Net2Phone Wants Some Of Skype's eBay Loot, Too

With Such A Big Debate Going On, Would BellSouth Actually Block MySpace?

from the doubt-it dept

Fri, Jun 2nd 2006 5:04pm — Mike Masnick

There's been a ton of buzz today saying that BellSouth had somehow started blocking MySpace and YouTube, leading to all sorts of accusations that the telco was already breaking basic network neutrality by stopping the two extremely popular websites. However, there was no clear basis for the accusation, and some thought it was actually MySpace and YouTube who had done something to be blocked by BellSouth -- which also doesn't make much sense. BellSouth has stepped up and claimed they haven't done anything, and aren't sure what's going on. However, what seems likely is that there was some sort of unintentional network problem that caused the issue. There's almost no chance that BellSouth would actively decide to block two of the most popular sites online just as the big network neutrality debate was heating up. No matter what you think of telco execs, they're not that stupid. Actively blocking such sites at this particular moment could only lead to shift public opinion further to supporting net neutrality, and no fake telco PR commenters would be able to change that. However, what this hubbub has shown is that should any of the telcos actually get around to putting in place such a draconian block, the public outcry would be swift and fierce. The risk, obviously, is that the telcos wouldn't block a site completely, but simply degrade performance. Also, for customers who have no other options for service, there wouldn't be much they could do but complain. Still, this should temper the idea that the telcos would actually try to block specific websites, as they would never get away with it for very long.

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52 Comments

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Trey, 2 Jun 2006 @ 7:08pm

As if Myspace needed any help loading slow.
I've been a somewhat avid myspace user for probably 2 years now... mostly just to keep in touch with people. And I have to say in the last 6 months the quality of the sites and the loading time for photos and individual profiles has gone down the tubes.

It's not unusual for content to error on loading or even not load at all, causing a constant Ctrl + R or just getting disgusted and logging off.

Can you imagine how much worse it would be if Telco's started degrading how much bandwidth myspace could use... talk about timeout's from hell.
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- Will, 3 Jun 2006 @ 7:21pm
  
  Re: As if Myspace needed any help loading slow.
  yeah i've noticed that too but i think most of the problem sits with the fact they have such crappy servers hosting myspace for such a high-bandwidth site...
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 7:35pm
    
    Re: Re: As if Myspace needed any help loading slow
    I agree. Myspace is hell. Only teenagers would put up with. I have been on myspace for over a year and it has slowed down a lot since all of the media attention. Now you have all the kids AND their parents.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 4 Jun 2006 @ 2:50pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: As if Myspace needed any help loading
      I never understand why they don't do AJAX for some of the smaller updates. I mean, it's not hard, and it has fox behind it now, that's a shitload of money.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Garth, 2 Jun 2006 @ 8:11pm

I use Bellsouth DSL and I have noticed that certain parts of myspace will load very slowly or not at all.
Not sure why that' been happening.
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Jeff C., 2 Jun 2006 @ 9:10pm

BellSouth
QOS by domain name? Umm..no,try again.
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- zachary pond, 3 Jun 2006 @ 8:03am
  
  Re: BellSouth
  QOS by IP address? Umm.. that's quite easy. Get your head out of your ass.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Jeff C., 3 Jun 2006 @ 9:50am
    
    Re: Re: BellSouth
    QOS by domain name by an ISP...not happening. Umm, get a grip. Physically possible, but still not going to happen.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - zachary pond, 4 Jun 2006 @ 4:58pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: BellSouth
      Jeff C, you really should know something about a topic before commenting on it. Traffic engineering is easy for an ISP (that's what I do for a living) and it has nothing to do with the domain name.
      
