|
It does make sense to peer/connect with networks closer to your consumers from a content delivery perspective, so this move makes sense for Netflix to improve/maintain their customers' experience and subscriptions. They've just cut out a middleman transit network, at the cost of now having to set up agreements with every residential ISP and severely weakening their bargaining position, but it was either that or lose customers. In addition to the traditional model of setting up private peering with consumer ISPs, Netflix tried to build out their CDN with free colo for their cache boxes from the ISPs in exchange for lower transit bandwidth consumption. That strategy would've worked better if there was any real competition in the residential ISP market, because the ISPs would be trying to deliver the content their users request (and are paying to have delivered) faster than the others. It probably worked with smaller ISPs (which, in general, aren't also content companies) for whom 4U, a few amps, and a 10Gb port in their POP ended up being less expensive than upgrading transit links or even setting up private peering with Netflix itself. It probably would've worked even for larger ISPs like Comcast if they had any real competition as an ISP, and weren't also directly competing against Netflix itself as a content company. It'd be really nice for both consumers and next-gen content companies like Netflix if Internet access became a public utility and there was some sort of CLEC/line sharing framework for ISPs, but the cable companies are (predictably) trying to stay relevant and prevent competition. We can hope that the FCC will push things that way, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
|
#
¿
Feb 24, 2014 18:52
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 15, 2024 00:28 |
|
|
adorai posted:There is no way any real ISP could make Netflix suck on their network and not take a shitload of customer backlash. Except when the ISP has a de facto monopoly in the areas it services, it doesn't really have to give any shits about customer backlash. As already established, Netflix is directly competing with Comcast's own content services, so it would seem that Comcast has a motive to passive-aggressively allow the Netflix customer experience on their network degrade.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 04:46
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:I just wonder how many of the people upset about Netflix direct peering are aware that Microsoft, Google, and Facebook among others already participate in direct peering with Comcast and other ISPs? It's great from a technical perspective, and will definitely improve the experience of Netflix customers on Comcast's network. I don't think anyone disputes that. What people are upset about is the power differential between the two companies. Comcast basically forced Netflix's hand at the expense of their common customers.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 15:56
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:Comcast and TWC aren't loving with Netflix's bandwidth, though. Additionally creation ownership and delivery under one roof has happened many times before in the history of American media, to say nothing of other countries. Just because it has happened, and will likely continue, doesn't mean that it should or that such an arrangement serves the public interest. The distribution infrastructure companies have a monopoly (oligopoly, actually, since it's multiple players operating in distinct areas) on said infrastructure. The vast majority of people have no choice among competing service providers, because there really isn't any competition. The fact that these same companies have, and are seeking to expand, ownership of the content as well is definitely cause for concern, because we, the subscribers, are at the mercy of their for-profit corporate structure. Without network neutrality enshrined in law, and possibly a requirement to separate ownership/control of infrastructure and services provided atop it (e.g. the power grid, which has competing generation companies feeding into the same set of lines), the vertically integrated media giants could exercise their control over which content we consume, from whom we get it, and how we get it delivered in ways that are blatantly against the public interest. Is it not clear that this is a situation that's ripe for abuse? The spokespeople for these companies have answered the calls for neutrality regulation with "we haven't abused our position yet, and we promise we won't," and "trust us." Why should we? This has all happened before. Again, this isn't about the fact that Netflix has connected their routers directly to Comcast's; that's sound network engineering. The problem is the context in which this has happened. If Comcast was simply a distribution network, and not a content company as well, then there'd be far less cause for concern. If Comcast was required by law to abide by net neutrality regulations, there'd be far less cause for concern. If Comcast was required to allow fair access to the infrastructure to direct service competitors (e.g. CLECs providing telco services over ILEC lines) then there'd be far less cause for concern. As long as the customers don't have a choice between several competing service providers for access to content, or at the very least, a legal framework which will back them up should there be a neutrality issue, there is most definitely cause for concern. SamDabbers fucked around with this message at 02:13 on Feb 28, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 02:07
