I think the advantage is that it doesn't require a Chromebook + HDMI cable + bluetooth keyboard & mouse...

Apple approved the Amazon Video App submission fully aware of its AirPlay capabilities. While anything is always possible "in the future", I think this level of suspicion is unwarranted at this point.

It's annoying, but best thing might be to buy a standalone HDMI switch and put all your less frequently used boxes on this one. If you stack this HDMI switch on top of your living room ethernet switch (if you have one), you can also get nerdy with the cable pairing symmetry.

Why would you buy an Apple TV if you didn't already own an iPad/iPhone? Maybe it will be a worthwhile thing to consider if/when Apple refreshes the device, but as it stands now Roku is probably the best bet for someone iOS/Android agnostic. And Roku can indeed play Amazon Video, whether you control it from the dumb remote or from the Android/iOS Roku App.

It is not exactly a full-fledged stand-alone streaming box. Chromecast requires a third-party smart device, usually a smartphone/tablet, to initiate the stream. While that makes it cheaper, and is not an impediment to the more tech-savvy users; it makes its overall market more limited. Amazon would be wiser to pursue a device that can be operated with either a dumb remote or a smart device, even if that makes it more expensive. Chromecast also lacks an ethernet port, which I personally find annoying.

Unless the other features include something compelling, not sure the motivation to buy this. Even on Apple TV, you can play Amazon Video content if streamed via AirPlay from an iPhone/iPad.

Care to list those Fortune 500 companies that somehow pass your dirty test? I certainly don't know any.

Apple should take this in the opposite direction... Provide tools to migrate Android data to iOS. For example, allow an Android user iCloud access, and be able to load that data (including app-specific data) from iPad/iPhone. Make the bar to convert to iOS as low as possible.

I'm not sure cable providers can afford to agree with this... Anyways, aside from this, I agree with your post. Big providers like TWC, Comcast, VZ, etc can accurately forecast out peak demand many months, even years ahead. They are big enough to have easy access to capital markets, etc. However, what of smaller, regional players? These broad "net neutrality" demands could be enough to sink them. Perhaps they deserve that fate, or perhaps instead the rules should allow them some flexibility.

Good post. Totally agree that a customer merely trying to get that 5/15/80 profile and can't get it has a legit beef. My point before should not excuse bad marketing and over promising on the part of the ISP... Merely stating how I think the technical people working at the ISP should manage things when shit hits the fan.

Well, if an entire metro-link is swamped under, you are already at the point where a whole building of CSR's might not be enough. Regardless, I would think QoS is optimally implemented as far downstream as you can manage, especially if you normally expect congestion problems to be fairly localized in nature.

Of course ISP's having over-capacity at all nodes, 24/7 is ideal. (Something about unicorns here...) Anyways, when you hit capacity, then what? Force everything to degrade at the same rate? That may sound fair superficially, but as others here noted latency-sensitive traffic will be hurt far worse than other types. Fairness ends up being entirely subjective, whether you use QoS or not.

That is an over broad definition, one that would preclude common sense QoS during times when ISP is approaching capacity limits. Common sense QoS would include, for example, putting torrents or FTP on low priority tier, voice communication on high tier, etc. What is bad is discriminating between two similar types of traffic, like Netflix vs YouTube.

I RTFA. Nowhere does this blogger compare Netflix traffic to similar service from someone like YouTube. Illegality under the normal understanding of "Net Neutrality" would require showing a bias between two similar sources of traffic.

Proper net neutrality legislation would define suitable actions for an ISP near or at capacity during peak usage. Because in that situation, stuff is getting throttled, and I sure hope my http or SMTP request has higher priority than somebody's torrent or video stream. QoS is a good thing.