Comments on news posted 2010-02-10 11:01:09: The network neutrality debate really started up in the States in 2005, with then AT&T CEO Ed Whitacre, envious of Google ad revenue, oddly declaring that Google should pay a surcharge to AT&T, well, just because. ..
Wow, an ISP that doesn't charge subscribers for their connection. That must be the case since this ISP is claiming Google is getting a "free ride" to their subscribers. Certainly they couldn't make such and idiotic claim if subscribers actually paid for their internet service.
Notice to the leeching double dipping ISPs...without compelling content like that from google, you wouldn't have any HSI subscribers. Without the streaming video and such, everyone would be free to go back to dial-up for $8.
And to Ed Whitacre, I think Chevy and the rest of Government Motors is getting a free ride on the government's roads. Time to pay up for every mile GM owners drive (since he also loved the consumption based model). Using Ed logic it doesn't matter that Chevy's "subscribers" already pay road taxes (license fees, excise taxes etc); Chevy is getting a free ride.
Meanwhile Google should refuse to pay any bounty and BLOCK access from any ISP that actively traffic shapes their content. The ISP would crumble soon enough.
In Sacramento, they are already peeved about everyone buying fuel efficient cars since it cuts into their massive gas tax revenues. They want to force everyone to have GPS in their cars and when you fill up, it reports to the pump how many miles you drove and adds the per mile tax.
Not even the smelly Prius driving hippies are safe from tax, borrow and waste government.
It hasn't passed but there are legislators who bring it up all the time and it was all the rage 2004-2007 with CalTrans looking for big money lobbying hard for it. »news.google.com/archives ··· av=hist7
It was brought up in Massachusetts too. Even Transportation Secretary LaHood endorsed the idea before Obama wisely nixed it.
That's friggin' ridiculous. Be green! Be efficient! Help us limit our dependence on foreign oil.
OH SHOOT! Uh...wait a minute. We didn't mean it. Please by more gas because we tax it to death and...
Didn't this happen to the tobacco folks? All the negative cancer-causing PR finally has usage down and to make up, they just keep raising the taxes in the name of the chronic health care problems it creates and how that's a huge burden to society. I suspect that's true but I seriously doubt if those tax revenues are used to help cover costs related to tobacco use.
(Just so folks know, I've never been a smoker and other than in principle, I don't care if they tax tobacco to death.)
Didn't this happen to the tobacco folks? All the negative cancer-causing PR finally has usage down and to make up, they just keep raising the taxes in the name of the chronic health care problems it creates and how that's a huge burden to society. I suspect that's true but I seriously doubt if those tax revenues are used to help cover costs related to tobacco use.
(Just so folks know, I've never been a smoker and other than in principle, I don't care if they tax tobacco to death.)
The taxes, to some extent, are used to pay for subsidies to Tobacco Farmers to help them grow more Tobacco. IMO, the subsidies should be cut off and applied to paying them to switch to an alternate crop (and totally phased out over a 3 year period). If the Government says that it is bad for you, why are they supporting it? Just collect the "sin" taxes on it but DO NOT support the Tobacco Drug Dealers by paying them to grow it.
The gas tax funds highway reconstruction. All Gas tax money is put into the Highway Trust Fund which is redisbursed to the states to pay to repair those pot holes you complain about. At the same time the gas tax hasn't been increased since the mid 80's. This worked for a long time because even though the tax wasn't increased to match inflation driver miles increased yearly increasing the revenue from the gas tax. Since 2008 gas tax revenues have been dropping. It's a non-starter (Pelosi said it wasn't even on the table) to raise the tax to compensate for 30 years of inflation that was never taken into account. As a result states are proposing the idea of per mile taxes as an easier sell to the public.
The reality is that in 2008 the highway trust fund was exhausted. Gas tax revenues no longer can cover needed construction and as a result we are now borrowing to rebuild roads. Personally I'd like to see the federal gas tax raised from the current $0.17 to $.30 and indexed against inflation. Otherwise we are all going to be driving on gravel roads soon, some rural areas have already started ripping out paved roads, without considering that gravel roads can have higher maintenance costs. Bitch about the per mile all you want, but if you really want to fix the problem you need to petition your rep's to raise the gas tax.
