Are Industry Best Practices Enough To Protect Net Neutrality?
from the no-sticks-anymore,-just-carrots dept
For the supporters of net neutrality, an Obama White House, Genachowski FCC and Democratic Congress seemed to be the magic combination to ensure an open, non-discriminatory Internet. However, one of the key proponents, Representative Boucher, has recently suggested that he is switching tactics, "scrapping the idea of pursuing legislation mandating an openly accessible Internet in favor of negotiations with stakeholders aimed at reaching a comprehensive accord." An agreement upon industry best practices could, in theory, be a good way to protect net neutrality, but there are causes for concern.As Techdirt contributor Tim Lee pointed out in his paper on net neutrality, the unintended consequences of legislation may be costly and inefficient. So, voluntary agreements could create a flexible, realistic approach to protecting an important principle. Something similar happened with the Global Network Initiative that brought together Google, Microsoft and Yahoo!, along with academics and human rights organizations, to agree to a set of principles and enforcement mechanisms to protect and promote free expression and privacy around the globe. But the motivating factor of this agreement was the threat of legislation following very humiliating Congressional hearings on American Internet companies' dealings in China. By creating a voluntary set of best practices, the Global Network Initiative sidestepped the unintended consequences of poorly drafted legislation. The ISPs could do similarly, but by publicly stating his change of tactics, Boucher may have removed the motivating factor.
Another key to any agreement would be competition in the ISP marketplace. In Norway, where they recently created a similar agreement between ISPs and consumer protection agencies to mandate non-discrimination of networks and endpoints, the ISPs are in a competitive sector. Because ISPs there recognize the competitive advantage of staying neutral, there is a force pushing them in that direction. In the United States, the driving force was largely the threat of legislation, and hopefully that is still there as Boucher guides the ISPs towards his comprehensive accord.
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Filed Under: best practices, legislation, net neutrality, norway, rick boucher
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1) Low caps on bandwidth. If ISPs cannot control the low percentage of people who use huge amounts of traffic by blocking or disabling certain types of traffic (P2P, Skype, etc), then they will have to limit everyones traffic to a number low enough to make the heavier users pay dramatically
2) Higher monthly costs. If the ISPs are forced to provide both ingoing and outgoing bandwidth to support P2P, Skype, and other "peered network" commercial systems, they will have to purchase significantly larger connections to peering points and increase their internal network size and connections to support it.
In the end, absolute net neutrality isn't any better for the average consumer than a restricted network. 90% of the bandwidth is used by 10% of an ISPs users. Being obligated to support all these other business models will mean massive changes, and those changes will go in the wrong direction.
Careful what you wish for, you might just get it.
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Re:
Weird Harold once again displays his stunning reading comprehension abilities.
Kevin points out in the post that legislation is a bad idea. But that what's useful is the *threat* of legislation.
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Threaten them all you want, the ISPs are hoping like heck it comes down the pipe, because then they can get all draconian on bandwidth without looking like the bad guys.
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Now there are some legitimate cases when some sites do get the fast lane. Mobile phones have special apps just for YouTube, so the carrier might prefer YouTube traffic since it's best supported on the devices. (I'm fairly sure that's an idea I picked up from Tim's paper.)
Can you regulate this type of transparency instead of regulating the actual behavior?
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Regulations
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Voluntary agreement to respect neutrality?
I believe laws should exist to protect certain rights, and as the digital age continues to grow it is clear that companies can control and manipulate data in ways unlike we have ever seen before. We are all coming to depend on the Internet and because of this there has to be a legally binding agreement to keep things neutral.
While I am not a fan of any new laws it is clear that a law could be written in such a way to prevent companies from the shady practices they are already likely engaged in.
The main problem with this is that Judges and the legal system are completely out of touch with current technology issues and ethical dilemmas that are being created on a daily basis on the Internet.
Leaving big business to "be fair" through an "agreement" sounds even more ridiculous than letting e-tarded judges and lawyers duke it out.
