how-to block ads
|
Share Topic
 |
 |
|
|
 NightfallMy Goal Is To Deny YoursPremium,MVM
join:2001-08-03
Grand Rapids, MI
 ·Site5.com
 ·Comcast
 ·Callcentric
| Re: This is alarming said by hopeflicker:said by aciddrink:said by ninjatutle:20% of all traffic consist of illegal activity. 90% of all statistics are made up on the spot. and 50% of users pull numbers out of their ass without posting links to their claims.  This is 100% true. I have not seen any actual data from an unbiased source that points out the actual data usage and breaks it down factually. Instead, we have a bunch of ISPs claiming that P2P is killing them, but we have others not on the inside saying they are full of crap. So who do we believe? The majority of users here on BBR believe that the ISP is full of crap. I would like to see some real data.
The only actual data I have seen was on Comcast's network in my area. I was fortunate enough to have a friend who worked at Comcast to show me the usage data for all of the high speed internet lines in the city as broken down by usage. It was an eye opening experience to be able to see that and to see that the top 5% of the lines in the city ate up more than the last 95%.
It would be useful to see that kind of data from every ISP. | |
|   funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5
2 edits | Re: This is alarming said by Nightfall:The only actual data I have seen was on Comcast's network in my area. I was fortunate enough to have a friend who worked at Comcast to show me the usage data for all of the high speed internet lines in the city as broken down by usage. It was an eye opening experience to be able to see that and to see that the top 5% of the lines in the city ate up more than the last 95%. It would be useful to see that kind of data from every ISP. I've seen the same kind of stat from a number of different involved and uninvolved sources that I believe it to be true.
The question is why is the network managed in such a way that 5% of the users can take 95% of the bandwidth? It's not the users -- users have no control over the size of the tiers, or the number of people they share bandwidth with. Why are the Cable Internet companies having so much trouble with this, especially?
It's not really BitTorrent's fault -- BitTorrent is simply the method users are choosing to transfer large files. About a dozen years ago, the method choice was FTP. About 7-8 years ago, the preferred method was HTTP. (Which is why most ISPs offer personal web pages but not personal FTP space) -- they wanted to get that traffic off of the last mile but FTP had fallen out of favor!
My thoughts -- »Re: WOW! Comcast cut off Dave Winer ... again
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
More fun, more features, Join BroadbandReports.com, it's free...
| |
| | NightfallMy Goal Is To Deny YoursPremium,MVM
join:2001-08-03
Grand Rapids, MI Reviews:
·Site5.com
·Comcast
·Callcentric
| Re: This is alarming said by funchords:said by Nightfall:The only actual data I have seen was on Comcast's network in my area. I was fortunate enough to have a friend who worked at Comcast to show me the usage data for all of the high speed internet lines in the city as broken down by usage. It was an eye opening experience to be able to see that and to see that the top 5% of the lines in the city ate up more than the last 95%. It would be useful to see that kind of data from every ISP. I've seen the same kind of stat from a number of different involved and uninvolved sources that I believe it to be true. The question is why is the network managed in such a way that 5% of the users can take 95% of the bandwidth? It's not the users -- users have no control over the size of the tiers, or the number of people they share bandwidth with. Why are the Cable Internet companies having so much trouble with this, especially? It's not really BitTorrent's fault -- BitTorrent is simply the method users are choosing to transfer large files. About a dozen years ago, the method choice was FTP. About 7-8 years ago, the preferred method was HTTP. (Which is why most ISPs offer personal web pages but not personal FTP space) -- they wanted to get that traffic off of the last mile but FTP had fallen out of favor! My thoughts -- » Re: WOW! Comcast cut off Dave Winer ... again Comparing FTP to Bittorrent is comparing apples to oranges. Especially in terms of eating bandwidth. If you are downloading a 4gb movie, FTP just transfers the files. Bittorrent does the same thing. The only difference is that people sharing needed to use an FTP server and have some kind of service that did dynamic IP lookups because dyndns didn't exist back then. Bittorrent doesn't care what your IP is. It just shares the files and it will do it indefinitely. It will take as much bandwidth as your line has and it will do it until you shut it down. Thats a hell of a lot different than FTP.