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:I'll be frank here: I see absolutely no actual guarding of public interest in "we're still going to have a whole bunch of private companies taking care of all of this, but some will be slightly less integrated". That's just a cosmetic thing to make people who don't think too hard feel good - precisely like the "breakup" of AT&T was! The primary purpose of cable companies first getting into the internet game, and then into the production game, is that it allows them to survive once cable TV dies out, and also allows them to survive if cable network access itself dies out. And in the meantime, Comcast for example gets revenue if you watch a significant part of Netflix's catalog on any ISP anywhere in the world. I agree that vertical integration provides benefits to the corporation's shareholders, and that having a bunch of private for-profit companies running critical infrastructure doesn't particularly serve the public interest, but having an environment where competition is actually possible among service providers would be better than what we have now. It'd be great to have publicly run communications infrastructure (e.g. municipal fiber) become the norm, but that's just not likely to happen in this country any time soon. The breakup of Bell did result in competition in long distance service, which actually lowered the cost to the consumer. It's what competition is supposed to do in the market. Install Windows posted:The context in which it happened is: Netflix's transit partners couldn't provide reliable service. That's all it is. PS: Comcast is required to obey net neutrality regulation now where no other provider is. You can moan about how that will technically end in 2018, but it's far more than any other fixed connection ISP in the country actually has to follow. Again: there is absolutely no cause for concern when transit providers fail to provide their service and very high bandwidth web entities decide to cut the problem off by direct peering. I forgot about Comcast's required neutrality as a result of the NBC deal. Thanks for pointing that out. I can complain about how it's for a limited time and only Comcast, but that's another argument entirely. I also agree that Cogent should take some blame for failing to provide the transit that Netflix was paying them for. If there was even the possibility of competition in the "eyeball networks," it seems like they'd have more incentive to build the links to the peering points to remain competitive, just as Netflix has incentive to have a presence in as many peering points as they can, whether they pay Cogent to build it or do it themselves. Install Windows posted:PS: decoupling production of content from distribution would forbid Netflix from producing any of their own shows anymore. This actually wouldn't bother me. All companies, not just Comcast or Netflix, should have to play by the same rules. cstine posted:And I'd bet they're paying Comcast less than they were paying their prior transit providers, given the huge amount of traffic we're talking about. Yes, but now they've set the precedent, so they're going to have to pay every single eyeball network to peer with them, which will overall increase their costs, which they'll assuredly pass on to the subscribers, who are already paying the eyeball network to deliver the content they've requested, and Netflix to send it.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 03:58
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:The thing is owning production companies doesn't actually prevent competition, and production companies not being owned by distributors doesn't really encourage competition either. It's a non-sequitur to the idea. It is not a non-sequitur. A vertically integrated company has every reason to promote their integrated service over that of a competitor's, or degrade that competitor's service over their network to make their own service look better, especially when they have a monopoly on the distribution network. The idea of separation is to remove the temptation to behave uncompetitively. It would be even better if regulation prevented the production company/subsidiary from giving preferred terms to one distribution provider over another, but it'd be a big first step to prevent the integration in the first place. Install Windows posted:The breakup of Bell did NOT produce competition in long distance service - it was the separate ruling that phone companies must provide access to any long distance service that did that. The baby bells did not seek to compete in each other's local markets for long distance service. Additionally, competition in local phone service remained practically non-existent, and often hampered by the Baby Bells themselves. The ruling mandating that phone companies must provide access to any long distance service wouldn't have come about if there weren't competing long distance services in the first place, which is part of what the breakup accomplished. It was an unfortunate side effect that the deal granted regional monopolies to the baby bells. Still, it was progress, and that's essentially