That is the point. The gov't has the transportation dollars but they steal to fund their other waste.
So I don't want to hear how they don't have money for road construction. That is like a drug addict who just wasted all his money on meth complaining that he now has no money to pay the light bill.
If they want to raise taxes, let them put it on the ballot and say it's to pay the bloated pensions of gov't workers and see how far they get. But no, after wasting all the money the first thing they run and cut is roads and public safety because they think they can raise taxes with those threats.
If they want to raise taxes, let them put it on the ballot and say it's to pay the bloated pensions of gov't workers and see how far they get. But no, after wasting all the money the first thing they run and cut is roads and public safety because they think they can raise taxes with those threats.
Public safety IS the poster child for bloated pensions. If you let citizens vote on tax increases, they will always vote no, and they will always vote yes on spending. See california's problem for details.
Can I get my gas tax money back then? Since Iowa refuses to have a motorcycle helmet law we do not get any federal road funds, and have the worst roads in the country.
Anyway, no way would I put a GPS thing in my car reporting to some bureaucrats how much and where I drove. I would rather drive on gravel roads. Well, more gravel roads.
And back on topic, lets see how it works for the ISP if they cut off Google. Not well I expect. What a bunch of wankers.
WOW ... surely that can't be true .... you are joking right?
Nope. Some parts of the World already do this, your tax is based on how much you drive, and where and when you drive, not your gallons of fuel.
As cars become more fuel efficient, revenues from gasoline taxes fall, and cash strapped states look to other ways to make money.
The idea of "a per mile" tax or roadway toll tracking system aren't new, but the movement is gathering more steam.
Not only that, they can charge you extra for driving into congested areas, at rush hour, etc to encourage "traffic control" or alternative forms of transport.
some parts of Asia all cars have to have EZ-Pass(well something like it) and you get billed for entering that area. they just have the transmitters on overheads.
Did you know that the state now has a computer that is hooked directly into the insurance company computers? The state is so desperate for money they have a computer program like a stock trading program watching the car insurance of every California driver. If your insurance lapses they cancel the car registration.
You don't have to be driving the car to have your registration cancelled. You don't have to be pulled over and get a ticket for no insurance to have your registration cancelled.
If you are sitting in your living room watching TV with the car parked in the driveway like it has been for the last 6 months and the insurance lapses on the car? The registration for the car will be cancelled and the greedy pathetic state charges $15 for someone to click the yes/no mouse button to reinstate the registration.
Computers and other technology are going to monitor every aspect of our lives so the state can charge you for smoking where you shouldn't, parking where you shouldn't, or even jaywalking, without ever being stopped by a policeman!!!!!!
Thats why they want to tax you based on miles driven since the mpg of most cars is going up, and the gas taxes arn't enough to pay for road upkeep anymore. :-(
It would be just as reasonable for Google to demand fees from the consumer ISPs for responding to web requests from those IPs. With two ISPs in an area, if one paid the fees the other would be at a disadvantag by not "offering" Google on its network.
That would be Google going "evil" (contrary to its supposed slogan). But it would be the same thing these ISPs are trying now, in reverse. Why not ISPs pay Google - and Google pay ISPs - and make the fees equal? It would all would zero out, and there would be no controversy about neutrality.
The economic model of the internet has always been peering among the "big pipe" owners, or semi-peering with payments, and everyone else paying their local provider for access. The ISPs get paid for traffic both coming and going, to each subscriber, and the cost is the same regardless whether it is Google, or a household or some other party that the packets are going to or coming from.
Notice to the leeching double dipping ISPs...without compelling content like that from google, you wouldn't have any HSI subscribers.
Meanwhile Google should refuse to pay any bounty and BLOCK access from any ISP that actively traffic shapes their content. The ISP would crumble soon enough.
We're planning to build and test ultra high-speed broadband networks in a small number of trial locations across the United States. We'll deliver Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today with 1 gigabit per second, fiber-to-the-home connections. We plan to offer service at a competitive price to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people.
