Video Usage Creates Traffic Jam Worries 257
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Zonk
from the backup-on-the-i-9-out-of-google-today dept.
from the backup-on-the-i-9-out-of-google-today dept.
An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet has an article talking about worries over the increase in video downloads in the last year. Free video hosting and the popularity of iTunes is blamed for this phenomenon." From the article: "This is far from an academic issue. Whether the new companies can deliver on their promises could have a profound effect on how the Internet operates--and it could hit consumers in the pocketbook. Business and entertainment content worth billions of dollars now flows over ordinary ISP networks. Internet voice calls, which can be garbled by any network congestion, are increasingly common. Serious online hiccups could be as irritating, and potentially economically damaging, as persistent L.A. traffic jams."
Cache server (Score:5, Interesting)
Networks and roads (Score:3, Interesting)
That's a really interesting analogy. It's taken us (the U.S.) fifty years to figure out that if you build more, and higher-capacity, roads, it alleviates congestion temporarily but ultimately results in...more traffic and more congestion. Does something similar apply to networks? Adding more bandwidth may be expensive, but unlike roads, (i) usage is easy to monitor and thus charge for, increasing companies' incentive to invest, and (ii) the many damaging externalities (i.e., costs like air pollution that traditionally aren't factored into the "price" of roads and cars) seem to be absent for computer networks.
Podcasts (Score:2, Interesting)
The press is stupid (Score:3, Interesting)
People who solve problems instead of hyping them understand that if there's a shortage of something (bandwidth, or QoS in this case), you go get more of it. And the problem is solved.
Re:We've been here before. (Score:4, Interesting)
This is a specious argument. This is possibly because you don't know how the system works, so I'm willing to give you both the benefit of the doubt and a [very] short explanation. The fiber going to the door is not a contiguous piece with the fiber leaving the POP. In addition, fiber is typically shared between multiple subscribers. They only have so much bandwidth available to the POP, and it costs them money to get more. Plus, they have to throttle people to avoid segment oversaturation. The system can handle whatever speed, sure, but they only give you a piece of it, so that other people can have a piece, too. (It would be nice to see a more intelligent system that would let you have more bandwidth when no one else is using it, though.)
Asterisk is very very close. (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm in the process of getting some IAX2 servers in place in our data center so I can use some leaner codecs, the trick here is that in practice this is all transcoding...I'm doing the equivalent of wav -> mp3 on all of that audio in real-time, which is the reason my upstream provider won't allow it, and I can't realy blame them in that regard.
If you work with someone that knows their stuff, gives you a properly prioritized connection, and you minimize latency to them, VOIP will just beat the living tar out of POTS. The problem is that companies like Comcast won't give you that kind of personalized attention. If I want to provide cheap sip or iax2 termination, I can do it, but I can't support you that well. If you're willing to wrestle with it yourself, absolutely.
We're heading into an area where high tech must be supportable, and not just throw out there.
Re:Cache server (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree that proxy use is smart on the part of the ISP to manage their bandwidth usage. Unfortunately, I don't think a proxy server will solve for the bandwidth issue this time. The entertainment companies want their content protected (ala DRM) meaning that each video will be a unique file and serves no purpose being cached on a proxy server. These requirements are at odds with easing network traffic by using cache servers.
The business way (Score:3, Interesting)
"Sure you can have unlimited rentals for $14.99, as long as you limit it to less than 5 a month, otherwise we'll throttle you to a limit of our choosing."
"Sure you can have 1Mbps up/down, as long as you don't try to use it, otherwise it will be 128Kbps."
How do they keep getting away with this. If I were to say, "sure I'll agree to pay you $14.99/mo for the service as long as it's only for one month, otherwise I'll just pay you $1.99/mo" I'd get service interrupted and a big splap on my credit history. We need consumer unions to protect ourselves. When one person drops the service, they'll be glad as it's just someone using the service to the advertised terms (instead of much lower than that), but if a thousand subscribers do it at once they'd notice.