the same thing that's happening right now, just with a new generation of networks. The cable companies are already in a position analogous to the baby bells before the regulation mandating access to competitors, and they're, understandably, fighting tooth and nail to maintain that position. Install Windows posted:It's not just Cogent, it was also at least Level 3 and another transit provider for netflix that have all been having trouble supplying Netflix's particular needs while also supplying everyone else who uses them - Netflix's sheer bulk of one-way data has also caused many of them to lose settlement-free peering privileges with many ISPs. Ok, it wasn't just Cogent. That's not important to the point. Netflix pays for the transit provider to send the data, and subscribers pay both their ISP to deliver the data AND Netflix to send it. The idea that traffic has to be balanced when one network is consumer heavy and the other content heavy is silly; they should both be motivated to deliver what their mutual customers are paying them for. It doesn't make sense for the content networks to have to pay the consumer network to deliver the content that the end customers are also paying it to deliver in the first place. That's double-dipping. Settlement-free peering between consumer networks and content networks makes sense, if the goal is good customer service. Motivation to provide better customer service does not exist when there's no competition. Install Windows posted:Right but those Netflix original programs simply weren't going to happen without the megabucks Netflix has off its regular service. The rules proposed themselves don't really make much sense except for a feel good thing. Someone will produce the content anyway, because there's a lot of money in it if you make something people want to watch. Netflix having preferred (exclusive, in this case) rights to the content is just as bad as if Comcast gave themselves preferred rights to NBC content. Neutrality regulation should prevent content producers from offering different terms to different distributors, so that the competitive market is preserved. If the distributors should have to play fair, then so should the producers. Offer the same terms to all if you're going to offer to anyone. First season does really well? Raise the prices for the second season then, but give everyone the same price. Install Windows posted:But Netflix has set no precedent here. Again, many other major Internet companies already pay for direct peering so they can avoid bottlenecks and slowdowns that can result going over public transit network suppliers. The prices paid to directly peer are roughly similar to the prices paid to deliver the same amount through normal transit networks, Netflix may claim their next service price hike will be to cover increased costs but I'd bet that their financial reports show they had nothing to do with it. We will have to wait and see about the price hike and the financial reports, but again, why should content networks pay a fee to directly peer with consumer networks at all, when the subscriber is basically paying for both ends of the peering? Isn't the whole point of peering to reduce transit costs for both peers? SamDabbers fucked around with this message at 05:34 on Feb 28, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 05:17
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:Non-vertically integrated companies also have every reason to promote everything they've got. Again, you're not showing where the competition will actually come from just by, effectively, rolling some things back to a few years ago where there was also minimal competition in all the same areas. The core of it all is the monopoly. The company that has a monopoly on the last mile AND owns a content producing subsidiary is in a better position to throw their weight around than a company that simply has a monopoly on the last mile. If a monopoly is to be granted at all, then it should definitely come with many strings attached, such as not being allowed to vertically integrate, and to provide wholesale access to the network, even if that's not under consideration at the moment vis-à-vis cable companies. I'm willing to bet that it hasn't been proposed because of lobbyist influence, but of course I'd have a hard time proving it. Install Windows posted:The fact that subscribers pay Netflix and their ISP has nothing to do with anything. Traffic balancing makes perfect sense - when the two partners are exchanging roughly the same loads to each other it greatly simplifies operations, and makes it a mutually beneficial connection, and as such payments between them are restricted. The more unbalanced they get the more one party starts to have to pay, because one side needs the other a lot less. There's no double dipping here! After all, someone already was accepting payment to take in the heavily asymmetric load and it's an industry wide standard that past a certain point one guy's going to have to pay to continue beign asymmetric Consumer ISPs can't possibly attain anything close to an even traffic ratio, given that consumer connections are overwhelmingly asymmetric. In any case, data will be requested by one party or the other, and it behooves them all to be well interconnected. I would argue that the heavy outbound content networks and the heavy inbound consumer networks need