Net Neutrality
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They don't need to pass along charges to the customer when they have profits.
The less profit they make, the less willing people are to buy their stock and not sell it.
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Look, if you go to a store and buy your frosted flakes, you're paying for frosted flakes. And the store's electricity. And employees. And all their other costs. Very simple. It is the store's burden to manage paying their bills and employees, but I paid for it.
Safeway/Comcast found a way to extract rent from Kelloggs/Netflix.
Well, it's kind of like Walmart going to a brewery and stating: "Hey, guys, your beer is so well-received by our customers that we're running out of stock regularly. Thus we need to buy some additional racks for your beer and we want you to pay for those racks! And you also have to pay for the trucks delivering your beer. And the guys unloading the trucks."
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we have so many ISPs
We do as far as the consumer sees it - but a lot of these ISPs are resellers and are just buying transit from the 4/5 Tier 2 providers. There's less competition there.
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Look, if you go to a store and buy your frosted flakes, you're paying for frosted flakes. And the store's electricity. And employees. And all their other costs. Very simple. It is the store's burden to manage paying their bills and employees and maintaining and expanding their infrastructure, but I paid for it.
And if they have to replace a wall or something, the next time you come back, prices might go up.
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We do as far as the consumer sees it - but a lot of these ISPs are resellers and are just buying transit from the 4/5 Tier 2 providers. There's less competition there.
But there is enough competition to mean they can't get away with the shit that Comcast is trying to get away with.
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And if they have to replace a wall or something, the next time you come back, prices might go up.
Well, unless they
extortconvice Kellogs to pay for that wall, of course.
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And if they have to replace a wall or something, the next time you come back, prices might go up.
They "might", if there are serious economic distortions at play.
Realistically, they would have to retain some earnings to hedge against the possibility of accidents (i.e., pay for insurance) and make long term plans for renovation, so they end up with slightly lower profits for a year instead of no profits for a quarter.
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And if they have to replace a wall or something, the next time you come back, prices might go up.
Well, yes, but the store isn't charging both the customer and the supplier to repair the wall.
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I don't think that there are any services left who are truly giving you unlimited traffic. At least that's the case in Germany. Granted, the limits are usually quite huge (my own ISP is talking about 60 GB per day) but the limits do exist.
Which, i think, is some of the disconnect that exists in the debate. Most non-cellular providers in the US have to deal with EXTREME amounts of push-back every time they try to move toward a data-capped system. Which basically means they (have to) set their pricing in such a way that the user who does little more than checking their e-mail and a few static web pages pays a very similar amount as the Netflix user. Yet the Netflix user is putting much more (constant 4Mbps per stream) strain on the infrastructure, mostly centered around peak hours (dinner to bedtime), since they use Netflix as a primary source of evening entertainment.
So, at it's core, the "providers shouldn't be able to charge Netflix for the traffic" side of the Net Neutrality debate is socialism all the way down. Internet prices from everyone according to the standard rate, Internet to everyone according to their needs.
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As is, the ISP isn't charging the customer the full cost of their usage (in most places in the US).
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Which, i think, is some of the disconnect that exists in the debate. Most non-cellular providers in the US have to deal with EXTREME amounts of push-back every time they try to move toward a data-capped system. Which basically means they (have to) set their pricing in such a way that the user who does little more than checking their e-mail and a few static web pages pays a very similar amount as the Netflix user. Yet the Netflix user is putting much more (constant 4Mbps per stream) strain on the infrastructure, mostly centered around peak hours (dinner to bedtime), since they use Netflix as a primary source of evening entertainment.
So, at it's core, the "providers shouldn't be able to charge Netflix for the traffic" side of the Net Neutrality debate is socialism all the way down. Internet prices from everyone according to the standard rate, Internet to everyone according to their needs.
Didn't we have a "what do you pay for your internet connection?" thread some time back where it turned out that US' prices are quite a bit higher than most other places?
Which would make this particular argument of yours a bit disingenuine.
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Popluation per sq km: Germany - 231 as of 2013. United States 35 as of 2013.
So, Internet connections are theoretically 7x more expensive per person (more in rural areas, less in urban areas) in terms of line infrastructure required (which is the bulk of the installation & maintenance cost).
So if US internet connections were only 2x as expensive as European countries, which Ookla's net index seems to bear out (it's actually a lot closer than that, comparing to the UK/Germany), then they're a lot cheaper than they should be expected to be.
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<a href="http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.POP.DNST">Popluation per sq km</a>: Germany - 231 as of 2013. United States 35 as of 2013.
