Is the 'Bandwidth Hog' a Myth?

[onehandle]

Yes. Comcast is full of it.
________________________________

But it makes great headlines: "Net Neutrality will force the telco's to give The Internet away to Bandwidth Hogs". They claim that bandwidth hogs steal all the bandwidth and cause network congestion, and therefore their behaviour harms all the other regular and peaceful law-abiding users. And to add insult to injury they pay the same price as the others! No, policing and rationing must be applied by the benevolent telco to protect the innocent.

Unfortunately, to the best of our knowledge, the way that telcos identify the Bandwidth Hogs is not by monitoring if they cause unfair traffic congestion for other users. No, they just measure the total data downloaded per user, list the top 5% and call them hogs.

For those service providers with data caps, these are usually set around 50 Gbyte and go up to 150 Gbyte a month. This is therefore a good indication of the level of bandwidth at which you start being considered a "hog". But wait: 50 Gbyte a month is… 150 kbps average (0,15 Mbps), 150 Gbyte a month is 450 kbps on average. If you have a 10 Mbps link, that's only 1,5 % or 4,5 % of its maximum advertised speed!

And that would be "hogging"?

The fact is that what most telcos call hogs are simply people who overall and on average download more than others. Blaming them for network congestion is actually an admission that telcos are uncomfortable with the 'all you can eat' broadband schemes that they themselves introduced on the market to get people to subscribe. In other words, the marketing push to get people to subscribe to broadband worked, but now the telcos see a missed opportunity at price discrimination...

http://gizmodo.com/5419179/is-the-bandwidth-hog-a-myth

[Sebastian Doyle]

1. The biggest bandwidth hog is SPAM

And Comcast not only isn't doing enough to fight spam, they are contributing to it. How many useless pieces of junk mail do they send out every month. Multiply that by their number of subscribers. Multiply that by 7, for those Comcast subscribers using all of their alloted e mail accounts.

That's a lot of crap clogging up their "tubes" (as former Senator Stevens would say). And it's coming right from their own servers.

[notesdev]

3. And the biggest source of spam comes from

overseas, China and Germany being prime among them.

Try this experiment:

1) Put up a mail server (your home PC is fine for this)

2) Leave it running for a couple of hours

3) Read your logs

4) Traceroute any connection attempts


Yes, it is that pervasive. You simply can't put up an email server anywhere on the net without some Chinese IP address attempting to connect and relay spam through it.

It seems more proper to me that there should be some sort of regime put in place to put a stop to this international criminal activity before restricting what Americans who are paying for their connectivity can do.

[Posteritatis]

17. #2 could be "minutes" instead of "hours" sometimes, too

It's shocking how quickly some things can get attacked like that.

[Angleae]

5. Comcast sends spam? Could have fooled me.

I get one email per month from them, and that only because I signed up for paperless billing.

[Sebastian Doyle]

7. You don't get all their ridiculous advertising Spam?

Like "Hey try our new resource wasting Comcast toolbar"

or "Why aren't you using that free McAfee Security Suite we have waiting for you" (uh, because it's a resource hog and requires MicroShit IE to install it)

Or 100 advertisements a month telling me why I should sign up for their phone service which costs three times as much as it should and couldn't beat what I already have anyway.

Or a dozen different Digital TV packages that all sound like "good deals" up front, until the REAL price kicks in about 3 months later.

You don't get any of that?

I don't either.... now that I have progammed my spam filter to dump it. But its still wasted packets getting in the way of the useful packets on the net and it would all run better if they just didn't bother with the shit at all.

[Angleae]

8. Never have gotten any of it, didn't need spam filters.

Only get the one "you have a bill, log in the comcast.net to view it" email once a month.

It's either a regional thing or I clicked a checkbox that said "don't email me offers"

[katkat]

12. Cox phone spam

At least you don't get recorded phone calls telling you about the Cox Digital Store in your area. And then reach no one who knows how to shut those down when you reach "customer service."

[Sebastian Doyle]

15. Comcast actually does have the phone spam too

But it helps when they don't have your actual phone number, or failing that, you can block their number. I don't know of any "good" reason why Comcast would ever need to call me, so I don't mind blocking it. Then when they hear the fake "this number has been disconnected or is no longer in service" recording, they can cross it off their list.

