There is no gaming on measurements and disputes are isolated and temporary with
issues not unique over the history of the internet. I think all the same
rhetorical quotes continue to be reused
- Kevin
> On May 15, 2014, at 11:43 AM, "Scott Berkman" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> Unfortunately these build-outs are primarily in subscriber facing bandwidth
> and number of headend locations (to add more customers to the network).
> These peering point/transit connection issues have been going on for a long
> time, evidenced by Level 3 coming out with this post. Comcast is also
> suspiciously absent from public exchanges (TelX's TIE would be one example)
> while many of their competitors participate for the benefit of the Internet
> as a whole and their customers.
>
> Measured broadband is also a game, because its very easy for large providers
> to give priority to (or otherwise "help") known speed test and similar sites,
> giving customers a false impression of their available capacity or
> performance. We've all seen cases where customers have some amazing result
> on their favorite test site, and then real world performance can't even come
> close.
>
> That said, if Comcast does or is making efforts to finally resolve this, more
> power to them and congratulations to their customers. Unfortunately trying to
> brute-force the industry and external content providers tells a very
> different story. Where is Comcast's official blog post showing evidence as
> to where they do ensure their peering and or transit to the largest Tier 1
> providers are not congested? Instead all we see are policy arguments about
> who should pay for what, while users continue to suffer.
>
> This is really similar to when TV providers have spats with content owners,
> and the result is the end users missing out on something they are paying for.
> It is good for related industries and the large players in each to keep
> working with each other in open ways to keep pricing reasonable (as opposed
> to working together in hiding to price fix), but it is not OK to do so by
> throwing tantrums and making everyone involved suffer.
>
> -Scott
>
>
>> On 05/15/2014 10:57 AM, McElearney, Kevin wrote:
>> Upgrades/buildout are happening every day. They are continuous to keep
>> ahead of demand and publicly measured by SamKnows (FCC measuring broadband),
>> Akamai, Ookla, etc
>>
>> What is not well known is that Comcast has been an existing commercial
>> transit business for 15+ years (with over 8000 commercial fiber customers).
>> Comcast also has over 40 balanced peers with plenty of capacity, and some of
>> the largest Internet companies as customers.
>>
>> - Kevin
>>
>> 215-313-1083
>>
>>> On May 15, 2014, at 10:19 AM, "Owen DeLong" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>> Oh, please do explicate on how this is inaccurate…
>>>
>>> Owen
>>>
>>>> On May 14, 2014, at 2:14 PM, McElearney, Kevin
>>>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Respectfully, this is a highly inaccurate "sound bite"
>>>>
>>>> - Kevin
>>>>
>>>> 215-313-1083
>>>>
>>>>> On May 14, 2014, at 3:05 PM, "Owen DeLong" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, the more accurate statement would be aggressively seeking new
>>>>> ways to monetize the existing infrastructure without investing in upgrades
>>>>> or additional buildout any more than absolutely necessary.
>>>>>
>>>>> Owen
>>>>>
>>>>> On May 14, 2014, at 8:02 AM, Hugo Slabbert <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>> So they seek new sources of revenues, and/or attempt to thwart
>>>>>>>> competition any way they can.
>>>>>> No to the first. Yes to the second. If they were seeking new sources of
>>>>>>> revenue, they'd be massively expanding into un/der served markets and
>>>>>>> aggressively growing over the top services (which are fat margin).
>>>>>> Sure they are (seeking new sources of revenue). They're not necessarily
>>>>>> creating new products or services, i.e. actually adding any value, but
>>>>>> they
>>>>>> are finding ways to extract additional revenue from the same pipes, e.g.
>>>>>> through paid peering with content providers.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I'm not endorsing this; just pointing out that you two are actually in
>>>>>> agreement here.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Hugo
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Wed, May 14, 2014 at 7:23 AM, <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On 2014-05-14 02:04, Jean-Francois Mezei wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On 14-05-13 22:50, Daniel Staal wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> They have the money. They have the ability to get more money. *They
>>>>>>>> see
>>>>>>>>> no reason to spend money making customers happy.* They can make more
>>>>>>>>> profit without it.
>>>>>>>> There is the issue of control over the market. But also the pressure
>>>>>>>> from shareholders for continued growth.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Yes. That is true. Except that it's not.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> How do service providers grow? Let's explore that:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> What is growth for a transit provider?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> More (new) access network(s) (connections).
>>>>>>> More bandwidth across backbone pipes.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> What is growth for access network?
>>>>>>> More subscribers.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Except that the incumbent carriers have shown they have no interest in
>>>>>>> providing decent bandwidth to anywhere but the most profitable rate
>>>>>>> centers. I'd say about 2/3 of the USA is served with quite terrible
>>>>>>> access.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The problem with the internet is that while it had promises of wild
>>>>>>>> growth in the 90s and 00s, once penetration reaches a certain level,
>>>>>>>> growth stabilizes.
>>>>>>> Penetration is ABYSMAL sir. Huge swaths of underserved americans exist.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> When you combine this with threath to large incumbents's media and
>>>>>>>> media
>>>>>>>> distribution endeavours by the likes of Netflix (and cat videos on
>>>>>>>> Youtube), large incumbents start thinking about how they will be able
>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>> continue to grow revenus/profits when customers will shift spending to
>>>>>>>> vspecialty channels/cableTV to Netflix and customer growth will not
>>>>>>>> compensate.
>>>>>>> Except they aren't. Even in the most profitable rate centers, they've
>>>>>>> declined to really invest in the networks. They aren't a real business.
>>>>>>> You
>>>>>>> have to remember that. They have regulatory capture, natural/defacto
>>>>>>> monopoly etc etc. They don't operate in the real world of
>>>>>>> risk/reward/profit/loss/uncertainty like any other real business has to.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> So they seek new sources of revenues, and/or attempt to thwart
>>>>>>>> competition any way they can.
>>>>>>> No to the first. Yes to the second. If they were seeking new sources of
>>>>>>> revenue, they'd be massively expanding into un/der served markets and
>>>>>>> aggressively growing over the top services (which are fat margin). They
>>>>>>> did
>>>>>>> a bit of an advertising campaign of "smart home" offerings, but that
>>>>>>> seems
>>>>>>> to have never grown beyond a pilot.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The current trend is to "if you can't fight them, jon them" where
>>>>>>>> cablecos start to include the Netflix app into their proprietary
>>>>>>>> set-top
>>>>>>>> boxes. The idea is that you at least make the customer continue to use
>>>>>>>> your box and your remote control which makes it easier for them to
>>>>>>>> switch between netflix and legacy TV.
>>>>>>> True. I don't know why one of the cablecos hasn't licensed roku, added
>>>>>>> cable card and made that available as a "hip/cool" set top box offering
>>>>>>> and
>>>>>>> charge another 10.00 a month on top of the standard dvr rental.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Would be interesting to see if those cable companies that are agreeing
>>>>>>>> to add the Netflix app onto their proprietary STBs also play peering
>>>>>>>> capacity games to degrade the service or not.
>>>>>>> So how is the content delivered? Is it over the internet? Or is it over
>>>>>>> the cable plant, from cable headends?
>
