If AT&T Mobile Broadband Banned TV Streaming, Why Does It Allow MLB Streaming?
from the net-neutrality? dept
Earlier this year, we covered AT&T's back and forth over its terms of service, concerning whether or not services like SlingMedia's place shifting (streaming from your TV to a phone or laptop) was allowed. Some had noticed that AT&T's terms of service appeared to forbid it -- but then AT&T said it was a mistake and took it out, only to change its position a little later, and reinsert the language. Because of that, Sling had to disable its own player from working when an iPhone is connected via the 3G cellular network, rather than a WiFi connection.Yet, recently, Major League Baseball's digital arm, MLB.com announced that it was going to start streaming video of games to its iPhone app, even on 3G connections -- and AT&T seemed fine with it. However, this differential treatment is leading to charges of favoritism and discrimination, even bringing out the dreaded charges that "net neutrality has been broken." The specific question is why AT&T gets to choose which streaming video apps are allowed, and which are not. If your regular ISP told you that you could watch Hulu, but not YouTube, there would be quite an outrage.
AT&T's response is disingenuous, at best, claiming:
AT&T said the MLB app streams video from MLB's website, while SlingPlayer streams from the TV set-top box Slingbox. AT&T also said the company is only trying to ensure all users on its network get the best possible service.While this -- once again -- highlights the point that mobile cellular services are nowhere near legitimate competitors for real broadband services, note that the AT&T person never actually answers the question. The fact that Sling streams from a settop box and MLB streams from MLB's website is functionally meaningless to the iPhone. To the iPhone user it's the same thing. It doesn't care where the server is placed -- it's just receiving a video stream. So AT&T is not being honest or upfront about this at all. If the network is a problem, then it shouldn't allow video at all. Picking and choosing who gets to run video certainly smacks of discrimination and favoritism -- exactly the sort of thing the FCC claims is not allowed.
"We're certainly not crippling any apps," an AT&T spokesman said. "This is an issue of fairness.... While we would like to support all video services across our network, the reality is that wireless networks simply lack the capacity to support customers streaming hours of cable, satellite or IPTV video programming to individual users."
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Filed Under: fairness, mobile, net neutrality, streaming video
Companies: at&t
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Pure technical question: Does 3g support a "broadcast mode" where the same video signal is picked up by multiple receivers?
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An MLB game is a one to many stream. Particularly if they support multicasting or cache the stream at different points on the network, it may be much less of a bandwidth hit than multiple customers running a one to one stream from their Slingbox to their mobile.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multimedia_Broadcast_Multicast_Service
But the technology is not widely implemented by wireless voice carriers, because the carrier would have to dedicate bandwidth to the broadcast and take it away from voice or unicast data. Does everybody really want to watch MLB, or anything else? Not so much.
Note the Wikipedia entry is written by enthusiasts. However, many EU carriers are looking to use MBMS for mobile TV in their 5MHz of unpaired TDD spectrum.
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Rhetorical Question of the Day #1
Nothing to do with pipeline.
Everything to do with how much money is changing hands.
That's all that ever matters to AT&T anymore.
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Re: Rhetorical Question of the Day #1
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Re: Rhetorical Question of the Day #1
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NFL/Directv iPhone Game Streams
Directv will be submitting an app to Apple's App Store to allow for NFL games to be streamed live to Sunday Ticket Superfan customers.
https://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/content/sports/nfl_online_mobile
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Isn't it AT&Ts network to do what they want?
the only justification AT&T needs is that they will make more money.
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Re: Isn't it AT&Ts network to do what they want?
That'd be correct if it was a free market, instead of limited competition by government mandate via deregulation. If the govt. is going to tell us we're better off allowing provider monopolies/duopolies, then they should be less restrictive to the consumer. Or they could just allow competition.
"There is no other goal more important to a company than that and if streaming MLB games over their network is the best way for them to make money than i don't see why people would expect them not to do it."
That's fine, but again, if there is a consumer demand to stream Slingbox, and the govt. isn't going to allow a competitive market, then yes, AT&T should be required to meet public demand.
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Re: Isn't it AT&Ts network to do what they want?
Come on. I pay ATT for up to 5GB of mobile data traffic per month. If it's a neutral network, then it's none of their business whether I use 5GB of email, 5GB of browser access,5GB of Cingular Video (CV), or 5GB of Slingbox.
