Why the Coming Data Flood Won't Drown the Internet 146
High Waters writes "Ars Technica examines predictions of an 'exaflood' of data that some alarmists believe will overwhelm the Internet. A closer look reveals that many of those raising the alarm about an exaflood are generally doing so to make the case against internet neutrality regulation. 'There's a reason that "exaflood" sounds scary. It's supposed to. Though Brett Swanson's Wall Street Journal piece tried to avoid alarmism, it did have an explicitly political point in mind: net neutrality is bad, and it could turn the coming exaflood into a real disaster'."
Re:This is a really old story (Score:3, Interesting)
Missed a <br> tag and a plural in my haste to get a first post.
SIC TRANSIT GLORIA TROLL TUESDAY
Old news. Metcalfe already predicted this in 1995 (Score:4, Interesting)
The only news here is the invention of a new scare word, "exaflood."
The only thing that could really make the Internet collapse would be to abandon the principles of neutrality and end-to-end connectivity, and I'm sure the dire alarmist predictions are intended to soften us up for some proposal... like one to hand over control of the Internet to the telcos so they can allocate bandwidth and prevent "exafloods."
By the way, what happened to all the "dark fiber" that was so spectacularly overbuilt during the dot-bomb era? Is all of it lit up now?
'exaflood' is simply telecom propaganda (Score:3, Interesting)
Let's say you needed your own acquired infrastructure to run your own cable system or your own cell/mobiles system. Let's say you didn't want your competitors services and content to be clogging your wires at your 'expense'. Let's say that it galls the living hell out of you that you can't control or throttle the full breadth of packets going over your own network!
And worse, some damn US Senator from Conn. decided to derail your immunity from prosecution over handing over data to the Bush Administration. Can't win that one? Then inject the fear of an 'exa' or peta or oogle event to scare the living shit out of people.
Propaganda. Every last fear-mongering fib.
Two Internets? (Score:2, Interesting)
I2: One for the original intention (legitimate email, web browsing, perhaps online gaming, minor file transfers).
One for the massive data transfers (to include streaming): video, file sharing, online or internet backups, etc.
Take your steenking music and video downloads to the overloaded one, and leave the _real_ internet clear for my WoW, if you please.
Oh
I'd pay for that. Yes, I would.
Re:The only people who are making this claim... (Score:3, Interesting)
Media companies should be allowed conduct business however they like (including lawsuits against people who are violating their copyright). However, they should NOT be allowed to control innovation or shutdown distribution methods for content which is being distributed with the permission of the copyright holder (and there is more and more "legal" content out there all the time as people begin to publish their own)
News organizations can distribute whatever news they like but they should not have the power to control other news outlets distributing their own news (even if the news coming from the little guy isn't what Big Media and the government want people to hear)
Telecommunications providers should be allowed to offer whatever services they like. But they shouldn't be allowed to block you from using 3rd party services. Telcos in the US should be treated just like the electric companies and should not be able to restrict your use of any program or network service (imagine if the electricity company could dictate what devices you were legally allowed to plug into the wall other than by setting standards for devices so they wont harm any people or harm the electricity grid) unless such use harms the service providers network in some way (or would harm the service providers network if you used it)
Churches and other "moral rights" type groups can protest and complain about whatever they like but they should not have the power to control or influence what other people not connected to those groups can and cant do with their leisure time (if I want to spend every cent I own playing an online casino, no-one should have the right to tell me I cant do that)
Manufacturers and distributors should be allowed to decide who they do and dont sell to but they should not have the power to tell the retailer what price they can sell at. If I want to buy $3000 SONY TV sets from SONY and sell them at 5 bucks each, SONY should not have the right to stop me from doing that (obviously I would go out of business fairly quickly though). Also, manufacturers and distributors should not have the power to tell retailers WHO they can and cant sell to. If I want to buy something from SONY in America and sell that item to a customer in Australia, SONY should not have the power to tell me I cannot do that.