So, Internet connections are theoretically 7x more expensive per person (more in rural areas, less in urban areas) in terms of line infrastructure required (which is the bulk of the installation & maintenance cost).
So if US internet connections were only 2x as expensive as European countries, which <a href="http://www.netindex.com/value/allcountries/">Ookla's net index</a> seems to bear out (it's actually a lot closer than that, comparing to the UK/Germany), then they're a lot cheaper than they should be expected to be.
Well, counter example: Finland.
Boom, headshot.
And from what I hear, your ISPs are not exactly tripping over themselves trying to establish internet connection out in the boonies...
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Finland: US$2.86 per Mbps, 13 people per km2
United States: US$3.52 per Mbps, 35 people per km2
Germany: US$2.76 per Mbps, 231 people per km2
France: US$6.37 per Mbps, 121 people per km2<song>One of these things is not like the others...</song>
Filed under: see also: Italy, Spain, Portugal, Ireland
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It's not my problem if you're unable to comprehend what you yourself are quoting there.
Maybe the US ISPs are merely too stupid to provide cheap broadband - wouldn't surprise me, what with the de-facto monopolies you've got going there.
Or how exactly do you think Finland manages to provide broadband cheaper while also having a lower population density? Magic?
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Apparently a weaker version of the Magic by which the US provides broadband at 40-60% less than France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland, all while having approximately a third to a half of the population density of all five countries.
The core of my point is that US Internet isn't significantly more expensive than "Western" European Internet.
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Apparently a weaker version of the Magic by which the US provides broadband at 40-60% less than France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland, all while having approximately a third to a half of the population density of all five countries.
The core of my point is that US Internet isn't significantly more expensive than "Western" European Internet.
There's a few problems with that analysis. Firstly, averages cover all sorts of sins (e.g., why does the emptiness of Montana make poor service in New Jersey acceptable?). Secondly, what are the definitions of what is being measured on the networking side? Thirdly, it would make more sense to compare urban internet with urban internet, suburban with suburban, and rural with rural; that would make the comparison far more meaningful. And fourthly, the larger size of the US should mean that (some) ISPs can grow larger, but the large majority of operations ought to paralllelize just fine.
I hate this whole “the US is a big area” argument. It's virtually always used to make lame excuses. Sorry you've picked up my ire this time.
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Yeah, I guess I didn't pick a terribly great initial argument. The crux of my argument should be "even without adjusting for the demographic differences between the US and Western Europe, the Internet in the US isn't significantly more expensive." And that's even with the majority of the US not having significant government "investment" in the Internet infrastructure. So there is very little hidden cost via
officially sanctioned thefttaxation to add on to US Internet service costs.
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Which would make this particular argument of yours a bit disingenuine.
What? No, it helps explain why it's more expensive than some other places.
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So there is very little hidden cost via officially sanctioned theft taxation to add on to US Internet service costs.
There are a number of questions that might be asked. But it's best to start by splitting into urban, suburban and rural service wherever you're measuring: people who live out in the boonies are naturally likely to have to spend more overall on all sorts of infrastructure due to reduced ability to share the costs and infrastructure with others. This will also largely deal with the other key structural differences between the US and Europe: we'll be comparing like with like.
Given that, we can then ask how much the service costs and what you get for that, and indeed what you can get (because some people will choose to get a lower service level and pay less, and there's always going to be someone not getting as much as they want to get). We also need to not assume that each side of the Atlantic is homogenous when answering these questions, as each has wide variation.
This all makes it hard to boil down into nice pat answers. That's reality. :)
The principal charge laid against certain ISPs (though not all!) is that they have under-invested in infrastructure. (Yes, the dratted stuff needs regular replacement anyway and it costs money. That's infrastructure for you.) Not investing in infrastructure will definitely increase short-term profits; that's obvious. Furthermore, the charge is that they have instead used their power of incumbency and their local monopolies to resist having real competition. That's where things get very murky indeed.
Unfortunately, where such things exist, it takes regulation to change things because monopolies can be thoroughly self-sustaining. It's a mess. (Europe has different messes, such as still somewhat eye-watering mobile roaming charges that kick in far too easily. I know the reasons for it, but it still sucks.)
FWIW, I remember being insanely jealous of how cheap internet access was in the US during most of the '90s. Heck, you guys were even able to have it switched on the whole time! (Per-minute charging sucked ever so much.)
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Europe has different messes, such as still somewhat eye-watering mobile roaming charges that kick in far too easily.
I… think that's been fixed now? At least partly.
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It's been reduced. It's not being abolished until like 2018, if it even happens that soon.
