

Detailed report shows how U.S. Internet access monopolies punish rivals - evanh2002
https://medium.com/backchannel/jammed-e474fc4925e4

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evanh2002
John Oliver calls it "cable company f*ckery" and we've all suspected it
happens. Now on Steven Levy's new Backchannel publication on Medium, Susan
Crawford delivers decisive proof, expertly dissecting the Comcast-Netflix
network congestion controversy. Her source material is a detailed traffic
measurement report released this week by Google-backed M-Lab — the first of
its kind — showing severe degradation of service at interconnection points
between Comcast, Verizon and other monopoly "eyeball networks" and "transit
networks" such as Cogent, which was contracted by Netflix to deliver its bits.
The report shows that interconnection points give monopoly ISPs all the
leverage they need to discriminate against companies like Netflix, which
compete with them in video services, simply by refusing to relieve network
congestion caused by external traffic requested by their very own ISP
customers. And the effects victimize not only companies targeted but ALL
incoming traffic from the affected transit network. The report proves the
problem is not technical, but rather a result of business decisions. This is
not technically a Net neutrality problem, but it creates the very same
headaches for consumers, and unfair business advantages for ISPs. In an
accompanying article, Crawford makes a compelling case for FCC intervention.

~~~
brokenmusic
The question people should be asking, how come in Eastern European countries
internet access is so cheap and fast, yet barely regulated? It's so easy to
argue for more regulation when things go wrong: trying to control businesses
always sounds like a more noble idea than settings them free. And yet, in
every possible example we see that where there's more freedom of enterprise,
the customer always wins. And this is especially obvious with ISPs.

~~~
dantheman
And the answer is simple: The local ISPs in the US are granted a monopoly by
the local government, given special privileges, and given free money. These 3
issues make it hard for new competitors to enter the market.

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awalton
Shame we have the data from nearly a hundred million witnesses, and yet the
feds still won't put together a racketeering case and go after these mobsters.

~~~
kristopolous
and just how do you plan to make them accountable to you?

Until you can answer that question, you won't get a seat at the table. Sorry.

~~~
ohashi
An idealist would say November 4.

~~~
001sky
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Between_Scylla_and_Charybdis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Between_Scylla_and_Charybdis)

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painflop
Was it Enron company? that was in business with electric power and would
shutdown power factories from time to time just to make shortage of power and
rise the price of electricity? How bad did it end?

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click170
I truly appreciate that this is being publicized complete with evidence, but
has the author also written a letter to the FCC and other relevant bodies to
complain about this behaviour and offer their supporting evidence?

I'm concerned that people will feel placated by writing a blog post, when I
think we need to be communicating more directly with the FCC.

~~~
jonathanwallace
Did you read whole article? This wasn't the author but to answer your
question, yes, people have contacted the FCC.

"“You know, I contacted the FCC. I contacted the [state] utilities commission,
just for help because you couldn’t make any ground with Verizon, Cogent, or
anyone,”..."

~~~
dmckeon
Can anyone with knowledge of Citrix speak to this:

> Because Boegly uses a Citrix application for payroll data, and “Citrix
> doesn’t like packet loss,” according to Boegly, the process was failing. ...
> > “Any time you have packet loss over a Citrix connection, it’s going to
> dump you,” says Boegly. “And that’s exactly what’s happening in the middle
> of the process. It has to then be started all over again and then begin the
> transfer process to get it to connect.”

If accurate, it sounds less than optimal.

~~~
davidp
Pretty sure this is straight-up TCP behavior, possibly combined with trying to
send large files inside the TCP connection via the Citrix protocol. If you
consistently lose some percentage of packets for a while, the TCP connection
can drop. The file transfer doesn't have auto-resume built in because it
operates at a very low level.

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logn
I'm guessing that the networks with speakeasy.net/speedtest/ and speedtest.net
were not slowed or special solutions were put in place to assure fast
connection... because TWC's favorite answer is to point me to these.

~~~
toyg
In the UK, it's common knowledge that ISPs "special case" speed-testing
websites as soon as they learn of their existence.

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septerr
I really appreciate the clarity with which this article described the issue. I
had read an article by someone from Netflix few months (I think) ago about
this and did not get the clear understanding this article provided.

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jokoon
youtube is being made completely useless...

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contingencies
I thought this was going to be about Facebook, Google, Microsoft.

~~~
sliverstorm
They aren't internet access monopolies.

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arh68
I don't think it's a mystery to any regulator what's going on. I think it's
hard to argue against the notion that _this is good for the economy_. If the
Monopolistic ISPs can extract more wealth out of the content-to-consumer
pipeline, doesn't the GDP go up? Everybody wins?

~~~
privong
> If the Monopolistic ISPs can extract more wealth out of the content-to-
> consumer pipeline, doesn't the GDP go up?

Perhaps you are being sarcasic, but I cannot tell. This is a version of the
broken window fallacy[0]. The money spent on the ISPs is now unavailable for
netflix (as an example) to spend hiring new people, buying rights to new
movies, etc. So it is not a given that this increases the GDP, or that it
would do so in a healthy or beneficial way.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window)

~~~
arh68
Yes. (: Definitely being sarcastic, just playing some mild Devil's Advocate.
It's how I spend karma. I think you're almost right. It's almost exactly the
broken window parable. The only difference I have is that it's not [just]
Netflix's money being wasted on broken glass, it's the ISP customers.

Netflix has to pay because they're too lazy to run their own ISP. In a way.
Get your own 'last mile' customers, or pay the man. But _why_ are there _no
other ISPs_ Netflix can choose from? Certainly a competitor could charge less,
or nothing. But the customers all seem to want throttled access! They
certainly pay the monthly fees. But _why_ would a rational customer do that?

When would a rational customer pay for cracked windows? Why would Netflix, the
stained glass entertainer, deliver their product on cracked glass? When
there's only one glassmaker in town, I'd guess.

~~~
asynchronous13
> Netflix has to pay because they're too lazy to run their own ISP. In a way.
> Get your own 'last mile' customers, or pay the man. But why are there no
> other ISPs Netflix can choose from? Certainly a competitor could charge
> less, or nothing. But the customers all seem to want throttled access! They
> certainly pay the monthly fees. But why would a rational customer do that?

Because the end customers do not have a choice. In most areas of the US, the
large ISPs have a government granted monopoly.

Take the house where I live as an example. I can choose Comcast or no
internet. Great choice, right? In the region where I live, there are exactly 2
high-speed internet providers. So that lets the ISPs claim that there is
competition. In reality, there's only a handful of houses in this region that
can choose between the 2 options. Most houses are stuck with one choice or no
connection.

At my work, the choices are even more limited. We pay crazy amounts for a T1
line at 1.5Mbs because that's the only option! Neither of the two high-speed
options will provide access to our building. (They call regularly, "would you
like our high-speed business package", "YES!", "oh, sorry, we can't connect to
that address", "Then stop calling.")

Why have no new companies entered the market to provide better service?
There's an enormous capital outlay to get started. Even worse, the local
government regulations about running new cable or fiber make it cost-
prohibitive or downright impossible.

Google is laying out new fiber networks right now. They have adequate capital,
and they have the clout so that local governments are willing to change laws
to get google fiber. The average startup does not have that kind of sway.