Which is another reason I'd never buy their phone service - how could I block their calls? :evilgrin:

[notesdev]

20. I get spam from Comcast users regularly

Mostly individuals with compromised home computers, I'd guess... but yes, a lot comes from the Comcast network. Mostly a function of how large they are.

[Posteritatis]

18. The really ridiculous thing is that what you're seeing is nothing

Some absurd percentage like three or four or five nines worth of spam generally doesn't get into peoples' mailboxes these days; it's blocked en route by the ISP, or by your mail program itself, or by one server or another along the route to your provider. Multiply what you're getting by a couple of hundred - or a couple of thousand, or worse - and you'll get an idea of what's actually trying to get to you all the time.

[DearAbby]

2. UNLIMITED ACCESS....

they advertised, that is exactly what I want.

[Posteritatis]

19. You sure they didn't advertise UNLIMITED ACCESS* instead?

ISP marketing language is ugly, lots of wiggle room like that phrase 'up to.'

[nilram]

4. And in terms of bandwidth offered to users, the US is at the bottom of the list

of industrialized nations. Other countries have more high-speed connections for people in rural areas, AND they have higher-speed connections available overall. That list includes South Korea, which I don't think of as a very wealthy nation overall. Other countries have made it a higher priority -- perhaps because, generally, their nationalized telcos are providing internet, not cable companies (which have a built-in conflict of interest). Hmm, I wonder if that conflict of interest would lessen if Comcast bought NBC?

http://www.physorg.com/news170447728.html
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2007-06-25-net-speeds_N.htm

"We're Number Twenty-Eight! We're Number Twenty-Eight!"

[Enthusiast]

11. And most of these nations

also have better and/or cheaper health care. But we have allowed corporations to capture the nation. And they will never relinquish this power. I fully expect any attempt at "net neutrality" to be shot down in a fashion after the health care reform effort (or non-effort).

[JoeyT]

6. Everyone that thinks Net Neutrality is a bad idea should have to use satellite internet for a month.

The one I'm using right now (Because our infrastructure is garbage.) only allows 200 megs a day unless you download between 1 and 6 in the morning. Exceed the limit and your internet connection dies. Usually for a couple of days. For 80 bucks a month.
This is what the telco and cable companies will bring to broadband. Fair access policies would be a disaster.

Edited to add: And I'm on the one with the least draconian FAP. One very large carrier goes by a monthly limit. So if you burn your 5 gigs in 2 days, you have no internet for 28 days. For a hundred bucks a month.

[Trekologer]

9. The "bandwidth hog" is a myth

Today's "bandwidth hog" is tomorrow's normal usage. Bandwidth usage is growing constantly and some users are just a little more ahead of the curve. Internet bandwidth is not a commodity where each additional unit has an incremental cost, such as gas or electricity.

Unfortunately, a lot of folks get on the bandwagon for overage or other usage fees thinking that their own usage is low enough to be under the cap and therefore their bills will go down. Which is completely wrong--it will just stay the same. ISPs are already enjoying around a 25% profit margin on their service, which is practically unheard of in most other industries (go look at the SEC filings). What they want is to take in even more.

[B Calm]

10. If everybody was forced to back to dial up, there wouldn't be a problem.

[Enthusiast]

13. Myth? I got a load of myths for you.

One myth is the American people DON'T WANT the public option. Another myth is health care reform is going to cost us far more than the status quo. Another myth is a "government run health care system" will be worse than the status quo.

My point is, when you get a load of money behind these "myths" they tend to be self perpetuating. So get ready for a huge disappointment in internet neutrality because you ain't getting it.

[panzerfaust]

14. Broadband speed by country: Where is US?

If we are going to pay for broadband, we should get actual broadband.

[Sinti]

16. This is total BS

they all have an upload cap and a download cap on your speed set by the server. The amount of bandwidth you get is already controlled. They're pulling this right out of their hat. They have virtual monopolies, if their pipe isn't big enough they should invest in their business.

The only thing they want to change is that they get to charge both you and the sites you visit for your time online - thereby pushing out the little guys, IMO. I believe they just bought NBC. The infotainment people want to be able to more completely control the information you get and make you pay for their propaganda. Listen to what Murdoch says...