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I… think that's been fixed now? At least partly.
I think they've been fixing it for voice (it was making mobile phones unusable in large parts of Belgium for example
) but it's still much more expensive for internet the last time I looked. Unless you get a short-term SIM from a provider in the country you're in; it works pretty well for a lot of vacationing but it's nuts for most business travel.Oh well, at least we don't have phones (meaningfully) locked to a provider.
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Furthermore, the charge is that they have instead used their power of incumbency and their local monopolies to resist having real competition. That's where things get very murky indeed.
Unfortunately, where such things exist, it takes regulation to change things because monopolies can be thoroughly self-sustaining.
Perhaps. But it's important to note that the monopolies generally exist because of existing regulation. Whatever you think the solution should be, it definitely isn't letting a Federal agency with a less than sterling track record go off in secret and figure out how to fix stuff.
I doubt they would even be terribly concerned about local monopolies anyways. That sort of thing makes it easier for the government to do its thing. They can partner up with the Comcasts of the world for their mutual benefit.
But...oh, Comcast is agin' it, so we better do whatever they say.
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I think they've been fixing it for voice (it was making mobile phones unusable in large parts of Belgium for example
) but it's still much more expensive for internet the last time I looked. Unless you get a short-term SIM from a provider in the country you're in; it works pretty well for a lot of vacationing but it's nuts for most business travel.
Oh well, at least we don't have phones (meaningfully) locked to a provider.
Naw, it's actually reasonable now. My current (very basic) contract has me pay 1.99€ per day for 50 MB if I'm using roaming data.
I could also choose to pay 0.238€ per MB or I could pay a flat fee of 4.99€ per month.
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My current (very basic) contract has me pay 1.99€ per day for 50 MB if I'm using roaming data.
…still seems pricey to me…
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I get EU roaming data for £1.99/day with no limit on usage. The speed reduces the more I use, apparently, but there's no other limit on amount.
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Perhaps. But it's important to note that the monopolies generally exist because of existing regulation. Whatever you think the solution should be, it definitely isn't letting a Federal agency with a less than sterling track record go off in secret and figure out how to fix stuff.
You guys need a free market in internet access.
Isn't it fascinating how in areas with Google Fiber, the price of everyone else's service drops and the quality of provision goes up? That's the effect of some real meaningful competition. But you don't get free markets just by magic, especially when there's incumbent
monopolistsoligopolists in bed with fucked up local regulation. There's no free market fairy; you have to have some rules in place to keep genuine competition viable.Be suspicious of federal regulation, sure, that's healthy, but don't assume it's automatically the worst option. Bad things can happen in other ways too, and being suspicious of local and state regulation is at least as important.
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You guys need a free market in internet access.
Tell that to the Net Neutrality guys!
Isn't it fascinating how in areas with Google Fiber, the price of everyone else's service drops and the quality of provision goes up? That's the effect of some real meaningful competition.
Absolutely.
But you don't get free markets just by magic, especially when there's incumbent monopolists oligopolists in bed with fucked up local regulation. There's no free market fairy; you have to have some rules in place to keep genuine competition viable.
Rules to rule the government. We used to have a Constitution, but hear that things. like, over a hundred years old or whatever.
No, obviously there's more to this than putting up a competing web page. I think everyone gets that.
Be suspicious of federal regulation, sure, that's healthy, but don't assume it's automatically the worst option. Bad things can happen in other ways too, and being suspicious of local and state regulation is at least as important.
Yes, sadly, people aren't terribly interested in holding government accountable. And when they are, it seems to often be with horrible misconceptions (like Comcast is against Net Neutrality, so we should all be for it). Still, smaller governments (i.e., local
state Federal) are easier to lobby and change direction.
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We used to have a Constitution, but hear that things. like, over a hundred years old or whatever.
It's my understanding that the US Constitution's only real value nowadays is as a tourist attraction; after all, the Supreme Court seems to have a habit of ignoring it…
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after all, the Supreme Court seems to have a habit of ignoring it…
Yes and no. The first amendment has been getting stronger, as has the second, lately. I think the fourth has been slipping. The biggest problems, IMHO, are from not worrying about enumerated powers, or deciding that we can twist the words so the enumerations can mean anything.
INB4 @Poygeekery falsely accuses me of the same
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The biggest problems, IMHO, are from not worrying about enumerated powers, or deciding that we can twist the words so the enumerations can mean anything.
Also forgetting that unenumerated rights are rights nonetheless.
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Also forgetting that unenumerated rights are rights nonetheless.
Yes, but violating those is just a way of exercising unenumerated powers.