We'll operate an "open access" network, giving users the choice of multiple service providers. And consistent with our past advocacy, we'll manage our network in an open, non-discriminatory and transparent way.
As a first step, today we're putting out a request for information (RFI) to help identify interested communities. We welcome responses from local government, as well as members of the public. If you'd like to respond, visit this page to learn more, or check out our video:
From that quoted item, they aren't the "ISP", they would be the infrastructure. Users would have their choice of ISP. That is unless Google would be one of the content provider choices. Just like DSL line sharing, if you get DSL Extreme, your ISP is DSL Extreme even if it is running over AT&T's or VZ's Cu.
said by FFH5 We'll operate an "open access" network, giving users the choice of multiple service providers. And consistent with our past advocacy, we'll manage our network in an open, non-discriminatory and transparent way.[/BQUOTE :
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This is the most awesome part of all. If Google picks your area, you could open up a "mom & pop" ISP and yet use Google's FTTH to get it to customers.
Google Uses 21 Times More Bandwidth than it Pays For
Here is someone who makes the case that Google doesn't pay it's fair share of internet costs. NOT that it pays NOTHING, but that it gets a huge discount and transfers costs to ISPs.
Here is someone who makes the case that Google doesn't pay it's fair share of internet costs. NOT that it pays NOTHING, but that it gets a huge discount and transfers costs to ISPs.
quote:Economy of scale Submitted by Paul Clieu on Mon, 2009-01-12 07:40.
Your estimates suggest that Google is paying 5% of the average cost for bandwidth. Considering their volume, this is not unreasonable at all.
It is a well accepted rule of thumb that as you double unit volume, unit costs tend to drop by 25%.
Assume the amount of bandwidth used by Google is about 10**8 (100 million) times that of a ordinary individual internet consumer. Log2(100 million) is 26.58. 0.75**26.58 is 0.000478. Assume the average consumer pays $600 per year, then when you do the maths, it works out that Google should be paying about $29M not the $318M allegedly paid. Your estimates should factor in the rather large economy of scale that Google should enjoy.
Re: Google Uses 21 Times More Bandwidth than it Pays For
Your point is valid, but keep in mind the report's author, Scott Cleland, is a paid lobbyist for AT&T and Verizon. Arguing science with guys like that is like trying to box with a river. Their interest isn't in the facts. Should you deconstruct one absurd point, another will simply pop up to take its place.
Here is someone who makes the case that Google doesn't pay it's fair share of internet costs. NOT that it pays NOTHING, but that it gets a huge discount and transfers costs to ISPs.
So, if I lease an OC12 directly to the internet and I'm bring charged a flat rate of $xxx a month (or annually) for that connection, I should be charged again by the ISPs who connect to me through my connection?
If everyone is going to bitch about transfer costs, I'm going to start first. For every bit, I'm going to charge the IP who sent it and received it from me.
Wow.. I should start charging Facebook, MySpace, MSN, Yahoo, dslreports.com (although I'd give them a discount), Gentoo, FreeBSD, OpenBSD,... (the list goes on).
The study estimated Googles payment to fund just the U.S. consumer broadband Internet segment to be approximately $344 million in 2008 or 0.8% of U.S. consumers flat-rate monthly Internet access costs of $44.0 billion. Thus Googles 16.5% share of all 2008 U.S. consumer bandwidth usage, is ~21 times greater than Googles 0.8% share of U.S. consumer bandwidth costs or an implicit ~$6.9 billion subsidy of Google by U.S. consumers.
Wow that's idiotic. Do readers really fall for that kind of reasoning?
In fact, Google pays for 100% of its own connection to the backbone, and each "consumer" houshold pays pays for 100% of its connection to the backbone. Google moves more traffic for less money because it's built its own network and gets wholesale rates.
If 16.5% of "consumers" (individual citizens)' traffic is to and from Google, then obviously they are spending 16.5% of their internet access charges on Google.