As you said though, FTP was the program of choice for large transfers because you could start transfers where you left off. Bittorrent is just another step in the file transfer world.
The network could be managed a lot more effectively. My first thought is to give priority to HTTP/FTP traffic. Make P2P traffic low priority. Then, you give whatever is left to P2P, but make everything else primary. That tends to piss off the filesharing crowd, but thats fine with me. | |
| | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5
2 edits | Re: This is alarming said by Nightfall:Comparing FTP to Bittorrent is comparing apples to oranges. Especially in terms of eating bandwidth. If you are downloading a 4gb movie, FTP just transfers the files. Bittorrent does the same thing. The only difference is that people sharing needed to use an FTP server and have some kind of service that did dynamic IP lookups because dyndns didn't exist back then. Either did 4 GB movies.
Bittorrent doesn't care what your IP is. It just shares the files and it will do it indefinitely. In most cases, it will share the file until the user reaches a certain pay-back value. But other P2P programs (Gnutella, eMule) share more like you describe. FTP servers also act in the way you describe.
It will take as much bandwidth as your line has FTP and BitTorrent both do this.
The network could be managed a lot more effectively. My first thought is to give priority to HTTP/FTP traffic. Make P2P traffic low priority. Then, you give whatever is left to P2P, but make everything else primary. Don't confuse the architecture of the end-points with the urgency of the content. Skype is a P2P telephone service. BitTorrentDNA does streaming video. These are P2P uses that should not be thrown into the slow lane.
Rapidshare handles large file transfers using the HTTP protocol. Network Associates handles their background upgrades via FTP. These are Client-Server uses that wouldn't do harm being in the slow lane.
The "network" must be managed in a neutral way. It can't be expected to know how urgent a particular packet is. There are a number of Internet Standard ways for the end points of a communication to identify handling instructions and the network operators have the option of turning on this capability (that's an oversimplification -- they can't just flip a switch, if big ISPs decided to support this, we'd be 1+ year from seeing this working on the open Internet -- but the standard and even the hardware already exists).
But don't drink the cool-aid. No prioritization scheme -- a standard one like I'm suggesting or a DPI one like your suggesting -- is a sufficient replacement for keeping up with routine bandwidth demand growth. Prioritization helps make sensitive applications more robust, but it doesn't invent bandwidth by shuffling the order of packets.
PS:
said by Nightfall:The network could be managed a lot more effectively. My first thought is to give priority to HTTP/FTP traffic. Make P2P traffic low priority. Then, you give whatever is left to P2P, but make everything else primary. That tends to piss off the filesharing crowd, but thats fine with me. Actually, most hard-core filesharers set up their own networks kinda this way (they limit their uploads to 80% of their modem's uplink rate). I'm not opposed to the idea at all. We don't want our ISPs deciding for us. Innovations like Streaming P2P could have never happened if all of the Internet transit providers decided unilaterally to put P2P last in line.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
More fun, more features, Join BroadbandReports.com, it's free...
| |
| | | | | | | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5
1 edit | Re: This is alarming said by Nightfall:Just a couple rebuttal points here... quote:
In most cases, it will share the file until the user reaches a certain pay-back value. But other P2P programs (Gnutella, eMule) share more like you describe. FTP servers also act in the way you describe.
A lot of popular Bittorrent clients do the same thing as Gnutella and eMule unless you tell it otherwise. It will share and keep sharing even if you have already went over and above the ratio amount. Oh, and most users don't set those options up so it just shares away. So I wouldn't say "In most cases" and say "In rare cases" for that statement. I don't think so (I'm about 80% sure here), but I invite you or someone reading to prove me wrong. Uninstall your software and be sure also to ensure its previous configuration files, directories and registry settings are also gone. (Either this or try it on a new computer.)