It seems there is no easy solution, but the laissez-faire approach will only allow large companies to continue to consolidate their power until it doesn't matter what the people say (like it hasn't already happened many times before)
If the majority of our data and communications wasn't heading towards complete reliance on the Internet then this wouldn't be such a big deal.
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The sky is Falling - The sky is Falling
Boucher -> "scrapping the idea of pursuing legislation mandating an openly accessible Internet in favor of negotiations with stakeholders aimed at reaching a comprehensive accord."
How will ALL stakeholders be involved in the outcome?
No doubt, the end users will be left out in the cold because there is not enough competition in the marketplace for them to vote with their money.
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Re: The sky is Falling - The sky is Falling
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Net neutrality legislation is not the solution
Besides, ISPs shaping traffic can be a very good thing. Low latency traffic for things like VoIP or video games should be given a higher priority to things like file transfer or P2P where latency does not matter. This just makes logical sense and is how any network administrator worth his salt would configure QoS controls on their network. I make heavy use of bit torrents, but honestly feel it should be given bulk priority below everything else and this is what I do at home. Legislating for a 'free' internet could very well make this practice illegal for ISPs, only resulting in a poorer quality of service for gamers and people with VoIP phone service.
The point is, the problem here is lack of competition, and NN legislation is only a band-aid fix to a symptom of that problem. Energy should be spent on encouraging competition and anti-competitive practices taken by ISPs (ie throttling competitor's content) should be addressed with existing anti-trust laws. We just don't need more legislation here, but I'm afraid we now live in the world where everyone expects the government to come swooping in to save them.
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For once I agree with weird harold
Fuck net neutrality. Without QOS, uncontrolled p2p simply makes everything else unusable, and with no real gain for the p2p users either.
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Re: For once I agree with weird harold
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Re: Re: The sky is Falling - The sky is Falling
(unless they are a dictator)
That does not preclude all parties from having an input to said agreement.
Why is the opinion of some stakeholders more important than that of others?
If there were real competition, then even the lowly consumer would have a form of input. Without choice, the consumer is subject to the silliness and greed of the monopolized marketplace.
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Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
Some cable companies, because of the topography of their networks, can suffer congestion between the end of the school day and 10PM at night, with too many people trying to get through too small of a straw.
The issue comes when more and more people are online all the time, with P2P, skype, and whatever other products that they leave active 24 hours per day. When you get enough of those types of people, the ISP needs to buy more bandwidth to avoid congestion. So their costs to offer you service goes up, but their income does not.
ISPs would look at any dramatic increase of bandwidth usage as a cost issue. Already, Comcast is setting a high 250 gig a month limit on users, and over time, that limit may be dropped to keep costs in line. Further, they may be required to increase the throughput of their internal network to support increased traffic flow, which in turn creates cost. Alternately, they might have to split users into smaller blocks and create more internal connection points, which also costs.
I also would not be surpried to see any "net neutrality" agreement include provisions for blocking out commercial services such as skype, which use the users computer as a node for transit of traffic.
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Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
Such worn out and tired excuses have become passe. Please try a bit harder, ok?
It is nice of you to use paragraphs, so I'll address them by number.
1) If a company oversells capacity, they should not call it unlimited. Plus there is little evidence that congestion is a problem, yet.
2) Then those cable companies need to expand their network. btw, which cable co are you referring to?
3) If they can not provide the service that they sold, maybe they should not be in the business. Maybe they need to charge more.
4) See item 3 above. And putting limits on a service that was sold as unlimited is just plain wrong.
5) A possible reason for a business to block a service would be because it is considered competition. The one thing that the big ISPs fear is real competition.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
2) multiple cable companies, both in the US and Canada have had issues. Comcast in the US and Rogers in Canada come to mind as companies that have this issue from time to time.
3) See point #1 - 90% of the customers couldn't afford to pay the real market price of what they are "buying".
