ISP's to push back on video downloads? - Page 4

You may be right about this, although I'm not sure it's every studio. Somebody can verify. But what happens if you don't want Apple's method or hardware? If you want to go with other options you have to make sure they have the content you want. Unless the method of delivery or the hardware becomes standardized at some level we're going to have the same content issues.

I look forward to the day that the infrastructure and content and quality is there for digital downloads, I just think it has a long ways to go.

Brandon

I can understand those who want a tiered, or pay for what you use, system. However, do you really believe you will be paying less? They won't lower anyone's bill, they will just increase the bill of those who use more.

I mentioned in another thread, that if I have to pay for what I use for broadband, I want the same pricing structure for cable TV. Only charge me for the channels I actually watch. I know that will never happen.

In most areas, there is a monopoly on true high speed broadband, and cable TV. They don't have to be fair, or competitive. Their business practices are making me more tolerant of just downloading what I want to watch, be it legal, or not. I haven't reached that point yet, but every increase in my bill (close to 200.00 right now) pushes me closer to the brink.

Art

If you are in an area with competition or low broadband penetration, then your bill probably will get lower.

The "big prize" for them is to increase their consumer base, not marginally increase your bill (which they could have done anyway). The only realistic way they can get that level of growth is by providing a cheaper service to drive further adoption in underdeveloped markets, or those with heavy competition.


If the flat rate was $50, and the charges-per-minute come up to $30 for the same average usage, then most customers will overwhelming chose the usage-based-model.

Many variables are present, and we shouldn't write off the idea prematurely.

I am a senior NOC engineer for Cox Communications. I understand exactly what our capabilities are.

Local network is nowhere near 500Mbps. I was doing a search on DOCSIS (the standard used for cable) the other day, and for most of the users out there, the max is only around 42Mb/s. The new comcast technology is in the hundreds, but significantly less than 500Mbps. ADSL2+ only goes up to 24Mb/s download, and ADSL1 is limited to 8Mb/s.

Now that's faster than the internet speed that mosts ISPs offer, but still not 500Mbps.

Was the 500 Mbps example being cited about Data Over Cable or was it about encrypted QAM channels (which can be used for VoD)?

And with all of this lofty, super high bandwidth talk, the average broadband customer is still getting less than 2 Mb/s.

You are incorrect. You are speaking of CABLE INTERNET. I am not talking about the Internet.

QAM. =)

I remember when I lived in California and was a cable customer. I was one of the first customer's and had about 3.6mbps downloads. Within a year it was below 1mbps due to their inabliity to keep up with demand. I can see ISP's limiting downloads or go on a usage based system if they can't keep up with user demand.

Here is what a pro HDM/anti-download fan has to say about this...

VOD is useless for video downloads, what they going to have 50,000 download channels? VOD if fine for a few hundred newer movies , but how are you going to offer a real selection ? can i watch any one of the DVDs that have ever been put out at any time of the day without any delay? NO the only way is to use IPTV and their whole networks are not set up for that. this means true video downloads have to use only the channels that are currently setup for 2 way internet traffic. at the current stated caps two 50G 1080p movies and i am done . that leaves me without any other internet traffic, like the web, or internet radio.

IF they convert some of the current downstream only channels to expand real video download service and still cap capacity for 3rd parties they will be looking at government imposed regulations real fast. government wants more competition to cable, they see internet IPTV as a way to get it. if the cable companies offer the service but lock others out then there is no competition.

Using the Comcast [alleged] claim of 100 MBPS off the bat & 400 - 500 MBPS down the road this can ONLY apply to Comcast customers but even to deliver Comcast will need to literally replace their current network or upgrade the size say 1000%.

They do not have the bandwidth in place to service the users. Nowhere near it...not even remotely close....

If only 1% of their customers [in any market] use the service they would need to add hundreds of thousands of GBs or Thousands of TBs of bandwidth.

The cost to do so is ASTRONOMICAL. And Comcast or any Cable Operator, Telco or utility [which is regulated as well as are public companies] does not have the Carte Blanche to drop the kind of money required to build out to the degree necessary.

The cost cannot be justified.

IE: Every 10 download customers @ 100 MBPS is 1000 MBPS / 1 GBPS...what if 1000 customers in the same market want the same thing AROUND the same time? It means Comcast needs 1,000,000 MBPS or 1000 GBPS bandwidth available at that moment. They don't have it. No ISP and ESPECIALLY no residential ISP has this type of capacity [on demand].


If we step outside of Comcast's national footprint for a moment take DSL for example. DSL runs on analog / copper POTS lines. The native bandwidth for a POTS line is 64K but can OBVIOUSLY be increased by compression but NEVER will a 64K POTS line be capable of 100 MBPS let alone 400 - 500 MBPS.