      Maybe you missed the hype about ISPs using traffic engineering to degrade Vonage's service. This is the same thing.
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BlackCow, 2 Jun 2006 @ 9:10pm

I kno this adds nothing of use to this coversation but.... myspace and telcos lick my balls.
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- EdB, 2 Jun 2006 @ 10:39pm
  
  Re:
  You let them do that? GROSS!!!
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Alex Hagen, 2 Jun 2006 @ 11:09pm

Of course
I have always thought the network neutraility debate was kind of a self-correcting problem. If some Telco decided to degrade performance of a certain website, all the victim website would have to do is detect if it the customer is coming in from that domain and put a big banner ad on the top of the page saying "Your ISP is slowing our site down on purpose. Please contact them at 1-800-555-8284 and ask them to stop".

Problem solved.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Jun 2006 @ 11:44pm

"And I have to say in the last 6 months the quality of the sites and the loading time for photos and individual profiles has gone down the tubes. "

More users + not upgrading hardware to handle more users = poor connection for everyone
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- Trey, 3 Jun 2006 @ 3:31am
  
  Re:
  {"And I have to say in the last 6 months the quality of the sites and the loading time for photos and individual profiles has gone down the tubes. "
  
  More users + not upgrading hardware to handle more users = poor connection for everyone}
  
  I wasn't implying it was the ISP's, if you read the title of the post you'll notice I was implying it was mySpace's fault... for exactly the reason you stated. Plus add poor coding techiniques and format to the pot and you get a load of junk.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Alan MadLeese, 4 Jun 2006 @ 1:05pm
    
    Re:MySpace
    Just a note to suggest that folks interested in the fortunes of MySpace might get an insights as to what is going on behind the scenes at MySpace by googling the names of Alan MacLeese and Trent Lapinski. it just could be that the anderson-dewolfe cabin boys and their crew have lost interest in the project and may even be preparing to abandon ship.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Alan MadLeese, 15 Jun 2006 @ 12:58pm
      
      Re: Re:MySpace
      Hallowell here again, I keep on obsessing about the cabin boys running MySpace, in charge of all those antic children, so maybe my concern is excusable. In any case, I felt I had to write again because I just got through reading a great book, "The Google Story,' and was marveling over the apparemt excellence of the company Google, and then I returned to my labors, which is checking out why the secret ownership of MySpace --- sharpsters-hustlers Andrew Alan Wiederhorn and his wife Tiffany of Portland Ore and Clarence (Bud) Coleman and his wife Joan of San Leandro Cal -- still hasn't been revealed by a single arm or leg of the national press or media, whatever. And, in aid of that, I was reading a Forbes magazine interview of cabin lads Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, aka CEO and president of MySpace, and the boys were asked if they could account of the breakneck increase in the number of small rubes in the MySpace tent, and Chris explained he had run bidnesses before, and had an experience crew, and of course it was all about the people on your team, and then Tom, restless as always, bleated:
      "In a way, it's our lack of experience that helps -- definitely for me. The thing I like about Chris is that he's not like all the other people I've met in business. He's able to cut to the chase right away. We don't waste time on things. We didn't sit down and write up this big plan and spreadsheets and try to force an imagined plan. We've b een quick and nimble on our feet. I was working from common sense. Even though Chris does have that badkground, he's never been pushing me to that mold, and he doesn't follow it himself....so we are not doing what everyong else is doing. When we were getting popular, people were saying, "Why aren't you doing this or that?' I thought they were ridicullous, and they thought I was ridiculous."
      What in the fuck did he just say? I said to myself -- there was no one else around. Well, he said they cut to the chase, don't waste time, work from common sense and, and ....and Ithought, having read about the sublimity of innovators such as the Brin and Page heroes, and then soaking up the bafflegab of a cabin boy, was indeed a plunge into the ridicullousness of life, but I guess that's what so great about the Internet. al macleesefrom hallowell, which is nicer than wherever you might be.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
I, for one, 3 Jun 2006 @ 12:51am

Need to catch the ISPs red handed
Exactly, who is to say the degradation of MySpace performance isn't entirely on their end? What is needed is evidence for the ordinary person. It's not easy to know whether your ISP is shaping packets or if the end site is having problems. What if you could know this for sure? What if you prove this in fact in a court of law? A simple application for Windows and MacOS is needed that can use a remote proxy, say in another country, to work in tandem with your own connection and show beyond all doubt that the ISP is acting in prejudice against a companys traffic.