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And when they are, it seems to often be with horrible misconceptions (like Comcast is against Net Neutrality, so we should all be for it).
Well, that's all your ISPs' fault. They have become so universally loathed that anything they want will automatically create a reflex to deny them exactly that in the general populace.
At this point, those guys could state that the sky is blue and everyone else would go: "Naw, it's green."
They have a massive PR problem and as such, they really should neither be surprised nor whine about the tempest that's blowing against them...
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They have become so universally loathed that anything they want will automatically create a reflex to deny them exactly that in the general populace.
Only for people like @blakeyrat, but he's who he is. Most people don't have a clue about what's going on. And pretty much none of us know what the FCC thinks Net Neutrality is. But I'm sure the big players will come out just fine.
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There was a publicized event where L3 was like "We'll bring the cables, you just have to plug your side in." No Verizon techs showed up.
can you cite that one? i'd be very interested in reading that.
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Why is that? Maybe they can’t afford a new port card because they’ve run out – even though these cards are very cheap, just a few thousand dollars for each 10 Gbps card which could support 5,000 streams or more. If that’s the case, we’ll buy one for them. Maybe they can’t afford the small piece of cable between our two ports. If that’s the case, we’ll provide it. Heck, we’ll even install it.
http://blog.level3.com/open-internet/verizons-accidental-mea-culpa/
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Interesting. Having read that post and the Verizon post, I'm not sure what to think. But his contention about how that red line is wrong definitely seems...wrong. The L3 guy even talks about what it's meant to represent, he just says that it's Verizon's fault.
However, I'm not sure if there's more behind this, like if Verizon thought that needed something extra to get 'er done. I found the Verizon response to that:
He basically says that L3 was being hypocritical, inasmuch as in the Verizon / L3 dispute, they were playing the same role as Cogent in the Cogent / Comcast stuff:
Summing up their position, Level 3 said:
To be lasting, business relationships should be mutually beneficial. In cases where the benefit we receive is in line with the benefit we deliver, we will exchange traffic on a settlement-free basis. Contrary to Cogent's public statements, reasonable, balanced, and mutually beneficial agreements for the exchange of traffic do not represent a threat to the Internet. They don't represent a threat to anyone other than those trying to get a free ride on someone else's network.
So what has changed for Level 3? Unfortunately, they are now the one “trying to get a free ride on someone else’s network” and failing to “keep the interest of their customers paramount.”
I'll let someone else dig up an L3 response to that.
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Only for people like @blakeyrat, but he's who he is.
I think you underestimate how many decisions are made due to spite.
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I think you underestimate how many decisions are made due to spite.
That's possible. I think the ignorance factor is larger, but that could just be my ignorance talking.
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Tell that to the Net Neutrality guys!
I see the
, but if there was actually competition for ISPs, they'd be paying Netflix for the right to have an on-premises CDN. And they'd be paying for it out of their producer surplus, instead of extracting rent from the customer.
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if there was actually competition
Yes, cutting that Gordian knot would help so many things, and not just with ISPs.
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The only reason they introduced net neutrality here was to keep the mobile providers from protecting their text monopolies.
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Well, that's all your ISPs' fault. They have become so universally loathed that anything they want will automatically create a reflex to deny them exactly that in the general populace.
The two biggest ISPs that top the "worst customer service EVAH" awards have something else in common -- they're also TV Cable Companies. I'd suspect that the ever increasing march of the cable bill, plus the blackouts that happen whenever the local broadcast stations or ESPN or Faux News get blacked out over carriage fee/bundle disputes, are larger influences in why people dislike Comcast/TWC service than their Internet & Netflix (for now, at least).
Plus, honestly, when people call their ISP (and I'm going to assume similar behavior carries over to their TV provider), they're total assholes about their outage. I think you'd be more likely to get civil behavior from someone if you just shot their dog, versus when their Internet is down1.
1Only slight hyperbole
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I was not aware that
sold cable television.
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I think you'd be more likely to get civil behavior from someone if you just shot their dog, versus when their Internet is down
Of course. If the internet is down, they can't get in facebook and twitter to tell everyone about how this jerk shot their dog.
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Yes, but we're talking about Internet Service Providers, not Internet Disservice Providers.
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I Jeff'd 2 posts to a new topic: Crazy ISP Stories
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Now that the FCC has published the new net neutrality rules in full, some nice British folks have published an easy-to-digest breakdown. The money quote:
The FCC repeatedly acknowledges within the rules that it doesn't really know what it's doing.
We've read all 400 pages of the FCC's baffling net neutrality rules – here's what YOU need to know
