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Press Starting To Realize Exaflood Was Nonsense
And that engineers may actually know what they're doing

Remember the "exaflood"? The idea that Internet video bandwidth demands were simply unmanageable and that we'd all be crying over clogged tubes by now? The exaflood never arrived -- because it wasn't real.

It was a bogeyman created by hardware vendors looking to sell intelligent network gear. It was a phantom crafted by think tankers and carrier lobbyists, eager to convince politicians that if they didn't give ISPs whatever they'd like (less regulation, no net neutrality laws, no price controls, huge subsidies and tax credits, less consumer protection, metered billing) the Internet would implode.

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The concept was debunked countless times by real network traffic analysis which clearly illustrated how Internet growth is not only reasonable, it is easily managed by smart network engineers and modest network investment. Still, the idea took root as a gospel truth in the press despite not being based in reality (something that happens far too often in this sector).

Most of the primary pushers of the myth have quieted down (like The Discovery Institute and Nemertes Research, the latter of which predicted we'd be seeing "Internet brownouts" by now) as time has disproved their predictions. Still, people seem trained to be terrified of the imaginary bandwidth apocalypse that never arrives. Last week we noted how Netflix streaming was now unsurprisingly eating up to 20% of peak prime time bandwidth, which resulted in some particularly silly headlines like this one at Slate. In refreshing contrast, Fortune's Scott Woolley points out that the Internet's doing just fine under this Netflix load:
quote:
"That video is growing rapidly and going to be huge is true," says Akamai co-founder Tom Leighton. "But there's tons of capacity out at the edges of the network....plenty of capacity in the last mile to your house." That capacity, he says, combined with smart delivery of Netflix content from nearby servers, means the Internet can handle Netflix just fine.
Wooley also correctly notes that this cycle of hyperbole has been going on since 1997, yet the Internet continues to adapt to new bandwidth demands created by a multitude of devices just fine. So about those Internet brown outs we were warned about in 2009...
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KrK
Heavy Artillery For The Little Guy
Premium Member
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK
Netgear WNDR3700v2
Zoom 5341J

KrK

Premium Member

They are in error where the truth is concerned...

... but that's never stopped them from pushing their agenda anyway.

Lobbying is big business.... both in the amount of handouts one can gather, as well as laws restricting your competition or creating barriers to entry of any competition, down to tax breaks going straight to the bottom line.

Trimline
Premium Member
join:2004-10-24
Windermere, FL

Trimline

Premium Member

Karl, Loved the Picture

It was so right - I had to LOL. You are the best...

fatness
subtle

join:2000-11-17
fishing

1 recommendation

fatness

those pirates

I heard that 98% of the bandwidth is used by 12 people who download everything illegal, even socks. They ruin everything.
Chubbysumo
join:2009-12-01
Duluth, MN

Chubbysumo

Member

Re: those pirates

they download everything, even netflix. good god, finally the press has found something else to overplay in the national media.

heat84
DSLR Influencer
join:2004-03-11
Delray Beach, FL

heat84 to fatness

Member

to fatness
said by fatness:

I heard that 98% of the bandwidth is used by 12 people who download everything illegal, even socks. They ruin everything.
I'm one of them. My PC is a Bit Torrent super seed box.

ArrayList
DevOps
Premium Member
join:2005-03-19
Mullica Hill, NJ

ArrayList to fatness

Premium Member

to fatness
said by fatness:

I heard that 98% of the bandwidth is used by 12 people who download everything illegal, even socks. They ruin everything.
funny. i thought that 98% of the bandwidth was used by people watching cute cat videos.

»www.youtube.com/watch?v= ··· LZbS5oig
MyDogHsFleas
Premium Member
join:2007-08-15
Austin, TX

MyDogHsFleas

Premium Member

The Discovery Institute? wow

They are the creationist whackos who pretend that they are scientists but push an anti-evolution agenda. Pretty easy to discredit.

Although, I must say they may turn out to be right, but not in the way they expected. There are credible scientists who believe that our universe is pretty artificial... either created as a simulation, or simply a projection like a hologram from the "real" universe.

Are you living in a computer simulation?

The Holographic Universe

heat84
DSLR Influencer
join:2004-03-11
Delray Beach, FL

heat84

Member

Re: The Discovery Institute? wow

I could swear one time I saw a grid on a wall. What do suppose would happen if I called for the arch?

Maybe this reality is someone's dream and when they wake up we're gone.

ArrayList
DevOps
Premium Member
join:2005-03-19
Mullica Hill, NJ

ArrayList

Premium Member

Re: The Discovery Institute? wow

said by heat84:

Maybe this reality is someone's dream and when they wake up we're gone.
don't even joke about that. its not funny. its serious.
fiberguy2
My views are my own.
Premium Member
join:2005-05-20

fiberguy2

Premium Member

And it ALL plays into the fabric of past, present and future

So a non-exaflood is being written off by a non-story based on non-facts (rather opinion?)

It's always funny how people are able to see into the future. Maybe this nonsense exaflood that never happened wasn't all about network engineering, rather, price and behavior engineering..

This story has the smell of a group that wanted their view to be right all along, and here we come after the fact with the "I told you so.. and here's my slant on the why"..

This sounds like politicians saying (after an election) "the people voted for..... " (insert their own slant here) ...

People will base views and make their story line on what every they want AFTER events happen.

It's pretty clear that internet use could have been curbed by high prices and the bad economy. There could be a number of factors INCLUDING network management (which also includes capping, throttling, threat of law suits, etc) that all played..

It's pretty presumptuous for any analysis to look at some set of numbers and sing praise to their cause.