The fact that Google pays lower rates per gigabyte doesn't mean anyone is subsidizing Google. If A sends a package to B, by UPS for $10, and C pays $20 to get it from B by Fedex, then is C is subsidizing A? Of course not, A is paying the market rate for 100% of A's segment of the transport, and C is paying the market rate for 100% of C's segment of the transport (each at his or her preferred speed).
Of course, if customers of retail ISPs are paying 21x the rate that Google is paying, it means the ISPs may be overcharging them. The excess is going to the retail ISPs' stockholders, not to Google. Evidently we need a public internet infrastucture to avoid this price-gouging by local monopolies or duopolies.
Re: Google Uses 21 Times More Bandwidth than it Pays For
Wow that's idiotic. Do readers really fall for that kind of reasoning?
You'd be surprised. The author (Cleland) is repeatedly invited to testify before Congress as an "objective expert" in the field of telecom, despite the fact his words, every last one of them, are bought and paid for (not to mention often make no sense)....
Their arguments are big enough to run freight trains through!
Look at this:
"The study estimated Google used 16.5% of all U.S. consumer Internet traffic in 2008, and that share is estimated to grow to 25% in 2009 and 37% in 2010."
"The study estimated Googles payment to fund just the U.S. consumer broadband Internet segment to be approximately $344 million in 2008 or 0.8% of U.S. consumers flat-rate monthly Internet access costs of $44.0 billion. Thus Googles 16.5% share of all 2008 U.S. consumer bandwidth usage, is ~21 times greater than Googles 0.8% share of U.S. consumer bandwidth costs or an implicit ~$6.9 billion subsidy of Google by U.S. consumers."
There logic is:
"We think people's Google related traffic is XX% of all traffic."
"We think that Google paid $$xxx amount for bandwidth last year."
"We think Consumers paid "$$xxx" for internet connections last year."
So Taking what consumers pay and dividing what Google pays into what we think the traffic is consumers using Google and Google's bots use means that Google is massively underpaying!
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Anyone see the HUGE holes in this? And I'm talking about the logic, not just the guesses at the numbers!
They are comparing APPLES TO ORANGES. They take consumer Internet charges and then extrapolate them to Google's bandwidth payments, like they are a similar thing. WTF?
How many consumer Internet accounts are ONLY billed for exactly the bandwidth they use? Any? No, pretty much everyone is on a flat rate billing that includes covers the ISP's overhead, profits, and the user's bandwidth.
Now, let's not even mention the wholesale to retail difference.
That whole piece is sheer idiocy.
A simple fact that bears repeating. Google is billed for bandwidth they use. They pay their bills. Consumers ISP's also have bandwidth costs which they have to cover with consumer's bills, so that end is also paid for. This "Free ride" or "subsidized ride" argument is complete horsepuckey.
These guys are bluffing, plain and simple, and Google knows it. What are they going to do if Google refuses to pay? Block them or degrade their service? Oh, that will go over well with their customers. It'll be a public relations nightmare that will go on and on. First, they'll get slammed for simply blocking or degrading Google, which they'll have to explain. They'll explain that Google isn't paying its "fair share" for bandwidth, at which point Google will fire back that it pays quite a lot for bandwidth, thank you very much, and it may also publicly ask why sites such as Bing, Yahoo, MSNBC, Facebook, MySpace, etc. aren't also being blocked. Are they all paying? If not, why is Google being singled out? And if they should pay, then shouldn't subs be either getting discounted service or maybe even free service? Then the ISP will have to try to explain their rationale for trying to double-dip by charging both customers and Web sites, and we know that the more they talk about this, the sillier and greedier they look, and we also know this isn't a discussion they want to have out in the open.
So who wants to be the first ISP to try this stunt?
I have to agree with you on this one. I can't see this going anywhere. If they force the issue, they will have to start explaining a whole bunch of stuff on multiple fronts.
There's a new Sheriff in town, and it's me! I can write a 30 page bullshit report full of inanities and made up facts to support the telcos. You dumbass, are out of a job! Pack up your typewriter and get out of town.
I guess they need to find some way to pay for fixing all of those potholes caused by Google's heavy traffic on the Information Super-highway... oh, my!
