[175881] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Cogent admits to QoSing down streaming
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Livingood, Jason)
Thu Nov 6 12:02:13 2014
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
From: "Livingood, Jason" <Jason_Livingood@cable.comcast.com>
To: "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick@ianai.net>, NANOG list <nanog@nanog.org>
Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2014 17:02:25 +0000
In-Reply-To: <D14544C8-7522-4CE3-BC3A-369CD2C03895@ianai.net>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
I noticed that Cogent has a Net Neutrality statement. If I understand what =
they disclosed on the M-Lab list it does not seem to jive with this. The se=
cond sentence seems like what they said they are doing, right?
http://www.cogentco.com/en/component/content/article/82
"Cogent practices net neutrality. We do not prioritize packet transmissions=
on the basis of the content of the packet, the customer or network that is=
the source of the packet, or the customer or network that is the recipient=
of the packet.
It is Cogent's belief that both the customer and the Internet as a whole ar=
e best served if the application layer remains independent from the network=
. Innovation in the development of new applications is fueled by the indivi=
dual's ability to reach as many people as possible without regard to compli=
cated gating factors such as tiered pricing or bandwidth structures used by=
legacy service providers.
Applications proliferate in a free market economy which is the Internet tod=
ay."
- JL
On 11/6/14, 11:12 AM, "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick@ianai.net<mailto:patric=
k@ianai.net>> wrote:
<http://blog.streamingmedia.com/2014/11/cogent-now-admits-slowed-netflixs-t=
raffic-creating-fast-lane-slow-lane.html>
This is interesting. And it will be detrimental to network neutrality suppo=
rters. Cogent admits that while they were publicly complaining about other =
networks congesting links, they were using QoS to make the problem look wor=
se.
One of the problems in "tech" is most people do not realize tone is importa=
nt, not just substance. There was - still is! - congestion in many places w=
here consumers have one or at most two choice of providers. Even in places =
where there are two providers, both are frequently congested. Instead of di=
scussing the fact there is no functioning market, no choice for the average=
end user, and how to fix it, we will now spend a ton of time arguing wheth=
er anything is wrong at all because Cogent did this.
Wouldn't you rather be discussing whether 4 Mbps is really broadband? (Anyo=
ne else have flashbacks to "640K is enough for anyone!"?) Or how many peopl=
e have more than one choice at 25 Mbps? Or whether a company with a termina=
ting access monopoly can intentionally congest its edge to charge monopoly =
rents on the content providers their paying customers are trying to access?=
I know I would.
Instead, we'll be talking about how things are not really bad, Cogent just =
made it look bad on purpose. The subtlety of "it _IS_ bad, Cogent just shif=
ted some of the burden from VoIP to streaming" is not something that plays =
well in a 30 second sound bite, or at congressional hearings.
It's enough to make one consider giving up the idea of having a functioning=
, useful Internet.
--
TTFN,
patrick