4) The service isn't sold as unlimited anymore.
5) Unless the last mile is somehow nationalized and turned into something like a state owned water utility, there will always be the question of blocking potential internal competition. The true solution is competition, and in most major cities, there is at least a cable and DSL offering, plus potentially others.
In the end, the cost of getting you that internet service is probably higher than you would be willing to pay for 24/7 assured bandwidth at your desktop. Hosting servers at under $500 for an open 10mbps connection isn't unusual, but that is without all the transit to get it to your door.
It isn't exactly as simple and as cheap as you wish it was.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
I am not wishing for anything except a winning lotto ticket. I am simply pointing out several flaws in your logic.
It sounds as though you are selling a walled garden and I doubt many people are interested in that anymore. I certainly would not like having to choose internet connectivity from prepackaged offerings similar to the cable/sat tv available today. The internet is a communication medium, not a media delivery system.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
The internet is a communications medium, but it is also a large overlapping collection of businesses. There really are three costs of doing business online, connectivity, bandwidth, and physical hosting / servers. If you run a business, these are the important issues. For an ISP, it is the same, connectivity, bandwidth, and physical network equipment.
What P2P does (even when used to distribute entirely legal, permitted commercial content) is that it takes bandwidth FROM the ISP (at their cost) and gives it to the software distributor for free. The usually answer is "that's not true, I pay for my 5mbps connection, I can use it as I want!". That may be true, but the ISP has priced your connection like you use many 10% of it, maybe less. Now, when it's only a few people using a bit more bandwidth than the others, it isn't an issue. But if the expectation is that everyone will use their connection to 30% or even 50%, the ISP needs to pay for more connectivity, more bandwidth, to support the business models of OTHER companies that the end users are choosing to use (and to provide bandwidth to).
In the case of total network neutrality (where the ISP has no say at all in how the connection is used ever), either your connection speed would have to drop to spread out the available bandwidth, or the price would have to increase to source more bandwidth.
My original example is 1000:1 - giving a monthly price say of $39.95. Raise the requirement and make that 100:1, and your monthly bill could be $399.50 for the same connection. (it would be lower because a part of the bill is administrative and so on).
You cannot get it both ways. If you want your full bandwidth all the time (total net neutrality) you will pay for it.
The ISP solution is a hard cap on all traffic. It means that the 90% of the people who don't use a ton would get full access at the given price, and the 10% that go way over would have to shovel over the cash to support what they are using.
Net neutrality by law or even by agreement would be a license for the ISPs to lock you down in other ways.
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time warner is already implementing caps without legislation. it's the lack of a mechanism like legislation that gives ISP's the idea that they can do these kinds of things without consequences.
2) Higher monthly costs.If the ISPs are forced to provide both ingoing and outgoing bandwidth to support P2P, Skype, and other "peered network" commercial systems, they will have to purchase significantly larger connections to peering points and increase their internal network size and connections to support it.
the costs are high already, and they never go down. no residential broadband provider has ever lowered prices except temporarily as part of a promotion. the current duopoly of cable and telephone companies guarantees high prices and little competition.
companies like skype and even the pirate bay already pay for bandwidth (both incoming and outgoing) already. residential users pay for bandwidth as well, incoming and outgoing. it's already being paid for by both parties. why should the ISP's be allowed to charge twice?
if the ISP's don't want to upgrade their networks, that is their prerogative. since there is no competition in the residential broadband space, it's not like consumers will be able to switch providers or anything.
In the end, absolute net neutrality isn't any better for the average consumer than a restricted network. 90% of the bandwidth is used by 10% of an ISPs users. Being obligated to support all these other business models will mean massive changes, and those changes will go in the wrong direction.
there is a simple way to fix this, which is to abandon the unlimited model and charge for bandwidth the way that hosting companies do.
this will never happen, because then consumers could choose providers based on a price per gigabyte basis, making cable and DSL an apples to apples comparison when deciding which of the two providers to go with (if you are fortunate enough to have two to choose from).