In regards to cable modem, the more people on it around you the slower you go as you are on a shared loop / ring for access. I have BrightHouse / RoadRunner & ping around 3500 KBPS however standing right next to a full of T1 internet access @ 1.54 MBPS the T1 runs laps around my [alleged] 3500 KBPS cable modem. The T1 is uncompressed so the data @ 1.54 MBPS is ACTUALLY much faster than the compressed 3500 KBPS cable modem.

Most residential accounts aren't going to order a T1 of internet @ $350 - $400 MRC AND buy a $500+ T1 router etc....and the T1 is only 1.54MBPS nowhere near 100 MBPS Comcast is touting which would be called an OC3 [an uncompressed 135 MBPS connection] An OC3 runs around $4050.00 MRC + the local loop MRC of around $2500.00 for a total of $6550.00 monthly...Comcast would need to add 7,407.40 OC3s to any market where 1000 customers or more will want the service at any given time.

The bandwidth at $30 per MBPS wholesale runs a paltry $30,002,962.00 monthly per market. If they need to offer in say 10 national markets that an extra $300mil monthly overhead...realistic???? Shareholders will love it...right??

Also, to make the downloads work MAY require MPLS [multiple packet label service] to seperate the different tpes of data traveling across the consumers internet connection at the same time as the movie download. If you have Comcast digital phone for example or if anyone in the house is using the internet at the same time...you don't want phone call voice packets getting mixed into your movie download rendering the file corrupted & unplayable...

The download will require a PVC VBR between Comcasts server the movie is downloaded from end to end to the consumers PC or set top box / tivo / dvr /pvr/ hdd etc...both MPLS & the hardware to generate the PVC VBR add to the cost of the download to make it work.

The bandwidth required is just not deliverable to make this work nor can the cost to deliver EVER be justified.

All Comcast did was try to steal some Blu-Ray CES thunder..the Comcast CEO saw some reporters so he did what comes natural he exaggerated.

In regards to Apple TV well you have to buy the hardware & it is already described as nowhere near BD or HD DVD quality so really not worth addressing. And it is not as easy as download & play..there are multiple steps involved that the average person just won't take the time to learn. Apple TV is a loser as a product & iTunes movie downloads are for iPods & iPhones. Plain & Simple.

The whole Comcast "tell an interesting lie as opposed to the boring truth" will blow over..in a few months when NOTHING materializes who will even remember what the Comcast CEO even said?

eci, this article was posted by Talkstr8t on the insiders thread. I was interested in getting your take on it since you're in the business.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2...21_003697.html

Much of it is focused on the idea of cable companies switching to IP and specifically Multicast delivery of content on their networks.

Do you have any facts to back all that speculation up?

Hell I get ~2Mb/s during peak-rate hours even though I'm paying for 6!


lol...gotta love the experts. But hey, he's just the guy in charge of regulating those internets, so what difference does it make?

Brandon

Yeah, I work in Telecom & vend access on all the networks I mentioned as well as dozens of other networks I didn't mention since it doesn't apply because they aren't making ridiculous claims that the uninformed masses might take seriously. IE: Comcast

What type of documentation would you like? Network maps with bandwidth per POP? Per CO?

Tell me exactly what you would like me to provide & I will.

Plain & simple.

Or better yet, call you current residential ISP and ask them what is the capacity of YOUR connection as well as the ring that you connect to along with all their OTHER customers around you serviced by the same CO.

They will tell you exactly what can or cannot travel end to end on your connection.

They will also tell you what they will ALLOW you to send & recieve and for how long before they interupt your connection etc...

I went to great lengths to explain "how it works" so that anyone that didn't agree or believe could easily take what I wrote & research on their own.

Call your ISP

And by the way, I wasn't speculating.

This is how I earn a living.

Interesting, who do you work for?

I work for Cox Communications.

No ISP has the capacity? I live in a small town. We are very fortunate. We have Fios, one of only a few handfuls in the US as of last year. Expensive though for 50 megs.

http://www.minetfiber.com/

and the pricing of internet:

http://www.minetfiber.com/pdf/internet%20service.pdf

and you have heard of google purchasing dark fiber?
Google is buying a tremendous amount. What do they know and think what will happen that we don't?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_fiber

http://www.news.com/Google-wants-dar...3-5537392.html

I am a Telecom consultant & a independent Master Agent with literally dozens of carriers.

Based on where the customers is physically located & who the RBOC [Regional Bell Operating Company] is &/or Cable Operator is in that specific market.