Install Azureus and uTorrent and see what the settings are at -- the last time that I installed these (more than 6 months ago), those were the most popular by leaps and bounds and both stopped sharing when the ratio 100% 150% 200% or something was reached by default. It is an option that a lot of people change after installing.
There are over 60 applications using BitTorrent according to the DCIA -- and they'll all behave differently, but these two are the main two.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
More fun, more features, Join BroadbandReports.com, it's free...
| |
| | | | | | NightfallMy Goal Is To Deny YoursPremium,MVM
join:2001-08-03
Grand Rapids, MI Reviews:
·Site5.com
·Comcast
·Callcentric
| Re: This is alarming said by funchords:said by Nightfall:Just a couple rebuttal points here... quote:
In most cases, it will share the file until the user reaches a certain pay-back value. But other P2P programs (Gnutella, eMule) share more like you describe. FTP servers also act in the way you describe.
A lot of popular Bittorrent clients do the same thing as Gnutella and eMule unless you tell it otherwise. It will share and keep sharing even if you have already went over and above the ratio amount. Oh, and most users don't set those options up so it just shares away. So I wouldn't say "In most cases" and say "In rare cases" for that statement. I don't think so (I'm about 80% sure here), but I invite you or someone reading to prove me wrong. Uninstall your software and be sure also to ensure its previous configuration files, directories and registry settings are also gone. (Either this or try it on a new computer.) Install Azureus and uTorrent and see what the settings are at -- the last time that I installed these (more than 6 months ago), those were the most popular by leaps and bounds and both stopped sharing when the ratio 100% 150% 200% or something was reached by default. It is an option that a lot of people change after installing. There are over 60 applications using BitTorrent according to the DCIA -- and they'll all behave differently, but these two are the main two. Not having any software installed on my system previously, I took the challenge. I opened ports on my firewall and used 2 clients. Utorrent to start. Utorrent will keep sharing even after your ratio is passed. There is an option to stop seeding after you hit your ratio, but that is not checked. Even if checked, the default number is 4kb/second. So user intervention is necessary to turn that on. This is on 1.7.7
Same to go with Azureus. The option was disabled by default. So once again its up to the user to turn that on if you want it.
I guess I learned a few things from this experiment. I wasn't 100% sure either, but I now know that you at least have to intervene if you don't want to be sharing after you hit your ratio. The Utorrent setting was the easiest to find, but just because its there doesn't mean the users are going to turn it off. As has been evidenced by various P2P applications like Kazaa, seems that users just let that darn application run all the time back in the day. Sure, the experienced users make sure the right options are turned on, so that covers everyone here on BBR. 
You are right though, there are a lot of applications out there and 2 apps don't make a default. It could have changed in the last 6 months too where these things were set to default. | |
| | | | | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | Re: This is alarming Thanks for doing that! Huh, I could have swore ... I stand corrected. | |
|
| | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5
3 edits | said by Nightfall: quote:
FTP and BitTorrent both do this.
Correct, but you left out the part of my post explaining about dynamic dns services and such. Seemed that back in the FTP days, a site could be shutdown pretty easily. Bittorrent is a lot harder to bring down than FTP thats for sure. Oh, now I see. I did read that dyndns point the first time before but I didn't know what your point actually was. Yes, it was easy to get rogue FTP sites shut down back then. Not only did the IP address tip them off, but abuse desks were more responsive to complaints.
You make it sound like FTP back 7-8 years ago was just as effective as Bittorrent which I disagree with. Bittorrent is much more efficient and dare I say better than FTP ever was. Actually we agree on how effective and efficient that BitTorrent is over FTP. I was thinking about what Cisco says topped the bandwidth charts at the time. I'd have to go back and see, but if memory serves me I was talking about how prevalent its usage was -- and it was more than 10 years ago. I think the "bandwidth hog" history goes like this: ftp (12+ ago) - http (~8 ago) - bittorrent (~4 ago) - http (~now).
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
More fun, more features, Join BroadbandReports.com, it's free...
| |
|
| |
|