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Re: The sky is Falling - The sky is Falling
i hope he's a shill and is at least getting paid to act like a corporate whore.
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Re: Net neutrality legislation is not the solution
but that was my decision. i was involved in the decision making process. with corporate agreements, i wouldn't be given any input. if youtube or vonage can't pay the asking price for preferential treatment, they won't get it. in fact, they may get degraded to the point of being useless, or blocked altogether.
this is especially dangerous when time warner and verizon are offering their own voice and video services that they want their customers to pay for and have plenty of incentive to discriminate against competitors.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
that's great, then stop over selling. if you can only afford people using 512k down, then sell it as 512k down, not 5mbps.
the world is changing. people don't just surf the web and check their email anymore. new applications and technologies come out every day that let people do more with the computers and the internet access they already have.
you act like the need to make a profit some how supersedes this innovation.
if your ISP can't deliver what it sells it either needs to be honest about what it is selling, or upgrade what it sells so it matches what is advertised.
if p2p is destroying your ISP, then maybe your ISP can work with the p2p community to improve the protocol before the community moves encrypted connections make shaping impossible. or do something crazy like talk to it's users about what they want and what they think is important.
this old world idea that you can just block something and expect it to go away is absolutely foolish.
being a corporation doesn't grant an ISP the right to lie about what they sell. profits are not more important than people.
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No representation is the real problem
It works through a representation system. Right now we have no real choices due to the heavily monopolized corporate atmosphere. We have no representation, no redress, and no input into how the Internet will continue to exist. This is a very real problem.
Simply put, if we do not demand rights we will not get them. Sitting back and letting big business decide how to police the Internet is the height of stupidity for a free thinking society.
I agree that there are laws already in place that could be applicable to this situation, but it makes very little sense to try and apply already broken laws to a system that is very different than anything that has existed before.
We must have mandated legislation that guarantees neutrality in communication over the Internet. This is a basic rights issue for 21st century people.
In another world where we actually encouraged competition this may not be necessary, but we do not live in that world. We live in a world that hails consolidation of power and money as the only real goal. This gives those with capital an unfair level of representation in our government.
The only way to counter-balance this is through demanding and ensuring our rights are protected through the legal system. There really is no other logical choice in this matter.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
The point isn't to block anything. Shaping was an attempt to address the issue by punishing the 10% that eat most of the bandwidth to the advantage of those that don't. The ISPs got slapped for it. End discusion, they aren't doing it in the US anymore (by sympatico does it in Canada).
My point is this: Overselling is the issue only when people are doing things beyond what an average used does. Most of us are not actively using the majority of out connectivity all the time. It allows us all to have a faster connection for the bursts of things we do, because there is enough lulls in our activity to let someone else go ahead.
With P2P and other methods (no matter the protocol) significant amounts of bandwidth are being used all the time. When you visit this website, example, you download the page quickly, and then spend X amount of time reading it. That doesn't use bandwidth. But your P2P program is running as close to full tilt as possible all the time, which means you have no lull time for others. If another people are doing it, there is no space for average users to get a full speed burst to download a website, and thus the get slower response time.
With average users, the ISPs only need a certain amount of connectivity to satisfy their needs. But when P2P users come along and eat up a ton of bandwidth all the time, they ISP has to get more connectivity, yet cannot charge more for it. Their costs go up, their income does not.
The response is caps. There is no part of net neutrality that says "and you get an unlimited connection at full bandwidth at all times". net neutrality just says no particular traffic will be blocked. Capping usage (say 50gig a month) isn't a violation of net neutrality, but certainly sticks it to the heavy file traders. Without those caps, the ISPs will do exactly what you ask, increase their network to match their complete offer, and raise you price through the roof to use it.
ISPs don't want to work with the P2P community because they don't want to get involved in policing content. It would also violate net neutrality by giving advantage to one type of traffic over another.
