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Comment Re:ISPs are doing dumb penny pinching (Score 1) 209

Interesting math, "...has never been as cheap as its now", and "...very affordable for carriers" costs what?
Who is the most in "...most providers just don't care about the quality of service they deliver for such users".

There are a great many assumptions made about network providers. Most of them are not fair representations of any known facts. Vilifying the network provider is really easy. But, they aren't the enemy. If they can afford to provide you a service you request, they will. And, they will usually care about all their customers because that is how they stay in business. If more customers communicated effectively with their network provider the world would be a much better place. :-)

Comment Misconceptions (Score 2) 209

Netflix streams at rates that effectively consume the entire subscriber subscription rate for hours on end. It is obvious from the postings which are being made that most who are posting are end users with no network design knowledge. So, here goes.

Netflix streams at 1.0-6.0 Mbps at a fairly constant clip the entire time a movie is playing. There are exceptions to this behavior. But, for the most part, that is the picture the network engineering folks see. Now, take a rural telco of 5000 access lines that offers DSL to 100% of its customer base. Today 2000 of the 5000 lines are subscribed and running ADSL2+FAST and 90%+ can attain speeds of at least 3 Mbps. Most can attain much higher speeds.

Of the 2000 DSL subscribers, lets assume that only 1% are Netflix customers (arguably a low number). If 1% are Netflix customers, then twenty customers will be consuming 60Mbps of bandwidth at 100% capacity constantly. If 10% are Netflix customers, then 200 customers will be consuming 600Mbps of bandwidth at 100% capacity constantly. This rate is twice the rate of the purchased bandwidth capacity for the entire ISP. And this assumes only 3 Mbps service.

Now lets assume that those 200 customers are paying $29.95 for their 3 Mbps service. The total revenue for those 200 customers would be $5,990.00 per month. That amount is almost $3000.00 per month less than the cost of the upstream port capacity without any transport fees. Oh and the bandwidth being purchased for the entire ISP is only 300Mbps redundant capacity. BTW - There is no regulatory recovery for Internet bandwidth. So, please don't play the telco monopoly card.

So, there are a bunch of end users who think you are getting the short end of the stick from the ISPs. Think again. Just because Netflix wants a free ride to the end customer and the end customer wants to use 100% of their purchased link on the cheap doesn't make the ISPs the villians. With this kind of network utilization, the ISPs are no longer able to make any money on their services. As well, they are now having to rebuild their networks to make sure they can support over the top video services like Netflix. And, Netflix is rating the ISPs???!!! That is like the fox guarding the chicken coop. Why would anyone want to hear from Netflix how well ISPs perform for their service when Netflix isn't paying for the network or bandwidth.

Comment As if . . . (Score 1) 174

Fuel cells are not batteries. If a fuel cell gets shorted out, it can explode. And it isn't like a car battery exploding. Eagle Pitcher makes fuel cells for space applications. When a fuel cell would short out at the plant, it would level a city block when it exploded.

So, yes, it is considered a good idea to replace a fuel cell with a short in it.

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