If I own the copyright to a piece of music, no-one else should have the right to tell me how I can and cannot distribute that music or to tell me (or the people distributing my music with my permission) what royalties are to be paid for use of that music or what paperwork is to be filled out regarding that music. (if I was to run an internet radio station, I have to fill out all the RIAA paperwork and pay royalties even if I have direct permission from the copyright holder for EVERY piece of audio I play on the station)
I personally believe in the ideal of truly free commerce and capitalism and the free movement of goods and services throuought the world (as laid out in books/papers by some famous economist who's name escapes me) unrestricted by any government (e.g. subsidies, tariffs, rules limiting the number of players in the market etc) or any corporation (e.g. companies who set minimum prices or who use collusion or monopoly power to distort the market)
Rules and laws laid down by governments should be about enhancing competition and moving closer to this "ideal economy" and in ensuring that goods and services are produced by those producers who are most efficiantly able to produce them (yes I know it cant ever happen in the real world but we can certainly get a LOT closer than we are now)
For another example, look at the airline industry. If restrictions were removed and any airline (that could demonstrate that it was safe etc) could operate between any airport and any other airport, we would see the market change. At the end of it all, the airlines providing service may not the be same ones providing service now. It may be that allowing foriegn carriers to take over the market results in a more efficient airline market (i.e. lower prices for consumers)
Re:Two Internets? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Why? Simple! (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm kind of in the business facilitating anti-neutrality (I know, I know...), and carriers are worried about their future - e.g. Telcos selling DSL see broadband killing their long-distance calling income, or cable providers see online content killing their cable TV income. They don't want their value reduced to providing a fat pipe for $45/mo, losing all their other business, and they want to know how to extract more money from their customers.
The "message" that they're rubbing their hands with glee to hear is "STOP creating more bandwidth, it's killing you. Create a bandwidth shortage by not upgrading, and we can help you make people pay to get priority for their (now shitty) VOIP, or IPTV stream etc.." Currently, the best-effort network is often good enough, but they need to create a shortage. It's pure manipulation to gouge for money, and as long as all the carriers play ball, it will work, since traffic is growing 50-100% a year. It'll be sold to us as a great improvement/bonus ("We can guarantee your bandwidth for glitch-free VOIP and IPTV, gaming etc, for only an extra $30/mo."). They'd much rather plow money into the infrastructure for this which will make them more money (smarter routers, identity management services) than more bandwidth, which will keep their revenue/customer static. Good for the NSA too, to track everyone more efficiently, so they can be charged.
The only hope is that maverick flat-rate, high quality carriers will provide us connectivity in competition to these bastards.
Incidentally, it's pretty much what Enron did for electricity in California - shut off supply to drive up prices, profit!
There are some real problems (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, there are things to worry about.
Too many new applications have hard real time constraints. Copying movie-sized files around, no problem - TCP will throttle. Streaming HDTV without stuttering is much tougher. We're entering an era where the highest-traffic application needs a high quality of service. If resources are tight, there's good no place to throttle. VoIP works because it's a small fraction of traffic. Streaming HDTV looks to be a much larger fraction of traffic.
We still don't have a good answer to managing backbone congestion in pure datagram networks. The Internet today works because the congestion is out near the edges. If we get enough "last mile" bandwidth deployed that the backbone congests before the edges, packet loss rates will go way up. If we have about 2x excess capacity in the backbone, no problem. That's the solution we know.
Microsoft has proposed systems where "broadcast" video is multicast in real time with a high quality of service, while "video on demand" is heavily buffered and sent with a lower quality of service. That's an obvious solution; it's what multicast is for.
(Amusing thought: one solution to video buffering problems is commercials. When transport can't keep up and the player is getting close to running out of buffered content, play an extra locally-stored commercial or two. This lets the buffering refill. Download commercials in advance based on personalization info, then insert them as needed during playback. Don't put them in the main video streams at all.)