The Coming Internet Traffic Jam
There was a thought-provoking article recently entitled Information Super Traffic Jam. It focused on the thought that video and other high-bandwidth media were going to stress a lot of the current internet infrastructure. The article sparked a lot of discussion on O'Reilly's internal mailing lists, which I planned to blog...but Brian Jepson beat me to it, over on Hackszine, in a posting entitled Un-unwire Your Home.
Brian's take is primarily practical, but it gives a real perspective on how applications drive infrastructure, and a resource that once seemed limitless starts to feel old and creaky.
The main takeaway should be this: there's a lot more internet time ahead of us than behind us. (Someone from Microsoft once said that. I've now forgotten who.) Expect change.
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This is also reminiscent of Robert X. Cringely's last three weeks of columns in which he connects Google's recent leases of dark fiber to the growing stress on the net backbone caused by video. You can find them at:
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/
Whether you support net neutrality or not, it seems a bandwidth crunch is coming.
Zach -- If someone shouted fire, and you took a look, and by god, there was a fire, the fact that the shouter had a checkered background wouldn't matter too much (unless you thought he or she set the fire.)
Whether or not Kerpen has an agenda or not, I think he pointed to something worth noticing -- and in fact, it turned out that a bunch of our people had been starting to hit the very limits he mentioned.
Tim, the article does two things: (1) shout fire, (2) claim that the net neutrality crowd prevents its extinguishing, with >80% dedicated to the latter.
And the first part is only a biased repackaging of this report: http://www.deloitte.com/dtt/cda/doc/content/dtt_TelecomPredictions011107.pdf - which is much more interesting than Kerpens article (although even this document lacks any serious numbers, is not an analysis but rather a compilation of interviews).
Zach -- you're right about the article. I should have made clearer only that it started the discussion, not that I supported its conclusions that the carriers need to be able to close their networks.
I am a big fan of the internet end to end principle, and in general agree that the opponents of net neutrality are flying under false colors. That being said, I have a lot of respect for Dave Farber's position and integrity, and the fact that he is on the other side from folks like Vint Cerf does give me pause. Esther Dyson has also bent my ear about net neutrality legislation. The point she makes is this: that ultimately the market will reject overbearing non-neutral approaches, and if we ban all experiments, that could indeed be a problem.
Often when lawmakers get involved, they create more harm than good.
So I guess I'd summarize my position as "net neutrality is a good thing, but legislation about it may be a bad thing" (at least until we see actual abuses succeeding in the marketplace.) But I'm sympathetic to the view that by then it might be too late.
The problem with giving up on network neutrality is that the inevitable end of that is government concessions to monopolistic access.
If your utility bills and service levels from utilities and similar don't convince you of the inherent bad-ness of that, then I don't know what to say.
I'm not suggesting giving up on network neutrality, just questioning whether legislation is the right way to get there. Every time the government has stepped in to technical issues, they've messed it up. So I worry that we might get more than we bargained for.
Richard-- What do you mean by "monopolistic access"? How is *broadband* internet access considered a utility? Is it vital for life like water, power or gas?
I have 4 viable choices right now for broadband: DSL, Cable, WiFi (multiple providers), and 3G (multiple providers). There's also satellite and the power company also wants to get in the market. Am I going crazy, or is there not plenty of competition?
BTW, I was paying Adelphia $50/mo. for my broadband. Time Warner just took them over and now I'm only paying $30/mo. (just for 12 months). What's the monopolistic abuse there?
I'm amazed at the amount of ad hominem Kerpen's piece has drawn from net neutrality regulation advocates (here and elsewhere).
You don't have to trust Kerpen or Deloitte about the need for increased capacity -- here's neutrality advocate Google saying the same thing.
Kerpen doesn't ask people to trust his personal authority that neutrality regulations could depress innovation and investment: he relays the concerns of Robert Kahn and David Farber. (Or are they just telco stooges?)
Yes, Kerpen works for probusiness lobbies and thinktanks. So what? The Internet is run on privately owned equipment, by businesses. It's not built or operated by the USPS, DoD, or FCC. It won't be federal rulemakers or public interest lawyers who deliver the new capacity and services of the future -- it will be businesses. So probusiness advocates deserve at least as much credibility in this discussion as anyone else.
Hi, was my comment deleted by accident? I'm a little suspicious because my comment took an anti Net Neutrality position because where I live, I have a lot of choice in terms of broadband and am only paying $30/mo. Does someone care to explain how Net Neutrality helps me? Perhaps it was received as hostile (I took the same tone as Tim did with Zach), but I am really miffed about the Net Neutrality debate because people refuse to present hard evidence as to why we need it.
Matt -- are you talking about another comment than the one that appears two comments up from the one where you ask whether your comment was deleted? Those were the only two comments from you that I found.
Hmmm, methinks my eyes were playing tricks on me, or there was a glitch (a spam filter perhaps?). Yes, that was the one. Sorry, I wanted to check for any responses and didn't see anything. It's there now, so all is well. Except for my Net Neutrality challenge...
If it's not a traffic jam that has slowed my broadband connection to a crawl the past couple of days I don't know what it is.
The servers repair guy was here yesterday and he tested/repaired my cable connection from the pole to my modem then hooked up a new/reconditioned modem. According to him my connections are spot on but nobody told Yahoo or Pogo or..... My so-called broadband connection is slower than dialup on sleeping pills --- that is if it connects at all. I've never seen so many can't connect errors.
Either it's a massive traffic jam or Microsoft released a WORM to frustrate us enough so we'd all buy new computers just to get VISTA.
Tim,
I am a little surprised by your argument on government legislation. It is a false argument that some proponents of non-neutrality wish to spread. Surely, in this age of war-profiteers turning in record-breaking quarters, loose monopolies of mergers and bundles, debatable price gouging etc, it is a little naive to want to believe that all the companies involved will tow some good line on the other side of short-term profits for the greater common good [Esther?].
If anything, some private companies interfere with day-to-day governance through unabashed lobbying and kickback offerings, creating grossly unfair access to government.
If a government legislation has caused long-term damage in the past, the legislation must be refined or redone and the legislators should be unelected, not have the people's say through "smart legislation" be silenced.
Regards, Harsh
There WAS a protective legal protection in place insuring net neutrality, which is how we got the internet going in the first place -as is- Now I forget what that was called, but ..
That was recently "neutralized" (How? Why? Who?) kind of leaving things wide open to the "tollbooth/lanes" legislation those huge opportunistic corporations like AT&T have been spending fortunes through lobbying, campaign contributions, advertising, "PR"/"News" and god knows what else trying to shove down our throats.
We're not talking about creating legal protection of Neutrality that never existed.
The protections in the Telecom Act of the 30's was "neutralized" by the Telecom Act of the 90's (or was it '87?)
Remember phone bills going astronomical during the late 80's/early nineties, the excuse being the phone co's were supposed to be laying fiber across the country, ...which they were also enormously compensated for via federal legislation? They made a big show about doing it, starting it, never did it, never finished the job. This has something to do with why the U.S. is so behind in net access/speed compared to a number of other countries in the first place.
Never underestimate what/who we're dealing with here.
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Zach [02.06.07 11:49 AM]
This "Information Super Traffic Jam" article was written by someone from a rather shady political influence group with no known technical expertise. The author, Phil Kerpen, also writes for the New York Sun and the National Review Online. He previously worked for the infamous Cato Institute.
Hence I'm disappointed that you draw attention to this article, in particular since its political bias and the use of absurd numbers is pretty obvious.