each other equally, or would, if the consumer networks didn't have regional monopolies. That gives them extremely unbalanced leverage (you want to reach customers in our region?) in negotiations. The industry standard practice works when the participants are peers in the dictionary sense of the word, not when one has hotels on Park Place and Broadway. Install Windows posted:If you think it's bad for someone to have exclusive rights to media, you're basically calling for the abolition of the entire current media industry. I'm not saying that I disagree with that as an ultimate goal per se, but it's incompatible with things like believing it would be ok to instead just split things up. Indeed, I am arguing for a reformation of the media industry. I am also arguing for the containment and heavy regulation of companies permitted to have a monopoly. Monopoly and integration are extremely problematic. Install Windows posted:"Content networks" aren't really a thing. They should have to pay, for the same reason you have to pay to have internet access. Do you not get that they have to get the data to another network somehow? You either pay a third party, who gets access to others through symmetric mutually beneficial links that "pay" for access by meeting needs in kind, or gets the access by paying the target directly; or you get the access by going and hooking up to the target network yourself. Again, the internet works because, globally, companies agree to these terms where heavy asymmetry means payment and close symmetry means essentially free transit (it's not really free of course, as the companies will share costs for maintaining their own links, as well as paying any exchange hosting sites as neccesary). I'm using "content network" to mean a network with a heavy outbound traffic profile. They should pay for long distance transit to and/or local colo at peering points that their counterpart heavy inbound networks have a presence. Without the consumer networks there'd be no content networks, and vice versa. Pay for access to a transit network that'll haul your data between regions; sure. Pay to have a presence at a datacenter; ok. Pay a network that needs you (ideally) as much as you need them for a local (same datacenter) connection; no. Both networks have already paid to build their networks out to the peering location so they can service their customers. At that point the traffic ratio is irrelevant. The only reason it doesn't work this way is that one network has a monopoly and the other doesn't. Note that I'm talking only about edge networks, not about transit networks. SamDabbers fucked around with this message at 06:40 on Feb 28, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 06:35
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:No company has a content producing monopoly now, nor will they anytime soon. The reason cable access a la the 96 decision for DSL and phone access hasn't been proposed is that it became considered that fiber network companies were "good enough" in combination with how most localities do not refuse access to build a brand new fiber optic network or replace copper POTS with fiber. It isn't really good enough of course. Of course nobody can have a monopoly on content production. I didn't say that. I'm talking about when a company has a monopoly in one aspect of their business (regional end-user ISP) integrates another business (content) in which there are competitors. That gives them unfair leverage, since the competing companies still need to have a relationship with the first (because of the monopoly) in order to do business. The difference is that now they need something from a competitor, and can't get it elsewhere. Localities generally don't refuse access to new buildouts, unless the private telecoms lobbyists have their way. In fact, some cities have tried to build their own to get better service, and the incumbents do everything they can to prevent it. Install Windows posted:Consumer ISPs do provide even traffic ratios most of the time. For one thing, you're forgetting that every consumer ISP out there also has plenty of business customers as well, as well as many major services like Google/Facebook/etc already direct peering and this results in most ISPs being able to maintain settlement-free peering with major transit networks - well, until Netflix really took off that is. And they'll be going right back to settlement-free when Netflix follows suit and direct peers, reverting the peering to symmetric enough. Consumer ISPs aim for even traffic ratios because that's what every other player in the industry is using to determine who pays. However, traffic ratios are not a good indicator of the value derived from the peering connection at all, even if that's what everyone's doing. The access-heavy consumer ISP's customers are going to request the content in any case, the content provider is going to send it, and the consumer ISP is going to pick up that traffic on some interface. It benefits both companies to peer so that expensive transit links don't get overloaded, and paying customers get faster access to the content they request. This was debated at NANOG35 and the audience voted 100 to 3 that traffic ratios were not a rational metric for peering. Install Windows posted:Well no, you're asking for pushing the media industry back about 3-4 years which isn't any kind of meaningful reform, and then simultaneously asking for completely changing it. Again, you can't have a monopoly on "media". Perhaps it was more fragmented 3-4 years ago, but the entire goal is to level the playing field for the benefit of the consumers, not to move it backwards. I'm probably getting some details wrong since I am not an expert about the media and telecoms industries and the regulation thereof, but I contend that it does not serve the public interest to allow for-profit enterprises run for the benefit of their shareholders (not the public) to have monopoly rights to a subset of a market that's become increasingly critical to modern life as we know it without strong regulation to prevent abuse.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 16:15