You might want to try thinking about it as a business person, rather than as a teenager in moms basement. The big world is very different from theoreticals.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
An ISP can simply charge the user more if they want an internet facing server. It is not difficult to ascertain packet quantity and direction without deep packet insprection.
Several ISPs got called on the carpet for their shaping, they could've simply asked the user to pay more.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
Shaping was an attempt to cut down the amount of traffic so as to keep the service good for the 90% of people who don't trade files 24 hours a day. It wasn't done the best way possible, and now the likely result will be no shaping but hard caps at a very low traffic level. I am guessing that ISPs will go as low as 30gig a month, which is more than enough for most people. You guys shoving 400 or 500 gig a month of file trades will be paying out the butt, which is pretty much what you are asking for.
You cannot have it both ways. Unlimited huge price, limited reasonable price that is right for 90% of the users.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
and just who would i be getting paid to shill for? who would pay for vitriolic posts full of leetspeak and typoes? :-)
seriously, are any of you interested in paying for it? i could seriously improve the quantity and quality of my nerdrage if i didn't have a real job :-)
The point isn't to block anything. Shaping was an attempt to address the issue by punishing the 10% that eat most of the bandwidth to the advantage of those that don't. The ISPs got slapped for it. End discusion, they aren't doing it in the US anymore
i disagree. one of the concessions for the at&t/SBC merger was that AT&T offer 768/128 dsl without filters or caps, effectively creating the internet slow lane they have always wanted.
all of this "bandwidth crisis" nonsense is about creating a tiered internet. there are hundreds of ways to implement the tiers and all of them involve residential ISPs treating their users like a captive audience that you have to pay to put your applications in front of. it's a move to get web companies to pay twice to deliver content and applications.
My point is this: Overselling is the issue only when people are doing things beyond what an average used does. Most of us are not actively using the majority of out connectivity all the time. It allows us all to have a faster connection for the bursts of things we do, because there is enough lulls in our activity to let someone else go ahead.
and my point is this: new applications become available everyday that add value to high speed internet access so the idea of the "average user" doesn't exist anymore.
bouncing calls through the internet used to be the kind of thing that only fone phreaks could do, now skype makes it uber simple for everyone. the next innovation (whatever it will be) will enable even more functionality which will mean even fewer "average users".
innovation happens way faster than cable and telecommunications companies can handle, so it's better for everyone if they just shut up and deliver the bits.
over selling was great when internet access was largely used to surf and check email. almost no one does just that anymore thanks to IM, MMO's, xbox live and the like. thanks to sites like youtube, googledocs, facebook, and myspace, even surfing the web isn't what it used to be.
the world changed, it's time for ISP's to change along with it.
When you visit this website, example, you download the page quickly, and then spend X amount of time reading it. That doesn't use bandwidth.... With average users, the ISPs only need a certain amount of connectivity to satisfy their needs.
that might have been the case 5 years ago, but like i said before that is no longer the case. there is no such thing as an "average user" anymore thanks to tabbed browsers, ajax, and other new innovations. every day new applications move more people away from simple surfing of static pages.
as communications unify, they will unify over the internet. there are plenty of other uses for the internet besides HTTP and bittorrent and the longer american ISPs ignore that fact, the further we as a nation are going to lag behind countries with progressive network infrastructures.
ISPs don't want to work with the P2P community because they don't want to get involved in policing content. It would also violate net neutrality by giving advantage to one type of traffic over another.
no, ISPs are also in the content delivery business and do not want the competition from p2p. cable compaines are offering phone services, at&t uverse, verizion FIOS, phone companies with no video offerings often partner with satellite TV providers, the list goes on and on. these corporations are fighting tooth and nail to avoid competing not only with each other but with new pure play start ups.
and even if p2p is bad for the internet, if we allow ISPs to block, filter, or cap it, what's to stop them from doing the same thing to games or streaming video or VOIP?
most broadband advertisements talk about how fast you can download music and video as a selling point. it's no secret that napster sold more DSL subscriptions than the cleverest of madison avenue marketing campaigns.
the problem with p2p is competition in the video and communications space, and that scares ISPs shitless.
