BBC To ISPs: Don't Traffic Shape Me, Bro

from the name-and-shame dept

Fri, Apr 4th 2008 8:49am — Mike Masnick

While there have been some complaints from ISPs about how much bandwidth the BBC's iPlayer offering takes up, the BBC is being rather aggressive in responding. mike allen writes in to let us know that the BBC has announced that it will publicly "name and shame" any ISP that tries to traffic shape in a way that harms its iPlayer offering. As the BBC's Ashley Highfield says: "Unlimited broadband should mean unlimited." He then goes on to suggest that other websites also agree to name and shame traffic shaping ISPs: "Content providers, if they find their content being specifically squeezed, shaped, or capped, could start to indicate on their sites which ISPs their content worked best on (and which to avoid)." Sounds reasonable enough. Of course, you might say that if all ISPs agree to traffic shape, then naming and shaming them won't do much good. But, if there's a truly competitive market, that would simply open up the opportunity for one ISP to publicly claim that it wasn't traffic shaping, and then happily watch customers come running.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: iplayer, traffic shaping, uk
Companies: bbc

16 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased), 4 Apr 2008 @ 8:59am

Different ISP, Same Pipe
I am guessing there is only one line and all other "competing" ISP's share through a lease or something. An ISP could claim they don't traffic shape but the line owner could be shaping, just like in Canada.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- J, 4 Apr 2008 @ 10:53am
  
  Re: Different ISP, Same Pipe
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Jake, 4 Apr 2008 @ 11:13am
  
  Re: Different ISP, Same Pipe
  That could well be true; it's only in the last ten years that we've had any competition to speak of in telecoms. Don't ask me who does own the lines, though.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Hellsvilla, 4 Apr 2008 @ 9:34am

Good on em!
Naming and shaming works very well when it is used with brutal honesty. It does an excellent job swaying public opinion, which then sways joe publics spending habits.

However, it has be done with brutal HONESTY. One ounce of inaccuracy and you wind up making a mockery of yourself. So I hope that everyone that takes part in this name and shame effort has clean hands before they start, and they keep their hands clean throughout.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Alimas, 4 Apr 2008 @ 12:57pm
  
  Re: Good on em!
  Wish we could get that kind of thing going on over here in the US.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
mike allen, 4 Apr 2008 @ 11:18am

having read the article several times
Ive come to the conclution that the ISPs have not got the bandwidth to cope but they should have enough to cope for all needs of all customers end off. After all thats what we pay for!!!!!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Wyatt Ditzler, 4 Apr 2008 @ 12:40pm

Capital idea
I thought this was an incredible idea. I am surprised that the content providers in the US have not started a similar action to hedge of network management.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Shandor, 4 Apr 2008 @ 12:54pm

Invasion of the Traffic Shapers
This is probably the first time since the abolition of the slave trade that the Brits have beat us to something good!
Don't forget that the US Govt has allowed temporary monopolies (phone) and local monopolies (cable) when appropriate, and rescinded them later when appropriate to the times. It's prob'ly time for it to step in again for the customers' sake, and stop this rapacious shaping/tazing of the customer.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- mike allen, 4 Apr 2008 @ 1:56pm
  
  Re: Invasion of the Traffic Shapers
  I have no idea how many ISPs in the UK but more like over 100 than under ours can be independent of telecoms the phone companies have to allow the ISPs to put their equipment in tele exchanges.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 4 Apr 2008 @ 4:38pm

"This is probably the first time since the abolition of the slave trade that the Brits have beat us to something good!"

Typical arrogant American twat.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Fritzo, 5 Apr 2008 @ 5:42pm

Before everyone agrees with the BBC, take a step back and look at it from the standard ISP's point of view. They have to maintain a very expensive backbone to the Internet, and because there is no connection that exists that will allow every single broadband subscriber to run flat out, ISP's use a metered formula to calculate how much bandwidth is needed. For instance, an ISP may have an OC3 connection (155mbps), and this would normally service, I don't know, 1000 subscribers. They're then able to give those subscribers a set low price.

Now, if just 25 of those 1000 subscribers start flooding the network, they screw up the quality of service for every other customer that is using their connection in a foreseen manner. The ISP could buy more bandwidth, but that extra pipe has to get paid for somehow, and that means your ISP subscription will go up. The more effective and economical way of dealing with the issue would be to cap the offenders.

So, here's the question I'm proposing: Is the BBC's iPlayer tool maybe pushing the Internet too hard? People see ISP's as just out to make money, but truthfully after wholesale prices profit margins of subscriber accounts are pretty thin. The BBC telling ISPs to simply "add bandwidth because we're doing something that demands it" is a bit arrogant and selfish, as it's going to end up hurting the subscriber in the end with higher prices.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Octothorpe, 6 Apr 2008 @ 8:14am
  
  Re: 1000 subscribers to OC3
  As a network engineer, I must dispute your claims. Your arguments are exactly those of ISPs, however as a large business, I pay roughly $20,000 for 1Gbps of throughput. in other words, $19 per megabyte of throughput (and that is symmetrical). At home (Comcast) I pay $60/month for a throttled 376k UPLOAD 6Mb down connection. I would much rather have a 3 Mb "unlimited" connection for the same price or even 1.5 Mbps symmetrical truly unlimited connection allowing for a 50% markup. If a given rate is sold as "unlimited", it needs to be truly unlimited.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
MikeJJ, 6 Apr 2008 @ 4:54am

Fritzo, in england BT have sat on 20 old equipment and are recently upgrading to 10 year old stuff. If they made a decent infrastructure there wouldn't be these whole issue of 25 people flooding the network, making the rest suffer.

Plus ISP's should not advertise "unlimited" if it isn't "unlimited". :)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Jake, 6 Apr 2008 @ 8:19am

Additionally to MikeJJ's comments, the iPlayer isn't all that heavy a burden compared to YouTube et al. They don't have to deal with international traffic, which probably helps some, and the player itself is well-made and loads quickly on even a fairly mediocre connection and PC.
Besides, if ISPs go around letting their marketing teams make promises that their infrastructure can't keep and then try to paper over the cracks in a way that hurts someone else's business, the BBC has as much right to complain as a private company.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Steve, 6 Apr 2008 @ 2:48pm

It has nothing to do with international or transit bandwidth thats cheap its all about BT backbone pricing which we all have to use and that expensive £50+ per Mbit because oftel wont allow them to reduce it as they say its uncompetative.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Steve, 9 Mar 2010 @ 2:04pm

I'll name and shame Talk Talk for shaping, Im not sure on iplayer or not as i havent used it since talk talk took over tiscali but even youtube stutters all over the place since these muppets took over.. anyone who wants a good internet connection AVOID talk talk
[ link to this | view in chronology ]