Here in the TampaBay area I am usually vending access on Verizon [Legacy GTE] & TimeWarner / BrightHouse. This is just for the last mile, for the LD I cross connect to Verizon [Legacy MCI], Qwest, AT&T, Sprint, Global Crossing etc...For the internet I use Verizon [UUNet], Qwest, Level3 / Broadwing / WilTel, TimeWarner etc...

I use the same method any where in the US. IE: If I get a lead in the Qwest / USWest region I do the same thing...a lead in the Verizon [Legacy BellAtlantic region] or BellSouth or AT&T / SBC / Ameritech, PacBell, NevadaBell, SNET etc...and cable operators like Comcast, Cox, Time Warner, BrightHouse, CableVision etc...

I sell throughout the US & originate off-shore. From India, the Philippines, Costa Rica, Mexico & the Dominican Republic. All off-shore is either VOIP or IPL [International Private Line]

I focus on call centers.

We use the Cable Operators network as an alternative to the RBOC when the last mile is just to expensive. [AT&T for example...they are to expensive so we go around for the T1 / DS3 / OC3 / OC12 / Gig-E local loop] so we connect VIA the cable operators local network & cross connect VIA tandem with as few HOPS as possible. Sometimes the customers location is just closer to the Cable Operators POP then to the RBOCs POP.

That's why I know that no cable operator or telco has the [on-demand] last mile capacity for this to happen in any volume.

For Comcast to deliver [residentially] 100mbps it is like bonding 2 DS3s [a DS3 is a 45 mbps connection] and 6 T1s [a T1 is 1.54 mbps] as there are no 100MBPS flat loop or port connections, only the bonded pipes I described above or an OC3 which is 3 DS3s or a 135 mbps connection. Ethernet connections start at 1GB.

There is just no way to deliver the content @ 100MBPS or greater to residential accounts.

^^ This applies to what I posted as well in my post # 112 just above yours?

Certainly it appplies except that Verizon isn't claiming the ability to deliver 100MBPS to residential customers or 50GB HD movie downloads [@ the same PQ/AQ quality as Blu-ray or HD DVD] in a 4 minute download time.

30MBPS for $155 monthly isn't a great deal to most U.S. Cable Modem customers with a $19.99 - $49.99 monthly product. I would order it if it was available but I am in the middle of the Verizon [Legacy GTE] copper / analog footprint so no FIOS for us until....the existing network breaks...Fios [in this market] is only available in areas of new construction. Verizon isn't replacing their existing network. They are running fiber from the CO right up the curb into the houses in areas where no prior analog / copper phone network existed. Places where only cellular was available until now.

Verizon is most likely trying to compete with DirecTV's HD channel lineup as are all the other cable & sat. providers.

If there was all of this ad-hock bandwidth available on-demand wouldn't they all [other cable & sat. providers] have as much HD programming as DirecTV?

Comcast should be worrying about what DirecTV is going to do next, not try to reinvent the wheel in regards to DVD / HD DVD / Blu-Ray.

Or Comcast better get to work deploying a 1 TB end to end network to back up their arrogant, ridiculous claim. Start providing their customers with GigE or OC12 routers etc...

Will Wimax alleviate some of the congestion? Or does it still eventually have to use some of the same transmission lines, cables or some other infrastructure?

And won't Dark Fiber play in as a positive or just add more the the problem?

I do not think there is any way around upgrading the connection at the customer premesis. The last mile must be capable of passing the bandwidth required for the process to work.

There may be tons of dark fiber waiting to be lit but not running through neighborhoods, it's between NOCs & POPS on a national level.

Then the POPs connect VIA tandem to the COs servicing the actual end users neighborhood.

It is in each neighborhood that the connection must be upgraded, it is the last mile from the CO to the customer's house, apartment, condo etc...

Google is buying dark fiber to connect markets on a national level not fiber running through residential areas for individual local customers. Most likely for the transport of cellular interstate & intrastate calls if they actually jump into cellular with a smart phone. They need a way to route cellular calls from the cell towers to any termination point in the US for as little as possible as they still have to pay the RBOCs for where the call terminates. This is a per minute charge. So they buy dark fiber turn up a few switches and boom they are a phone company. They turn up a switch in the Verizon foot print, in AT&T [SBC & AmeriTech region] in BellSouth, in Qwest US West and they can terminate just about everywhere in the 48 cont. states.

A lot of the dark fiber is actually unintegrated network assest of companies that went out of business before the build out was complete back in the late 1990s and the first part of this century....as well as lots of decomissioned fiber & POPs based on all the consolidation in telecom like the GTE / BellAtlantic merger to become Verizon who later acquired MCI / WorldCom [who owned MFS, BFS, UUNet etc...tons of other small voice & data networks] or the SBC / Ameritech / AT&T merger or the Level3 / Broadwing / WilTel merger etc....once these companies get together they drop a lot of redundant routes and take down POPS after they migrate traffic to fill up certain POPs so they can take down under used POPs to lower overhead.

