A port that is on average utilised at 90 percent will be saturated, dropping packets, for several hours a day. We have congested ports saturated to those levels with 12 of our 51 peers. Six of those 12 have a single congested port, and we are both (Level 3 and our peer) in the process of making upgrades – this is business as usual and happens occasionally as traffic swings around the Internet as customers change providers.
That leaves the remaining six peers with congestion on almost all of the interconnect ports between us. Congestion that is permanent, has been in place for well over a year and where our peer refuses to augment capacity. They are deliberately harming the service they deliver to their paying customers. They are not allowing us to fulfil the requests their customers make for content.
Five of those congested peers are in the United States and one is in Europe. There are none in any other part of the world. All six are large Broadband consumer networks with a dominant or exclusive market share in their local market. In countries or markets where consumers have multiple Broadband choices (like the UK) there are no congested peers.
I've read that. It was what I was thinking of when I wrote both the quotes in my comment. Netflix wants to get data to Verizon but the bottleneck is at the connection between them.
I've read that. It was what I was thinking of when I wrote both the quotes in my comment.
How remarkable.
What I got from that piece is that - if Verizon are one of the companies mentioned - Verizon customers are requesting data from Netflix.
Netflix have bought connectivity from Level3.
Level3 have peering arrangements with Verizon for sockets that are dropping packets and over which Verizon is refusing to take part in a joint connection upgrade.
Continually upgrading your connectivity in peering arrangements to cope with rising demand is, for nearly every other ISP in the world (outside certain monopoly markets in the US), completely standard practice as otherwise you die.
And Verizon is refusing to do this unless Level3's own customers pay it money.
Given this is a peering arrangement, now imagine it the other way around.
Say Level3 had it's own TV business and was asking Verizon's broadband customers to cough up money to them on top of Netflix and Verizon, if they wanted Level3 to upgrade the network that Netflix are already paying for, for a usable connection to Netflix...
Think about that for a bit, and then try and tell me that the whole affair doesn't look utterly hatstand.
The only thing I would add to your argument is the part about ISP customers having paid the ISP for that bandwidth but which the ISP is refusing to deliver.
Prior to capitulation, Netflix purchased access to Verizon through multiple tier 1 providers. These providers are publicly known to have private arrangements regarding interconnections.
More than one of the backbone providers in question have publicly stated that Verizon/Comcast/TWC are no longer following the tenants of their private agreements.
The bare contest here is that the established order of hierarchical internet traffic is being challenged. The reason, IMO, people on HN dislike the ground shift is that it:
a) creates communication failures where there were previously fewer
b) is based on regulatory capture and monopolistic business practices
c) is not a technology driven change
d) increases the moat for all established internet services
A port that is on average utilised at 90 percent will be saturated, dropping packets, for several hours a day. We have congested ports saturated to those levels with 12 of our 51 peers. Six of those 12 have a single congested port, and we are both (Level 3 and our peer) in the process of making upgrades – this is business as usual and happens occasionally as traffic swings around the Internet as customers change providers.
That leaves the remaining six peers with congestion on almost all of the interconnect ports between us. Congestion that is permanent, has been in place for well over a year and where our peer refuses to augment capacity. They are deliberately harming the service they deliver to their paying customers. They are not allowing us to fulfil the requests their customers make for content.
Five of those congested peers are in the United States and one is in Europe. There are none in any other part of the world. All six are large Broadband consumer networks with a dominant or exclusive market share in their local market. In countries or markets where consumers have multiple Broadband choices (like the UK) there are no congested peers.
http://blog.level3.com/global-connectivity/observations-inte...