Comcast, Cox Slow BitTorrent Traffic All Day 342
narramissic writes "A study by the Max Planck Institute for Software Systems found that Comcast and Cox Communications are slowing BitTorrent traffic at all times of day, not just peak hours. Comcast was found to be interrupting at least 30% of BitTorrent upload attempts around the clock. At noon, Comcast was interfering with more than 80% of BitTorrent traffic, but it was also slowing more than 60% of BitTorrent traffic at other times, including midnight, 3 a.m. and 8 p.m. Eastern Time in the U.S., the time zone where Comcast is based. Cox was interfering with 100% of the BitTorrent traffic at 1 a.m., 4 a.m. and 5 a.m. Eastern Time. Comcast spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice downplayed the results saying, 'P-to-p traffic doesn't necessarily follow normal traffic flows.'"
W T F (Score:5, Insightful)
Not even 100%. (Score:2)
I get fiber-to-the-home. I may have to call at some point, as I'm supposed to get 100 mbits, and their test actually results in more like 60. But you know, a doller/month/megabit is a damned good deal. Full duplex, too -- I often seed torrents at one megabyte per second.
The difference is, of course, Fiber rocks, and also, my ISP actually believes in net neutrality, or claims to. If they're throttling my traffic, fine, I'm still downloading at 300 kilobytes/second. Again, kilobyte
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How do measure what I'm getting? (Score:3, Interesting)
Comcast also puts in these 10 second bandwith burst boosts so any test you do has to outlast that if you want to know the sustained rate.
The best way I seem to be able to test things is to find some server and start multiple scp sessions going. But this is plagued by weird artifacts
It will get worse. (Score:4, Insightful)
What you're actually paying for is a kind of time-share bandwidth thing. Based on a profile of an average user who wants spurts of high speed (to make web pages responsive) but doesn't actually need that data rate anywhere near 100% of the time.
This is generally a good deal all around, because by selling it this way, the ISPs ensure good utilization of the equipment, and you get fast web pages. And that connection is on 24/7.
If your use profile doesn't conform to that estimate, for instance, if you're actually using a fairly constant bandwidth, then you need to upgrade your service to a plan that figures that in. Prices for those plans are sure to come down soon, as the capacity is built in to satisfy the upcoming demand for internet-tv.
It is unfortunate that the ad campaigns didn't specify this explicitly at the outset (although they're getting better). But I think it was in the name of brevity rather than malice. And also some malice, but at least at some point someone probably figured that many people either weren't bright enough or didn't have enough time to fully absorb the details, so they oversimplified them. I don't think that assumption is wrong, btw.
Haven't you ever wondered why a T1 line, which ostensibly has lower data rate than your plan by a factor of between 3 and 5 in most of the country, costs so very much more? That's because they don't expect you to use that data rate anywhere near all the time.
Re:It will get worse. (Score:5, Insightful)
[...]
If your use profile doesn't conform to that estimate, for instance, if you're actually using a fairly constant bandwidth, then you need to upgrade your service to a plan that figures that in.
Consider what it actually means to have a "profile of an average user". The ISP knew from the start that some people would use their bandwidth in short bursts (e.g. web surfing). Others would use it in other ways, like watching YouTube or Netflix for hours at a time, or listening to internet radio. Some people would use it for P2P or gaming.
The "average user" profile comes from combining all those different user profiles together. Many people will use 1% of their available bandwidth, say, and a few will use 90%, and when you average them together according to how common you think those profiles will be, you decide that the average user will only use maybe 5% of the bandwidth they're paying for.
But everyone still fits into the picture. If you're the guy using 90% of your available bandwidth, that's fine, because the ISP already took you into account when they decided how much capacity to build. You're not obligated to hold back or switch to a different service: they knew there would be some number of people using a lot of bandwidth, who'd be balanced out by a much greater number of people using only a little.
Now, as time goes by, higher bandwidth applications like BitTorrent are getting more popular. That means the ISPs have to adapt, because their old estimates are no longer accurate. Instead of the "average user" using 5% of the bandwidth he's paying for, maybe now the average is 10%, so the ISP has to have twice as much capacity.