The response is caps. There is no part of net neutrality that says "and you get an unlimited connection at full bandwidth at all times". net neutrality just says no particular traffic will be blocked. Capping usage (say 50gig a month) isn't a violation of net neutrality, but certainly sticks it to the heavy file traders. Without those caps, the ISPs will do exactly what you ask, increase their network to match their complete offer, and raise you price through the roof to use it.
now you are being deliberately obtuse. i said nothing of the sort. i said that ISP's should be honest about what they sell. that means being upfront about the actual speeds you can connect at, and disclosing things like caps instead of burying them in the fine print, or implementing them after the fact. this helps consumers make the best of their limited (if any) choices.
and so if "average use" is 50gb a month, what happens when the next hulu comes along and more "average people" start doing more with the web than ever before? internet usage will only continue to grow. isp's can grow to meet that demand, or they can upset their userbase and risk government intervention.
you can't sell a drug and says "cures cancer" on the label, why should an ISP be able to sell limited service with caps with "unlimited" on the label?
You might want to try thinking about it as a business person, rather than as a teenager in moms basement. The big world is very different from theoreticals.
and you might want to think about the future instead of clinging to the flawed thinking of the past. deceptive and anti-competitive behavior is not now and never has been good for business.
how's this for theoreticals in the big world:
first let's talk real traffic numbers. at my house i have two voip phones, my wife plays an MMO, i am a very active steam user, and my nephew is an avid xbox live user, plus i seed/leech torrents 24x7 and according to my firewall logs this month i have pulled in 55.8gb and put up 66.4gb, which is well under the 200gb a month transfer i get on my rented VPS for $20 a month.
i pay $85 a month for basic cable and "unlimited" broadband, yet i can get almost twice the transfer for almost half the price from a web host. based on those numbers i am all for paying for what you use, and i am one of the bandwidth hogs.
based on your speculation, that would put my costs "through the roof" but i am not so certain. now, let's assume that residential bandwidth is somehow more expensive than the commercial variety, and that twice the price is justified. what about the almost half the transfer?
is it really 4 times as expensive per bit to push traffic to a home?
now let's take these numbers to your mom's basement. if i am being overcharged per gigabyte, and i max out my connection 24x7, imagine what your mom is paying per gig as a "average user" whatever that is.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For once I agree with weird harold
look at these transfer prices:
http://www.linode.com
400gb of transfer is $39.95 600gb is $59.95. they aren't the best deal around either:
http://www.webkeepers.com/vps/index.html
you can get even more for even less. the actual price of transfer just isn't that much. sure, residential ISPs have higher costs for wiring, equipment, and customer support, but a lot of it has to do with the fact that the hosting space is highly competitive and the residential broadband space is not.
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It all comes down to lack of competition. I just moved to a new location in a downtown area (walk to everything), and guess what happened when I go to get Internet at my house. Yep, Cox is the only game in town (not even DSL), and they charge $45/month for a 1.5 Mbps line. The only saving grace is I get like 20% of that speed most of the time. Normally I get like 10% of the advertised speed.
You don't need to enforce net neutrality if you have competition, you only need regulation where there is no competition (probably 95% of America).
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Threats are not useful at all
What we need, to ensure that anyone can switch if he or she doesn't like what a provider is doing, is competition! Thus, the drive for "network neutrality" legislation and overbearing regulation of the Internet is very anti-consumer.
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Re:
As mentioned elsewhere, any problems here should be solved by encouraging competition, not by forbidding traffic shaping.
The real net neutrality issue IMO is treating different providers differently (ie making sure MSN loads as fast as possible, but not Google), not different types of traffic. So far I think we haven't seen any of that, but it could still be coming.
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