Any good network hacker could knock this up in a few hours. Call it ISPy or something catchy. Have it log the results (anonymous stats) and submit them to a blacklist of badly behaving ISPs.

At the moment the telcos are relying on the ignorance of ordinary users to get away with what they like. Let's put a stop to that.
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- Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 1:08am
  
  Re: Need to catch the ISPs red handed
  with ISPy in mind this whole program could be called 'Get Smart' as it would dutifully communicate the foot traffic of the telco (think shoe phone)
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Alpharocker, 3 Jun 2006 @ 1:27am

myspace ignites flamewars!!!
I can't imagine what would make people think Bell South was messing with myspace...
Could it possibly be this message from Tom:

if you're using Bell South in tennesee, alabama and florida, then you're probably having trouble accessing your home page. we've been calling them and asking them to turn things back on. not sure what the prob is!

In addition to the fact that mySpace is one of the slowest and least functional websites I have ever had the misfortune to use, now they are flaming up teenyboppers everywhere. Maybe this will cause the South to overflow with teenage rioters.
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- Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 11:06am
  
  Re: myspace ignites flamewars!!!
  I would like to know where you get that from , because I am looking on myspace, and there is nothing about that at all...
  
  I think your full of shit
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randolei4.78, 3 Jun 2006 @ 6:44am

Ping Testing
I Pinged myspace.com and the ping for 1000 bytes is 60 ms on a 1mbps connection (comcast)

Average google is: 41 ms

If you want to test this go to

Start

Run

type in cmd

Press Enter

type in ping myspace.com -l 1000

(thats PING myspace.com -L 1000)

(you can replace myspace.com with the IP of a server)

to exit type in exit and press enter

you can also ping indefinitely by using "ping myspace.com -t -l 1000

1000 is hte length of the ping which can range from 32 to 66000
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Ap, 3 Jun 2006 @ 7:52am

Not BS fault
true, Bell South isn've very good at the data end of their business but I doubt they're to blame for this problem. Sounds as if there's a peering issue. When one ISP is handing the packets to another, probably a backbone provider, and that provider's router is either overloaded or broken in some way. If you're having a problem with reaching a specific address, do a tracert (trace route) to it If one hop is extremely long then there's your likely culprit.
To tracert ..open cmd as someone else described,
type in tracert, space, the name or IP addy of the target and then hit enter.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 8:04am

inkernet in alabama?
they's only like 4 of us here in al that even have computerses. ain't nobody here use no mispace.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 10:36am

who cares
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RMartin, 3 Jun 2006 @ 1:25pm

Not just BellSouth
I'm on 5megabit Charter service, and my DaUgHtEr tells me MySpace.com has been incredibly slow for the past couple of weeks.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 2:55pm

I Phucking HATE My Space. I hope they ban it.
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Red, 3 Jun 2006 @ 3:25pm

It's so annoying
Im on a 8 megabit connection and myspace usually works fine except for when I try logging in during peak hours. (around 3-5pm Pacific time)

Myspace really needs to upgrade their servers more often, too many users are joining up for their servers to hadle it all =/ (Though they probably aren't making enough money to do that)

Then again, with all of the people committing Myspacecide, Banning it, and with the downfall of Myspace upon us, I don't think they will have to upgrade their stuff too much anymore.
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Anonymous Coward, 3 Jun 2006 @ 9:52pm

myspace is really stupid anyway....ive never used myspace nor i ever will...its a waste of time how people would spend most of thier time just to make a webpage "cute" so that u can have more friends....and plus more than half of those 500 people u dont even know and the rest are just plain perrverts.
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- BigMeanDog, 4 Jun 2006 @ 4:09pm
  
  Re: Myspace and AC
  Anonymous Coward, you are a freaking moronic sub-intelligent bonehead idiot. I wish you'd come to one of my shows so I could stomp your ass in the moshpit. MySpace is a godsend for musicians and oh yeah, your mom told me to tell you to shut the f-up! You never have anything worthwhile to say anyways.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
randolei4.78, 4 Jun 2006 @ 4:51am

Ping Testing
The idea was to see if Bellsouth users had slower pings. But anyway, Myspace probably has servers that orignally were awesome but in these past 2-3 years their users have been increasing and servers have been reconfiguring to handle as many users as possible. Another problem miht be a lack of server and network maintenance. Like fragmented op systems and files. ALck of ram modules. virus infections. Ummh too many servers in one room without proper room cooling. Over stacked rack servers. etc.