That's the risk of oversubscription: it only works as long as your estimate is accurate, and when actual use changes, you have to update your estimate and adjust your capacity. Again, they knew they were taking that risk when they chose to oversubscribe their lines.
Some ISPs want to have it both ways, though. They want to keep their oversubscription model, but they don't want to adjust their capacity to keep up with changing usage patterns, so instead they try to force their customers to comply with the old, outdated estimates. We shouldn't let them get away with it.
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There are only a few options here for the ISPs. One is to build out as you say and charge everyone. Another is to build out some more and charge most people the same, but make the limits more explicit. Nudging the higher bandwidth consumers into higher price brackets. This nicely solves the scarcity probl
Re:It will get worse. (Score:5, Insightful)
But if demand is rising faster than they expected, and they have to raise their rates to maintain their network, then so be it!
I certainly know that I'm paying for shared service, and that the bandwidth they advertise might not always be available -- I don't call to complain about slow downloads or uploads, because I know they'll say "we don't guarantee anything" and they'll be right. But when that bandwidth is available, I expect to be able to use it.
one more thing (Score:4, Insightful)
That is, let's say the ISP has 100 Mbps available, and they're providing "unlimited" service capped at 5 Mbps to 400 customers, under their old estimate that an average customer would use 5% of their available bandwidth.
Now BitTorrent comes along, and soon the average customer is using 10% of their available bandwidth. Instead of doubling their network capacity to 200 Mbps, the ISP can halve the per-user cap to 2.5 Mbps, keeping overall usage the same without spending a dime or raising their rates.
(Well, it isn't quite that simple, since in reality everyone hasn't increased their usage equally, so the lowered cap wouldn't affect them all equally. But there is some number where the ISP could set the cap to keep usage under control without having to add capacity or raise prices.)
Of course, ISPs don't want to do this. They want to keep advertising big numbers. But the fact is, people use more bandwidth than they used to, and that demand isn't doing away, so something has to change: the ISPs need to either add capacity and/or raise their prices, or stop advertising service levels they can't provide at the current prices.
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Wow! So many blind assumptions about the GP in just that line. But I'll bite anyway. The problem is not filthy hippies trying to get everyone else to subsidize their usage. The problem is as the GP pointed out, a business model that relies on oversubscription to advertise a service that they don't actually have the capacity to provide.
Until the early 70's, cars sold in the US had gross horsepower ratings. This was measured using
Re:W T F (Score:5, Insightful)
We all understand that the figures quoted for these "unlimited" plans are maximums, and just because you're paying for up to 1 Mbps upstream doesn't mean there'll always be 1 Mbps upstream for you to use. But you should still be able to use whatever is available.
And if the network is so overloaded that people are routinely unable to hit 1 Mbps, the ISP should either add more capacity or adjust their marketing to be more in line with the amount of bandwidth that actually is available.
Times change, and people on average use more bandwidth now than they used to. In the future, they'll probably use even more. That means the oversubscription equation is changing, and it's going to keep changing. If an ISP wants to oversubscribe their capacity, that's fine, but they have to keep up with changes in usage patterns.
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Well, yeah (Score:4, Insightful)
I have Cox High Speed (Score:5, Interesting)
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On the internet end it's really slow, too. On their highest tier of home internet service, I g
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Interesting, I've had the complete opposite track record with Cox. I have an business interne
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You actually have an SLA...chances are GP doesn't, like most of us residential customers. There's nothing we can point to contractually that will (should?) make them jump and fix the problem now. Personally, I want to pay Comcast as little as possible per month. In general they don't try to go the extra mile for me, so I don't place a premium on their service.
Re:I have Cox High Speed (Score:5, Informative)
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Of course that doesn't change the fact that they offer X kbps d/l speed, but only give it to you when they feel like it, which is seldom if ever. I wonder though, what are good bittorrent speeds on a cable connection? How do you know if you're getting throttled?
And one other thing, slightly off topic, but why does
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Nor is FIOS from what I have read from other users here on /,
Depends.