Now, I can appreciate their problem that Sling and other un-authorized video streaming eat up the bandwidth. They do. My WinMo sling throws about 45 MB for a half hour show, which is about the same amount as my mobile email uses all month. I understand that if everyone does this, it hurts the network. But they should not be able to choose what I do - they should only be able to define how I use their network. Currently, that is "up to 5GB".
The current comment from ATT is like them being a gas station, selling you 10 gallons of gas, and then telling you which brands and types of car you can put the gas into. "No station wagons, and only Ford."
Yeah. I like the gas station analogies.
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Re: Re: Isn't it AT&Ts network to do what they want?
The way i see it, the industry can go one of two ways: 1)Switch to metered data plans where you pay per MB, making the carrier indifferent to what you use the MB for, or 2) keep "unlimited" plans that more tightly control access to various types of data/content. I'm not sure which is better.
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?
Might be wrong, but did you mean deferential?
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Sonsidering all the mergers of AT&T and lovey-dovey relationships with the NSA, CIA, It'd say they are offering MLB to *THEIR* fans.
After all, the general public already gets American Idol voting (which consequently is the best, most efficient method of transmission, versus real inefficient video streams of slow moving Baseball.)
As for other content, it can't be done right now. Investments in the "Capital Moneycounting Department" for shovels and wheelbarrows have taken precedence to building capacity into the network.
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...Barack Obama is a White Sox fan AND throwing out the first pitch in this year's All Star game. So.....no.
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The only people who watch MLB are old white Republicans and Sarah Palin (as Letterman reported a few weeks ago).
Are you seriously that obtuse?
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European Standard for Cell Phone Chargers
Talking of cellphones, the European Commission has just brokered a deal between a number of cell phone manufacturers to start using the same charger by next year. They are also working on a similar deal for laptops and digital cameras... See, governement can do some good things once in a while...
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Re: European Standard for Cell Phone Chargers
Anyways, for this case, don't celebrate government too much. This is something that the cellular makers are working together on doing, and was reported out of of the industry's MWC confab in Barcelona this February.
http://www.itpro.co.uk/609900/mwc-09-industry-unites-for-universal-mobile-charger
Wh ile there has been pressure from the EU for phones to be more green, there is no way any government agency can claim to have pushed around the entire globe's telecom ecosystem. Nope, this was done by the handset vendors, for their own good. Here's why:
Every phone shipped needs to have a power charger shipped with it and this adds to the total cost of the handset. Vendors are attracted to the universal plug because in using it, they can exclude this cost, and say "BYO plug".
Also, vendors need to package each terminal with a regionally compatible plug, which increases logistics costs. By completely excluding the plug, the exact same boxed phone could be shipped to the UK or the US. That's more cost savings.
This is good for the environment, since we all have a few chargers lying around, and good for consumer choice, because now we can buy the charger we prefer (car, fast, cheap, dock, stand, etc)
And if you want to allocate credit, the Chinese government might have been first in 2006:
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200612/19/eng20061219_334047.html
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Network Engineering
I must says though, AT&T, if you network really is that poor, fix it!
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Re: Network Engineering
I haven't seen any indication that the mlb streams are multicast. If you have some information to cite that says they are, then please do. Otherwise, please quit making stuff up.
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Re: Network Engineering
Well, OK. But if a subscriber pays for 5GB of "data". Then it should be true that 5GB is 5GB is 5GB.
ATT advertises a certain speed of network, then sell a contract with a cap of 5GB. Now I just want them to deliver.
Just transmit my darned bits! That's what I pay for, that's what our deal is. Stop snooping into what I'm sending.
The funny thing is that the only reason I need to sling is because the darned rights holders to the show won't allow my Tivo to just transmit the file to my phone. So I need to play the Tivo file, capture it with my sling, and send it as a stream. I'd be happy to simply have it sent as a data file. One industry prevents me from doing things one way, and another wants to prevent my workaround.
All this despite the fact that I am paying good money for the show ($90 cable bill) and the bandwidth ($60 ISP and $30 ATT data plan) and the slingbox, and my tivo! For $180 a month, can I please watch my @#$@# content!
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Conflict of Interest
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Hypocrisy is the issue
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Can't speak spanish but...
Is there a Spanish or Foreign Language programming carriage requirement yet? Should there be?
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Re: Can't speak spanish but...
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Gosh Mike, that phrase seems a bit snarky since everything else you say makes clear that AT&T's behavior here is a classic example of why so many people care about net neutrailty.
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AT&T full of it
--Jeff
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AT&T is a load of crap if Orb Live can stream live tv why can't sling
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S
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