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No, I'm suggesting that a company like Netflix pays to deliver traffic directly to a company like Comcast. Netflix only pays once (they're paying Comcast instea
by exelius 12y ago
No, I'm suggesting that a company like Netflix pays to deliver traffic directly to a company like Comcast. Netflix only pays once (they're paying Comcast instead of paying Level3/Cogent, at least for delivering to Comcast customers).
I think our big difference of opinion comes in the understanding of the industry. Content and distribution have always been intimately linked. In fact, that's the whole disagreement: Netflix is performing content distribution but is not paying for the full cost of that distribution. Inexplicably, a lot of people feel those costs should be pushed to the consumer (i.e. "I already pay once for Internet! Netflix shouldn't have to pay because I already do!") rather than to the company making the profit off the specific act of a user watching a video (who will inevitably push those costs to the consumer, but only to THEIR consumers).
Netflix's business model is nearly identical to HBO's. The only difference is that HBO bills through the cable companies and Netflix does not. But the cable companies take a cut of HBO's earnings for distribution. Netflix wasn't paying that until recently.
- TheCraiggers 12y ago>Netflix's business model is nearly identical to HBO's. The only difference is that HBO bills through the cable companies and Netflix does not. But the cable companies take a cut of HBO's earnings for distribution. Netflix wasn't paying that until recently. You're probably right about that. However, I don't agree with the FCC being lobbied in order to protect an aged revenue model and further increasing lock-in. That shouldn't be the FCC's purpose. The whole thing smacks of the laws some states are enacting trying to prevent Tesla from selling cars online, etc.
- kristopolous 12y agoI think the ISP should be a common-carrier and unbiased vehicle for the open exchange of information that makes the Internet so intellectually critical. It sounds like you prefer them to be a privately held entity with zero civic obligations. I really wish that there was a metaphorical wall between entities that facilitate the civic function of a press and these more or less chicanery-based private corps. I'm terribly worried about the fact that the fate of modern discourse, society planning, press, arts, and culture essentially lies in the hands of the people whose primary goal is to bring commercially sponsored leisure distractions to the living room - their interests are too narrow and their vision of the task is too thin - as if we asked the Orville Redenbacher corporation to single-handidly draw up agricultural subsidization, land use, and disbursement policy (I bet their suggestions would favor more popcorn and leave 80% of the problem unsolved.)