I don't actually get fiber from Verizon. I get it from a local ISP, and I had DSL from them before I had fiber.
Right now, I'm downloading a torrent at a pretty steady 300k -- as in, 300 kilobytes per second. I'm uploading at 1 megabyte per second. On a better torrent, I can easily get up to 2-3 megabytes down. It's pretty close to sharing files over a LAN.
Face it we are screwed thanks to Net Neutrality.
Which definition?
The original definition is that the network should be neutral.
The twisted Telecom definition is that the government should be n
You still suck. (Score:5, Insightful)
But that does not address you blocking any of the traffic.
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The Internet users who participated in the study may not be representative of Internet users overall, she added. The users who run the Glasnost tests may be "heavy users of p-to-p," Fitzmaurice said.
http://broadband.mpi-sws.mpg.de/transparency/bttest.php [mpi-sws.mpg.de]
The Glasnost webpage has been responsive, but the test has been throwing up a busy signal for me since yesterday.
Anyone else?
'P-to-p traffic doesn't necessarily... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope it sure doesn't when you implement layer 4 filtering and then configure it to block/messwith/"delay" p2p apps. Who knew?
Daily Comcast Rant (Score:5, Funny)
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"Good evening, this is your local nightly news. Today, the headquarters of the major internet and cable provider, Comcast, as well as the offices of the RIAA, were crushed by a massive wall of ice. [xkcd.com] Local rescue workers, arriving at
Will they change? (Score:3, Insightful)
Now the real question is whether there will be enough pressure for Comcast to remove this unnecessary throttling. Given their track record with many of their other questionable services, I doubt that they will.
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I'll admit, I don't know much cable bandwidth, but wouldn't it be wise for them to start laying fiber and cable side by side and then do a seemless switch one day?
It seems cable vs fiber is a losing battle for cable.
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With DOCSIS 3.0 [wikipedia.org] cable can run as high as 152/108. And no, that's not in kbps.
When they implement DOCSIS 3.0 is a different question. I asked a Comcast tech if he had any idea about when they would implement it in the Northern Virginia area. He laughed in my face.
And Comcast is running a set of [inaccurate] commercials touting their fiber optic network -- they already run some FTTN. The trick is FTTH, and the last mile is the most expensive part of the infrastructure. (The commercial implies that Comcast r
Sounds about right (Score:5, Interesting)
I remember that someone here on
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My torrent settings are standard, encryption with max 50 simultaneous connections a time on a single torrent. I actually used to be able to put 75 but recently
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Now, going straight to the internet, not through the router, that doesn't happen.
Could be something with the modems.
Torrents are getting fast nowadays.
Torrent and connection drops (Score:2)
My connection will drop every 5-10 minutes, severing my internet access. It will return by itself in 2-3 minutes or if I restart the modem.
I used to have a similar problem, except with eMule. I'd fire it up, it would run for a few minutes, then my internet connection would go down.
Turns out it was my router, a D-link DI-524. It has a tiny connection tracking table, and reboots if you go over.. which happened reguarly when using eMule's KAD network and all the UDP packets that implies. If I disabled KAD, I no longer had the problem.
You could be seeing something similar with the DHT that is used in some BitTorrent clients, or really any fe
Subverting Alternate Legal Distribtuion Schemes? (Score:5, Insightful)
However, I did just grab the new Nine Inch Nails album, and as a former musician myself, I still dabble in remixing on occasion. Thus, when I went to go grab the freely available multitracks for remixing, I was somewhat surprised that they were only available via Torrent. That's smart on the part of Trent Reznor and his tech team (why bog down only his own servers with information that he's freely sharing with everyone?), it's bad for other artists and remixers if their access to this media is going to be limited because of the "taint" associated with BitTorrent.
I'm not sure there's a solution here. Any distributed network will inevitably be used for some amount of "gray market" trafficking, but it would be nice if we preferred and promoted technologies for their Common Good usage rather than limiting them by their potential negative effects. And by "we" I mean the corporations who gouge us for $100 each month just to shuttle electrons around.
Same theory applies to the web (Score:2)
it's bad for other artists and remixers if their access to this media is going to be limited because of the "taint" associated with BitTorrent.
