The pipe was more than big enough, but ISPs chose to not allow all the packets through.

You might not be aware of this, but that happens with peering, data-centers, etc., all the time. Where the physical layer is capable of, say, Gigabit throughput, but you're only paying for 10Mbps (and they're only reserving for you throughput through their infrastructure of 10Mbps). You pay for the larger "pipe" (e.g., a higher cap), and voila, the valve on the pipe is opened wider.

That's exactly what happens in this Comcast/Level3 situation.

If you've got fiber installed, and switch port connections available, lighting up the fiber costs pennies per terabit transferred,

You are looking more and more like someone who doesn't understand the fundamental cost-centers of large scale network administration with every post.

Your insistence that internet service is the equivalent to telegraph and telephone service only shows that you don't really understand the underpinnings of internet service.

No, I get that. I just don't see the backbone providers changing. Nobody is going to want to be the one who makes such a massive change that impacts billions of dollars of revenue (in connected customers) and the "trailblazer" in finding the pitfalls that need addressing along the way. This is an area where jumping out to the bleeding edge is rarely, if ever, rewarded, and where there is precious little ability to adequately test lab environments under anything approaching "real world" conditions.

It's an idea that might've taken hold if the Internet was being deployed from the ground up today, but I don't see it being implemented in the current environment.

Perhaps that's me being a 20 year industry-vet curmudgeon at this point. Not sure. :-)

You invested? like with a prospectus and such?

I've addressed this fallacy elsewhere: the parts of tax subsidies which had actual contractual, regulatory, or statutory "requirements" tied to them have been either upheld, or worked out through the existing oversight processes. What you're asking for is something new which (frankly) nobody thought to include in the requirements when such things were being done decades ago. That's not the ISPs' fault, it's "ours" collectively for having something of buyer's remorse about the deal we negotiated with them.

But pretending that we're Darth Vader, telling them we've altered the deal and to pray we don't alter it any further is not governance, but tyranny.

What you're describing has not really been done "at scale" (in my experience and understanding anyway) by anything other than a few companies. Expecting that the backbone providers are all going to change their traffic infrastructure to accommodate this model you describe may not really be practical for "the current Internet".

For something like an "Internet2" type of green-field deployment, if we "had it all to do over again, starting with the tech of today", you might be onto something. But I don't see that change happening in today's environment.

Oh, I remember dial-up ISPs all too well. I helped build two of them, and then was there for the lighting up of one of the first/few MMDS (wireless cable) ISPs. As you point out: I've got a low ID#, I've been to this dog and pony show for a long long time. :-)

As I said elsewhere in this sub-thread, I'm fine with any of a number of ways of introducing competition:

• competitive wholesale access
• electric companies acting as the disinterested neutral third-party fiber carrier for competition
• communities deciding to install fiber for community-networks (provided they also allow for competitors to access that fiber

But attacking the problem from the "neutrality" side of the argument is just a misguided tactic, putting another piece of duct-tape on an already shoddy arrangement.
There's plenty of ways to crack that nut.

And that should be mandated on the cable side of the wall as well. The reason it gets no traction on the telco side of the playing field is that they aren't really investing in outside-plant upgrades (FIOS was a dismal money-losing failure for Verizon, which is why you haven't seen a new community be rolled out in years, except in one case where a court ordered them to because they'd contractually agreed to roll it out but hadn't done so after halting rollouts).

Cable on the other hand has a constantly growing need for capacity (for video) and so has been doing plant-upgrade after plant-upgrade over the intervening time.

You're making the classic mistake of thinking that the "transit data-rates" is the dominant cost factor. It's not ... switching and routing equipment, for the types of throughput you're describing, is where the real costs lie. I think your assertions about hardware costs are extremely low-ball, and this comes from someone who's been in charge of spec'ing, approving and buying network hardware for the last ten-plus years of his career.

*grr* How can it be 2014 and /. still doesn't let you edit your own post? My "your/you're" gaffe is going to bother me for weeks.

