ago

Verizon, TWC, Comcast. All of these providers are local monopolies. This is the root of the problem. Here in Australia I can choose any number of retail ISPs that will service my Fibre to the Home connection. If I was not living in the building I am now I would be able to choose any number of ADSL ISPs. This creates competition and fixes the problem. Funnily enough this access is legislated here in Australia. Yes. Legislated. There can be no ISP monopolies in Australia. Better yet we have embarked on building a Fibre to the Home national network called the National Broadband Network which functions under the same scheme, ensuring we won't have any bullshit monopolies for the foreseeable future. Americans should campaign for the same solution, enforce last-mile wholesale and legislate separation of ISP retail from ISP wholesale business units. Everyone wins.

grecy 12y ago
Everyone wins. No. The rich can't get obscenely richer.
jedrek 12y ago
I firmly believe markets should be regulated for competition. I'm sure there are examples of companies merging and creating an improved experience for their customers, but I can't think of any. On the other hand, I can list half a dozen companies I've done business with, where a merger has reduced the quality of service and while increasing its price. Tons of markets that have been "deregulated" have become more competitive - national airlines in Europe, Ma Bell in the US - but they are almost all about breaking up a government sponsored/created monopoly. The US market telecom market has done an amazing job re-merging, to the point that a few more mergers and it'll be Ma Bell all over again.
Veratyr 12y ago
> Better yet we have embarked on building a Fibre to the Home national network called the National Broadband Network Just feel I should add that while we did embark on building a Fibre to the Home network, after the last election we're switching to a Fibre to the Node network instead.