But you can apply that same reasoning to any service offered across the internet. What if they'd just posted it on mirrored web servers? Is Comcast going to start limiting web traffic? Or FTP? I suppose I shouldn't give them any ideas.
From a technology standpoint it just seems like a retarded policy. The rise of BitTorrent traffic only means the content avai
To be fair... (Score:2, Interesting)
Thoughts? (and please dont just cry about the evil ISPs. We honestly need to have a constructive conversation a
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Here's a thought. Since most p2p sites feature lots of ads and generate lots of hits, why don't the ISPs run P2P sites themselves and gain that revenue stream?
WOW (Score:5, Insightful)
Limiting bittorrent because it can be used for illegal downloads is like scrambling epsn because people make illegal bets on football games.
Lower your Comcast bill (Score:2)
Low sample size for Cox (Score:5, Informative)
Now I shouldn't be defending them because I have Cox, but I'd just like to say I get anywhere from 30-300kBps when downloading torrents which is not terrible but ultimately lags far behind what I could get back in the urban area where my parents live that uses Bright House.
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Seems to me that they're not inspecting 100% of all connections due to limited resources. During peak daytime hours, some connections slip through.
Comcast, Cox Slow BitTorrent Traffic All Day (Score:5, Funny)
We need net neutrality now! (Score:2, Informative)
This is the only thing I have seen that will allow me to get speeds on torrent networks where they should be. If I didn't do this Cox cable red flag me for days and my internet dra
Throttling depends on the lack of competition (Score:2, Interesting)
Restore Common Carrier? (Score:2)
Does that reason outweigh the benefits of a non-discriminatory communications network?
Should we not restore at least the non-discrimination provisions of common carrier for data networks?
Would non-discrimination not automatically, and with minimal government interference for good actors, result in net neutrality?
The only downside I can immediately come up with is that less regulation means less opportunity for graft
Comcast Lies ... (Score:2)
Yawn.
Blocking P2P Pure and Simple (Score:2)
Net Neutrality is obviously already dead as long as this is true.
Yea - it doesnt mean that (Score:2)
you gotta low how bold corporate shills can speak due to years of republican administration spoilage.
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how bold corporate shills can speak
What? She's not allowed to speak? Or she's not allowed to speak boldly? Or is it that she works for a corporation? Isn't this (at least where I am, and Comcast is) America? Ever hear of the first amendment? Be you a Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Marxists, or Communist--you can't restrict the freedom of speech in America.
republican administration spoilage
Cox In Arizona (Score:2)
I've Never Noticed (Score:2)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good-NOT EXACTLY (Score:5, Funny)
Actually it's information superhighway robbery.
Re:Good (Score:5, Informative)
So now I am not allowed to use my rights to download GPL'd software or public domain software now? Implying that P2P is all illegal copying is incorrect and makes you look misinformed. P2P can contain free-to-copy files along with not-free-to-copy files as can HTTP/FTP/Etc. So can CDs, Hard disks, Floppy Disks, Cassette Tapes, Flash drives, the list goes on and on. Just because some people use knives to kill people shouldn't mean that we have to now use forks to cut our meat.
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I hate to say it but a lot of states limit the size knife you're allowed to own for this very reason. This is why swords usually have to be dull. One could easily interpret this for broadband speed and limit the available bandwidth.
Personally I haven't noticed this slowdown on Cox. I routinely download at my rated speed or even slightly above. For this reason everytime there is a large download I usually look for a torrent first to get it. The latest Debian DVD iso only took me about 25 minutes to downloa
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
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Have fun downloading the latest big name Linux release with that dialup! There are many legitimate uses for Bittorent, and speaking from a throttled Comcast connection, switching to dialup is not an option. It won't increase your BT/P2P traffic but it will slow down everything else you do. My connection is fine, as long as I keep my upload extremely conservative (at about 1/10th actual capacity, minimum) when using Bittorrent. Turn off Bittorrent, everything's peachy again.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
That is correct, however BitTorrent is a much faster way to download it, when it is a new release of something popular such as Ubuntu, HTTP downloads are around 30KB/Second while torrents are around 200Kb/Second, therefore, there is little justification to not use BitTorrent when downloading large files, and when you figure that BitTorrent doesn't stress the servers of the project, it is a better choice in the long run too.