|
|
|
Install Windows posted:That has already existed for decades though, due to most big cable companies owning or having a controlling interest in at least some cable channels that are also available off their network. This isn't something that happened "now". Agreed. I'm saying it shouldn't be this way. Install Windows posted:I don't understand why you think the only fiber alternates are municipal build though. I don't. It is one alternative that seems to work well where it's been implemented, and has been fought every step by entrenched players who refused to build out fiber in response to customer demand. If there's no competition to one-up, there's no incentive to upgrade anything. Install Windows posted:So again what's the problem here? Why should people stop paying who are paying now? The idea that "well people are going to use that thing" is a rationale for not charging for it doesn't make sense. I'm not saying that there's a monopoly on media, only on last mile connections. A last mile provider whose transit links are getting clogged by streaming video traffic actually derives significant value from directly peering with the streaming video network. The justification of maintaining balanced traffic ratios to get the video provider to pay for peering is flawed because the last mile network would carry the traffic anyway, since their paying customers are requesting it. Install Windows posted:To be blunt here, the problem with all of this is capitalism, and vaguely increasing faux-competition to attempt to fix it with capitalism isn't going to work. And nationalization of internet access is outside the capabilities of the FCC, at least for the moment. Agreed entirely. We can try to make it incrementally better though in the mean time, rather than holding out for the fall of capitalism. The "faux-competition" would at least give the appearance that consumers could vote with their dollars, and switch to a provider who will better meet their needs, instead of only having one option for Internet access. I'm actually part of the fortunate minority who lives in an area with more than one cable provider. My experience has been that the smaller competitor has provided better service for the price compared to the larger, and I think that having a choice between providers is better than not having one, even if it's not as good as having a not-for-profit public network.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 28, 2014 17:14
|
|
|
KillHour posted:Are you an executive at Comcast or something? You're white-knighting a one hundred and fifty eight billion dollar company, and it's making everyone This, and Install Windows posted:The "double charging" bullshit was disproved months ago. [citation needed] Please explain how it is not double-dipping if your customers pay you to carry the traffic they send to, and receive from, all reachable networks in your routing table (i.e. Internet access) and then you turn around and charge the other networks to exchange traffic with your paying customers. Please explain how it does not increase the overall value of your network to peer directly with those networks your customers exchange the most traffic with, regardless of traffic ratio, rather than offering a poor experience by forcing that traffic through congested transit links. That is, unless your goal is to make a competitor's service seem less attractive to a captive customer base than your own in order to extract payment from the competitor or otherwise unfairly protect your service's revenue. Please explain how an end-user ISP like Comcast could get a content network like Netflix to pay them anything if their mutual customers had a variety of competing ISPs to choose from, who could increase the overall value of their networks by offering better connectivity with the networks the customers want to exchange data with. Say you own both a both an apple orchard and the only trucking service that delivers produce to grocery stores in your area. The grocery stores stock apples from many competing orchards, including your own, but you instruct your truck drivers to "accidentally" drop the apples that don't come from your orchard. Then you offer a higher cost "premium" delivery service to the other orchards so that their apples arrive unbruised. Oh, and you've successfully convinced the grocery stores that they shouldn't allow other trucks to deliver apples for them for reasons (  ), so you rake in the cash whether the apple buying public buy your unbruised apples or your competitors' unbruised apples. The orchards pretty much have to pay your "premium" toll if they want to sell apples in your area, because nobody wants bruised apples.I would really like to understand how you've come to your conclusions, and what information I'm missing that I cannot seem to reach the same conclusions. doomisland posted:Don't forget about paid peering "Paid peering" is a misnomer, because the one paying is not really a peer. It's just paid transit with all but the transit network's customers' routes filtered out.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 26, 2014 05:19