Back in the 1990s Wall Street said lay fiber, buy switches, build billion dollar data centers..GE Capital funded it, there were never EVER enough customers to fill up the pipeline so carriers, resellers, CLECs & ISPs all started going under. If Google is smart they are buying up assests that didn't get purchased on the steps in front of bankruptcy courts across America

I also received one of those obnoxious phone calls from Comcast a year or so ago, prompting me to cancel my service in protest. They guy calling appeared to be going out of his way to speak in an offensive scolding parent-child voice.

It actually seems kind of funny to me. In most industries, people that consume a lot of your product are called 'good customers' and you try to find ways to keep them happy. Though you may also try to find ways to charge them more.

I'm not sure of the business model that says you should selectively alienate all the largest consumers of your product, driving them somewhere else.

I think some of the problem is Comcast worries it can't sell you as much content if you are using their broadband to get it from someone else. But in the long run that line of reasoning will probably hurt them since the Internet is not going to go away and more and more competitive content will be available on it anyway.

They should realize that when folks cancel their broadband (or have it canceled) they also cancel their Comcast cable TV and phone.

- Tom

You are 100% right. The internet has become just as much of a Utility as electricity, local phone service & water, the carriers really love the customers that under utilize the service leaving lots of breakage on the table. They love a cable modem customer that only uses it to surf the web but no real bandwidth consuming activity [you know the middle class microwave popcorn generation that has to have wether they need it or not and no patience either everything right now ASAP...the bigger the hurry the consumer is in the MORE they pay...law of economics if you just gotta have it] they also love a digital phone customer that has a $15 - $20 monthly long distance bill along with a $20 local line but is willing to pay $50 for a local line with unlimited LD literally giving the carrier a $10 tip.....BREAKAGE is what they live for, consumers that leave a tip or over pay based on not enough usage to require the actual product they opt to buy...that way they can oversell their capacity which is what all carriers do [incl. Comcast]. They anticipate under utilization & their networks cannot really support all the customers they have let alone all the ADDITIONAL bandwidth required for all the forecasted movie downloads if it really is the next big thing [which I really doubt]

The only thing keeping these networks from crashing is that all the customers are not using the services at the same time, if they were it would be armegedon. Like right before a DeLaHoya fight or a UFC / Pride type MMA tournemant on PPV...suddenly the remote won't order the fight, the web site is down & you cannot get through on the local phone line....over sold capacity. Not enough server ports on the cable network to accommodate the demand VIA the remote or enough server ports on the internet for online ordering...

They also bundle a bunch of products together to disguise what you are really paying per product and cram in a few eronious charges like LNP or the Universal Service Fee which is NOT passed onto any Goverment agency nor does it go to buy school books for under privledged children like they claim..this is all 100% profit with no overhead factored into it at all other than the cost to bill the line item on the customer invoice which may be an eBill which means they don't even send it in the mail they email it keeping the cost down & the margin higher. They really screw the AV concentric crowd by forcing a very robust SD premium movie package onto all that want every HD channel. I know with DirecTV I have to get their largest package to get all the HD stations..I never watch any SD channels so I am CLEARLY leaving $40 - $50 on the table monthly.

it would be nice if sat or cable would let you ala cart but then the greed factor comes
to play and that will never happen.

OMG, you do NOT have a 500MBPS connection in every cable customers residence....do you know how many TBs that would require running through every CO you operate...PLEASE. Call me when the shuttle lands on that one. ROTFL hysterically.

And the Comcast 100MBPS now & 400 - 500MBPS down the road is for PC downloads on their internet service not to HDTVs or TVs VIA their cable box.

And it is using the internet [allegedy]

That's what the Comcast CEO stated at CES.

And you are correct that Cable Modem accounts have no CIR and the more people on it the slower you go.

If a customer was to order a T1 / DS3 / OC3 / OC12 yes they would have a dedicated internet connection with the exact bandwidth purchased.

You know your statement about a 500 MBPS connection in every cable subscribers home etc....that's almost an OC12 [540mbps] which retails for around $16,200.00 @ wholesale $30 per meg plus the local loop which is mileage based...wanna retract your ridiculous statement?

No anything ending in DSL runs on a copper / analog POTS line.

Cable Modem is entirely different.

XDSL

ADSL

SDSL

all run on copper / analog POTS lines.

Cable Modem is capable of bandwidth that DSL cannot touch not by a long shot.

That's why cable operators sell cable Modem & RBOCs [Regional Bell Operating Companies] sell DSL on their copper / analog POTS lines.

And that's why anyone "in the know" would ALWAYS prefer cable Modem to any flavor DSL.