But, I'm glad that in a society like ours, a career can be made out of anything, even if it is just talking about facts, or non-facts..

Now would someone please go step on a mosquito so that we can make sure Obama doesn't get a second term? Oh, and thank you to who ever killed the fly that caused Nancy Pelosi to lose her Speaker position.

Post-predictions and analysis is about as valid as the republican supporters coming out the day after an election to say "I told you so"..
dagg
join:2001-03-25
Galt, CA

dagg

Member

Re: And it ALL plays into the fabric of past, present and future

said by fiberguy2:

This story has the smell of a group that wanted their view to be right all along, and here we come after the fact with the "I told you so.. and here's my slant on the why"..
um... and you come across people who want their views to be wrong that often?
of course you are going to have people after being proven right stop and say "oh look, i was right"... and of course they are going to say why they felt they were right to begin with.

unless im totally misunderstanding what you are trying to say here, you post resembles a three year old's tantrum.
az00935
Premium Member
join:2010-09-09

az00935

Premium Member

Tons of capacity at the edges of the network?

"But there's tons of capacity out at the edges of the network....plenty of capacity in the last mile to your house."

Tell that to the 10s of millions who have only satellite service or those that have been stuck on legacy cable or DSL with no speed increase for 5 or 10 years.
WernerSchutz
join:2009-08-04
Sugar Land, TX

WernerSchutz

Member

Re: Tons of capacity at the edges of the network?

said by az00935:

"But there's tons of capacity out at the edges of the network....plenty of capacity in the last mile to your house."

Tell that to the 10s of millions who have only satellite service or those that have been stuck on legacy cable or DSL with no speed increase for 5 or 10 years.
Sure there is capacity, except that you cannot use it (the 250 GB arbitrary Comcast cap).

meeboo
@verizon.net

meeboo

Anon

Re: Tons of capacity at the edges of the network?

and Charter just announced a 250 GB monthly cap as well.
cramer
Premium Member
join:2007-04-10
Raleigh, NC
Westell 6100
Cisco PIX 501

cramer

Premium Member

And yet...

And yet they got all those things anyway! Then shoved all the cash in their pockets and either walked away or cry every time they have to upgrade anything.

To be fair, the idea does have some merit. If technology weren't improving over time, we would be screwed. Just try using the internet over dialup today. I have (rarely); It's horrible. We're seeing elements of this today (at least in the US) where most end user's speeds are embarrassingly slow and rather expensive, and ISPs are quick to raise prices and introduce metering and caps to convince users to not use the speeds they are getting. There are areas with major congestion problems; and the ISPs don't want to spend the time and money to fix it. (you're lucky if they even admit to it.) They don't want to spend the millions it takes to jump to DOCSIS3, instead they cling to the decade old "zero cost" change-a-number-in-a-config-file "upgrade" path. (which is, actually, quite expensive.)
chgo_man99
join:2010-01-01
Sunnyvale, CA

1 edit

chgo_man99

Member

Anyone remember Gordon Gekko's "greed is good"?



the companies seem to still follow this idea and have no idea how much is enough.

Anyway, the whole world has problem, not only the U.S. I would not blindly follow those statistics that praise higher speeds in Asia and Europe. They rarely take into account cost/average income.
THey may have cheaper internet and faster speeds but they may get models of modems with usb only that forces them to install crappy software on pcs with ads and other bulls (because modems with ethernet ports cost close to 200). And thats been happening with France Telekom (owner of TPSA in Poland) using Wanadoo (now replaced by Orange).

You try to switch to alternative carrier? It will take you a month and before that you will be without internet after your request!

Customer Service over email takes here in the US 1-2 days but minimum 5 days or more there to respond. Phone lines take forever. You have to go through consumer protection agencies to speed things up.

And over there, you're still required to order at least 2-3 year contracts (or pay outrageous monthly fees for 1 year or month-to-month). THey give an impression that they award their loyal long contract customers with free gifts (web camera, keyboard). But I would rather prefer lower monthly prices than this mess!

Competition? almost none, outside large cities. Cables only serve big, medium size cities and some surrounding suburbs. Most people need digital satellite for TV which are often bundled with telco. Some people who have access to higher access tiers on ADSL2+ are lucky and have IPTV but I suspect they are only available in large cities where cable is available too.
Expand your moderator at work
tmc8080
join:2004-04-24
Brooklyn, NY

tmc8080

Member

snapshot in time

since 1997, if nothing changed we would actually start clogging up the sparse fiber connections by carriers such as AT&T and Comcast... but PLENTY has changed.. allow me to paint a broad picture.

1. signal technologies can now squeeze 1000%+ the bandwidth through the SAME fiber optic cables already laid.
2. actual fiber buildouts in areas outside the northeast US and around the globe continue.
3. the number of companies building fiber from 1997 - 2010 has increased, even local governments (muni builds) are involved in building fiber in the last mile.
4. the price for broadband dropped 1997 - 2010 (enough residential consumers out of the northeast got access to broadband for the first time sparking a nationwide trend) Some people who were screwed in 1997 and could only get dialup are still screwed-- stuck with decades old piss poor technology (thanks for NOTHING QWEST!!-- the worst telecom screwup of this bellcurve)

So, if you want the next 10 year snapshot... let's revisit in 2017, god willing we're all here then..

Bill Neilson
Premium Member
join:2009-07-08
Alexandria, VA

Bill Neilson

Premium Member

Yet another reason that these companies imposing

criminally low caps should be fined for screwing consumers

FastiBook
join:2003-01-08
Newtown, PA

1 recommendation

FastiBook

Member

The real issue...

The real issue is the switch to ipv6, THAT will be interesting after companies fail to do this and find no more available IP addresses.

- A