This ISP can try disabling Google access for a while and see where it gets them. While I'm not sure about neutrality rules in the Spanish countries Telefonica operates, but I'm sure customer backlash would solve things pretty fast.
and never has been a free ride. The websites like google or fill in the blank all pay for hosting of some kind or another. T3's, T1's or any other kind of pipeline doesn't come cheap to any website.
Bottom line, consumers and websites alike pay for connectivity to the world wide web.
Without Google, I might not even use the internet. Google should block content and demand ISPs pay them for their services. Google is the real king here.
You aren't missing anything. Your only error is assuming logic plays a role here. These guys know full well how the Internet works; they simply want to double-dip by charging both their customers and the content providers. While their "argument" makes no sense to anyone with knowledge of how the Internet works, they're betting there will be enough people out there who don't know and who will therefore buy into their claims to get away with this scheme. And, believe me, there are plenty of people who don't have the slightest clue how this stuff works. Remember Ted "Tubes" Stevens? His comments on how the Internet works would be comical if it weren't for the fact that it's people like him who set policy for things they don't even remotely understand.
PAY nnnnn pay n pay cause the isp is night we ar day PAY nnnnn pay n pay this over charging us is gay PAY nnnnn pay n pay we gonna make stupid isps pay instead
This demonstrates yet again why we our Government needs to step in and classify all broadband providers as "dumb pipes". We would not be having this stupid discussion otherwise.
They are. They are just having a hard time realizing this and are fighting tooth and nail to make us think otherwise. Unfortunately for them, the smart ones like us have already realized it.
Lets say google used 100% of all bandwidth, they would need to pay for 334mil/.165 = 2024.24. Now to calculate the overage: Other peoples share = 44000-2024 = 41976 divide by google payment (2024.24) = 20.7 - magic - the overage number didn't move! Still 21.
Now lets try the reverse.
Say google used 1% of trafic: 334/16.5 = 20.25 - other people will then pay 44000-20.25 = 43980 divide by google cost = 2172, adjust for 1% usage (* .01) = 21.72.
My head asplode - is seems no matter how much google uses they always seem to have an overage of 20 to 22 times as much!
Could it be, no, but could it be that home users pay 21 times too much for bandwidth??
...great post by whoever that was
Also, I don't think I'll be using any bandwidth to even bother reading the 27 page "report."
Too crazy. Here we have people paying for both ends of (cell) phone calls, both ends of internet, and it's not enough for some people's greed.
Here's a point to consider as an ISP - if you don't want to offer people the "speed" you advertise, keep it where it is until you can handle the CAPACITY. I'd rather have a stable line than a totally randomly sometimes fast one.
the maximum data rate of a physical communication link is proportional to its bandwidth in hertz, which is sometimes called frequency bandwidth, radio bandwidth or analog bandwidth
Thinking about the quote from the original article:
...companies like Google use a lot of network bandwidth for free, something which was good for them but not for Telefonica.
Do they now. Hmm. So if an ISP can't handle 10,000 people checking gmail/facebook/etc. and then watching some YouTube clip that was emailed to them, that is not the problem of Google/Facebook/etc. if their outgoing lines all have plenty of "BANDWIDTH" in the true sense. Does this mean that the ISP is struggling with capacity needed to serve their customers with enough actual bandwidth???????? Sounds like they're not planning for people to actually USE their fast lines...
Problem with fast internet is, eventually, even the "ordinary" users will eventually figure out that it's capable of much more than simply browsing a site or two a day and sending plain text emails. Once that happens, people expect their broadband connection to be up to the tasks; Netflix, YouTube, Gmail, and whatever the frak else they can find...
Hello, Mr. ISP - At last check I thought it was your CUSTOMERS using your bandwidth to get to Google and Google's bandwidth... not the other way around.
Block all access to Google and put up a response page that tells the customer Google is blocked because they won't pay to be carried by Telefonica.
Then they can watch 99% of their customers flee to other ISP's. An elegant solution and Telefonica can avoid having to pay for pesky bandwidth upgrades AND they can claim they beat Google.