Oh and overworked itnernet connections
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HotGarbage, 4 Jun 2006 @ 7:38am

Thanks...checkpoint met
Sounds like a bunch of conspiracy theory to me. It has been my experience that whatever the simplest explanation is, is most likely the accurate explanation. But it does make for some nice drama on the boards.
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Crazy J, 4 Jun 2006 @ 9:26am

Oh yeah... It's Happening.
To start with this typically occurs in emerging or developing markets such as the move to rural communities. I may have actually observed the necessary equipment being dropped in by a certain midwest cable provider.
Several surrounding areas have been impacted as these rural communities have begun receiving degraded performance for streaming content only. When I asked the gents that dropped the HW in what was up, they said this was temporarily necessary. I question the validity of the BellSouth accusations also, but in the end it was certain types of traffic that they took issue with, not merely the site/content providers.
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Chad, 4 Jun 2006 @ 10:39am

Myspace Suxs
Myspace is the worst peice of software ever created, I don't use Bell South and I have a direct connection to the backbone of the Internet. The truth is the My Space software is totally buggy and the servers are slow, and they probable can not handle all the new load put on this crap. It is amazing that so many idiots choose this online community, it just proves how stupid can be. Especially with all your stupid posts about telco's degrading QOS. Get a fucking life, and get off a piece of crap system like MySpace.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Jun 2006 @ 4:38pm

The Irony...
" [Re: myspace ignites flame wars!!!] I would like to know where you get that from , because I am looking on myspace, and there is nothing about that at all... I think your full of shit" Lawl.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Jun 2006 @ 9:31pm

Well Well
Lets see, considering that MTV owns mySpace perhaps you guys can take it up with them. I know MTV can shell out some for some new servers.. incase you guys didn't know they mySpace got bought out last year some time.
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Devang (profile), 4 Jun 2006 @ 10:03pm

what about the long tail?
You have to wonder the same for sites I haven't been on yet, and those which aren't nearly as big, the long tail of the web so to speak.

The outcry wouldn't be big, and most people wouldn't even notice it, just like I wouldn't notice a site about Russian chimps going down.
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jdragon, 4 Jun 2006 @ 10:45pm

MySpace need to write better code
and re-architect their hacky application..come on, cold fusion? Also, maybe they should also stop trying to upload spyware and streaming tons of crappy javascript junk to the client!
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myspace-er, 5 Jun 2006 @ 3:28am

scans
has anyone else ever noticed scans on there firewall from myspace IPs. i was interested one morning to find my log files suggesting several tcp and udp scans were preformed on my IP throughout the night. having done a little research and a quick whois search i found the originating IP be from myspace. kind of weird....
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randolei4.78, 5 Jun 2006 @ 4:22am

Interesting. tcp and udp can both be used to tranfer information. check to see if the udp's were at regualr intervals, perhaps they were to ensure active network connection. (udp is used for datagrams) tcp id assume someone was streaming content maybe?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 13 Jun 2006 @ 10:32am

MySpace and YouTube are very popular, if they were blocked it would be noticed, how about much smaller sites? How do we know if a site is being limited or blocked?
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Roslyn, 12 Jul 2006 @ 4:19pm

Blockers!
I believe Bellsouth is blocking MySpace. I never receive any MySpace alert emails to my bellsouth account. If I try to have my password emailed to me via my bellsouth account I do not receive the email. If I go and change my profile on MySpace to my generic email address with yahoo I receive their email! Coincidence - I think not!
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- aggravated with myspace, 14 May 2007 @ 8:43pm
  
  Re: Blockers!
  Actually, I was deleted from myspace about a week ago and I tried emailing them twice to find out why... I guess now I know why I didn't get a response.
  