Your minimal-government-intervention solution is for the government to force the incumbent ISPs to lease their privately-owned infrastructure to their competitors, and at government-regulated prices? I am interested to see how you justify that as a lower regulatory burden than forbidding the prioritization of packets based on origin.

Sure, it's simple.

The solution you propose is a long-term regulation which needs to exist forever in order to solve the problem.

The solution I propose is a medium-term regulation which only needs to exist for a decade or two until the previously-government-squashed competition is given sufficient opportunity to re-assert itself in the marketplace.

That makes it a less intrusive burden, as it is not permanent, and doesn't actually cost the carrier money (because they still are recouping the cost of the service they're providing to the competitors).

I understand your assertion, and simply disagree with it profusely.

There was no "understanding" associated with the tax-relief. If there was, it'd be codified in the laws and regulations surrounding such tax relief. If there had been such codification, this wouldn't even be a discussion, it'd be "no, your statutorily prohibited from doing that," or "OK, that's fine, but to do it, you need to repay the $nnn,nnn,nnn,nnn.00 in tax relief that was predicated on not doing so." Instead, folks like yourself - who actually don't understand the issue at all, get all hand-wavy about "we gave them tax relief" and assume that there was some actual agreements codified around it, which weren't actually there.

Let me be clear on something: you haven't paid for "a packet". You've paid for a pipe, capable of a given flow-rate. In this case, Netflix (for example) has also paid for "a pipe", capable of a given flow rate, into the system you get your data from. It's not nearly big enough, though, to service all the people who want to consume data from Netflix. Now, your argument is that the people who sell the pipes should just give Netflix a bigger pipe and take it on the chin because goddamnit you want to watch your Breaking Bad reruns. But the pipe Netflix needs, to do what you're asking, is really goddamned big. Big enough that if Netflix wants a pipe that big, it should damned well pay for upgrading it themselves. That includes both just the physical pipe, but also whatever the people who sell the pipes need to charge in order to able to handle the inflow of data from a pipe that big, sending it on to all the various places where those bits are going to drop back out into your laptop.

Your attempt to fixate on "charging for packets" is laudable. It certainly makes for a more compelling argument, or it would if there were any companies charging "by the packet" instead of "by the width of the pipe."

By all means, though, if you want to go to "paying by the packet" billing, I suspect the telcos and cable companies would be happy to oblige. It's a much more tenable business model for everyone involved, charging metered service, so that those who put the most actual strain on the network pay the most. But the last time a carrier tried that (TWC, 2008, in field trials in Texas) there was a hue and cry from folks - on this very site - against such "paying by the packet".

So, believe me, I very much understand the issue, and have been paying attention to it before you had even heard the phrase "net neutrality."

Except that electrical utilities haven't already brought sufficient fiber into residential neighborhoods. They're not bringing out NEARLY the amount of fiber to the pole you'd need to in order to sufficiently handle "broadband everywhere".

Realistically, I'm fine with any of the various options for "how to get competition in the marketplace". But I think that is the answer rather than trying to interfere with day to day traffic management policies.

Everyone else did such a great job destroying your points

I feel like you're reading a different thread than I am. I've yet to see such "destruction" of points.

Thanks for playing, though.

Fine, then local municipalities should be allowed to establish their own publicly funded internet services without any interference from private service providers in the form of lawsuits because of "unfair" competition.

I have absolutely no problem with that. I would argue that they shouldn't be doing that without also opening up that last-mile infrastructure they're building to "all comers" (ie, if the taxpayers have paid for outside-plant for high speed bandwidth specifically to force competition against an incumbent carrier, then that fiber should be available for anyone who wants to compete against the incumbent carrier).

If a community has the financial resources, and the political will, to take that tack to solving the "lack of competition" angle, versus the usual "competitive wholesale access" angle (where TWC/Verizon/Comcast are forced to allow competitors to use their last mile), then that's a perfectly reasonable solution.

Ah yes, the ol' "if you don't agree with me, you must be a shill for the opposition" chestnut.

*plonk*