|
|
|
Okay then, let's call it "access fees" instead of "double charging." Netflix didn't really have a choice but to become Comcast's customer, since Comcast refused to upgrade the capacity of their peering links with Cogent unless they got paid. An ISP's customers pay them to maintain those peering links at sufficient capacity to carry their traffic, whether it's Joe Schmoe paying Comcast or Netflix paying Cogent. Networks peer without settlement (each paying their own part of the cost) because it costs each side less than using a third party for transit between them, and nobody can really sell "Internet access" without being able to reach the entire Internet. Comcast realized that it had leverage to get someone else to pay them to upgrade their peering links. The majority of Comcast's customers don't really have any other options for Internet access of sufficient speed to use streaming video, which, incidentally, eats into their cable TV revenue. Since Cogent wouldn't pay, Netflix was forced to become Comcast's customer or else lose subscribers who have no other choice but to use Comcast for Internet access. It was a brilliant business maneuver blatant money-grab, but it also set a precedent: every edge ISP will now demand "access fees" from anyone they can, since they can control access to their subscribers. This is a problem because the barrier to entry will be too high for smaller companies than Netflix, Google, or Amazon to pay every ISP like Comcast that refuses to upgrade peering links to keep pace with the traffic routed over them. Transit won't really be all that useful anymore, because every edge ISP will just let their settlement-free links to transit networks peg at full capacity in order to pressure everyone into becoming their direct customer, just like Comcast did. It seems pretty obvious that this is likely to harm the Internet by stifling innovation and increasing the frequency of partition events as ISPs use these saturated peering links to extract tolls. It's not like it doesn't cost Netflix/Google/Amazon anything to set up a peering link. They have to pay for their own equipment and presence in the exchange points, and they should. But so should the ISPs; no network should be allowed to charge for access to their paying customers, because the customers are already paying to be accessible. It may not make sense for a large network to peer with a much smaller one, and that's fine, because the smaller one can always buy commodity transit as long as the larger network's links aren't saturated. Refusing to peer because it doesn't make financial sense is reasonable, but refusing to peer, or demanding access fees to peer, with saturated links to potential transit providers is not. The right thing for Comcast to do when their links with Cogent became saturated by Netflix traffic would've been to a) upgrade the links with Cogent and remain settlement-free, b) peer directly with Netflix, also settlement-free, or c) a combination of both, whichever option cost the least to rebalance the traffic. As annoying as it is sometimes for the average Internet user, Cogent has repeatedly called the bluff of other ISPs that want it to pay for peering. Unbalanced traffic (i.e. Cogent sending more than receiving) is usually the reason cited in these disputes, but it really doesn't make sense. If your customer requests data from ISP XYZ, and you cut off the peering connection to XYZ, then all you're doing is forcing that traffic over a transit port rather than a peering port; your network will still carry the bits. If you're big enough to have no transit links, then the Internet becomes partitioned and that benefits nobody, which is why Cogent still doesn't pay anybody for transit, and they're pushing for the FCC to implement "strong" net neutrality. That actually is a good thing, unless you're a Comcast shareholder.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2014 03:55
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 15, 2024 00:28 |
|
|
Cogent offered to upgrade their settlement-free peering connections, but the other ISPs tried to get access fees, which Cogent didn't and shouldn't pay. I did explain, in detail, why access fees are a problem, and why the traffic ratio argument is erroneous. Customers are paying the ISPs to maintain an acceptable level of service to the whole Internet. It'd be different if Netflix was paying Comcast for transit, just like they were/are with Cogent, but as you can see, Comcast doesn't appear anywhere in the list of peers, which suggests that Comcast is not providing transit to Netflix. Edit: I give up. We've both stated our arguments in multiple ways and are going around in circles. I'm interested in what others have to say on this topic, but I'll post no more in this thread. SamDabbers fucked around with this message at 04:29 on Mar 27, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2014 04:23
|
|