  I wonder if this bellsouth issue has anything to do with my account being deleted?
  
  I live in Louisiana.
  
  I tried to make a new account and myspace will tell you this is you use bellsouth email:
  
  "We are currently not accepting accounts from Bellsouth email addresses. Please try using a different email address". Or something like that.
  
  I found this article by googling "myspace and bellsouth" because I've been so confused and have not been able to get answers from customer service or "Tom".
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Jess, 31 Jul 2006 @ 8:45pm

myspace is slower than ANYTHING
i just started using myspace because all my friends are on it, but sometimes I can't even log in because its TOO DAMN SLOW! And I have Optimum Online cable which is really fast on all other sites. And there are load errors on 1/6 pages everytime I click. It makes me sick to think their service is this bad and they're still so popular...
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Toonie's Friend, 1 Oct 2006 @ 12:44pm

Sabotage of Complaint Sites
What you describe hasn't happened to me, but I don't use Bell South. Sometimes my connection just dies on the more complicated myspace pages.

But I woudn't be surprised to find a company sabatoging a forum that had critical content. When I set up a website that includes information about a local veterinary hospital, (Kindness Animal Hospital in Maryland, and head vet Marc Katz) it started out at the top of google search results and within a few months disappeared entirely. I suspect people with the means to do so can now block sites with content critical of them or their businesses.

If anybody knows how to get around this, please let me know, as I really believe that clients of Kindness ANimal Hospital in Maryland have a right to read this story and make up their own minds about whether or not this is a safe place for their pets. Clearly I don't think so, but my site doesn't come up on Google anymore. See www.thetooncesproject.com
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Phoenix, 17 Dec 2006 @ 4:52am

Just Myspace?
This problem began for me with Myspace, then hotmail, and now it's reached several sites I had used daily without problems. Not sure what's going on, but I've tried every hardware and software solution I can think of. There's no good reason why some sites will not work and others aren't having any problems, except that there is something wrong at Bellsouth. Unfortunately for me, my area has very few practical internet options than Bellsouth.
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Plz Help!!!, 20 Jan 2007 @ 3:26pm

Bellsouth Blocked Myspace?????
I cannot receive any myspace alerts to my bellsouth email account. Can someone please help me???
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Plz Help!!!, 20 Jan 2007 @ 3:27pm

Bellsouth Blocked Myspace?????
I cannot receive any myspace alerts to my bellsouth email account. Can someone please help me???
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
fred, 9 Feb 2007 @ 6:13am

bellsouth/myspace
I've been unable to access myspace for over a month. The log in page just keeps reappearing. I've contacted myspace several times and they have been of no help. Bellsouth says everything on their end is working fine. help!
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Rick, 11 Feb 2007 @ 1:12pm

I think bellsouth is doing something....
When I go to myspace the load times of the pages are extremely slow it is like dial-up. Sometimes it gets so slow that I have to just exit out of it because of the frusteration of waiting. Any other site loads fast without lag. When I get on my friend's cable internet myspace loads really fast so something is up with bellsouth. Their internet also has terrible routing, My ping to a Atlanta server is around 50ms and i'm in northern FL. They need alot of work, they cannot advertise to a gamer and have slow service.
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Sandra Geniepiper, 17 Mar 2007 @ 12:43pm

Bellsouth and MySpace
I just tried to sign up for MySpace and they are not accepting bellsouth e-mail addresses.
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DANIELLE YOUNG, 12 Jun 2007 @ 4:57pm

MYSPACE
I FORGOT MY PASSWORD AND DONT WONT TO MAKE A NEW PAGE
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D, 22 Jan 2008 @ 3:07pm

MySpace
Sorry, www.myspace.com has been blocked by your network administrator.
Please contact your network administrator if you have questions. This service is powered by OpenDNS.

^^^
This is the message I'm receiving today in SC.
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