There is illegal software via HTTP and FTP too, in fact one might say that there is just as much via HTTP as via P2P. As for clogging the networks, the ISPs should have gotten more bandwidth before they offered higher speed Internet or at least have it in their advertising that they throttle P2P and certainly contracts. It would be like if I set up a huge pile of sand in my backyard, and I had people pay $40 per month to get as much sand as they wanted and it said so in the contract and through advertising. Of course some people only needed a bit of sand and took some home in buckets, others would take bigger ones. However, fearing that my sand would run out I poked holes in all of the larger buckets making them carry much less. People would have a right to be mad at me for promising unlimited sand and then limiting it. Same thing with the ISPs
I don't know where you live, but here in the US there are about 3 main ISPs and most if not all have torrent throttling. Some of the more rural areas only have one way of getting high-speed internet and if you don't like that ISP it is either that or dial-up. And as for creating your own company, the grants the government/cities gave out to help get internet to the world, chances are won't be given again making it impossible to
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Who said they were overusing? One Linux distro via P2P per month is throttled the same as 24/7/365 pirated movie downloading.
It appears they are throttling on the means, not the content or quantity.
Re:Good (Score:5, Informative)
I would like to see a citation..and perhaps a clarification by what 'software' means in that sentence. I am unaware of any illegal software, except software that circumnavigates protections.
More and more service are using bit torrent, Blizzard spring to mind.
I ahve worked for companies that use bit torrents to send information out to there home workers.
Switching isn't the correct answer because of the limited choices, and you know it.
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Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
As to your other arguments to the legality and saturation of networks, your viewpoint is quite backwards. The fact of the matter is, its a precedent being set, that they can sell you "always on high speed access to the internet", but then dictate what you can and cannot do with it. A phone company that listened in on your phone calls, and then disconnected you because your conversation with your girlfriend wasn't deemed as important as a business call being handled by your neighbor is an apt description of whats going on here. We pay for access to something, we don't expect them to determine what is important to us and why we are going to use it.
If it boils down to a supply and demand issue, why doesn't it sort itself out the same way all other markets do? Do you see gas stations dictating where you can and cannot drive? No, they raise their prices and pass the cost of business to the customer. Its simple economics.
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You have always on, high speed access to the atmosphere. However, we're going to block your access to oxygen. I'm sure you wont mind, its for the good of the entire atmosphere.
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Allow me to correct you.
Besides, there are other uses for bittorrent besides Linux distros. What about Free / Creative Commons media, like music (or even free-as-in-beer professional music, like Radiohead's latest album) or videos (anime music videos, Star wreck, independent movies, video tutorials)?
Comcast's reasoning (p2p is for i113641 w4r3z!!!111ONE) is simply a lame excuse.
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Warcraft? (Score:2)
Oh, and then there's the legal media downloads via BitTorrent. Azureus Vuze comes to mind.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
In this day and age when most of the middle class doesn't give a fuck enough to vote with their dollars or otherwise, we techies do what we have to. If that means enabling everybody to steal from the big corporations that have been ripping everybody off for years, then so be it. I encourage everyone that I know to do the same.
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When you take back something that was unfairly taken from you (i.e. high prices due to monopolies), that isn't ripping someone off. It's called justice. Illegal? Maybe, but don't forget a lot of laws were made only to benefit the rich and powerful.
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Justice is not about getting your way. Justice is about protecting your rights whomever you may be.
And then there were laws created for the poor...
For example unions...
What you are doing is seeing only your side of the story.
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When you take back something that was unfairly taken from you (i.e. high prices due to monopolies), that isn't ripping someone off. It's called justice.
1) People use P2P to get free movies, music, and pirated software. None of this stuff was "taken from you." You have the option to buy it at many locations nationwide for reasonable prices. There's no monopoly on movies, music or software at the moment.
2) Yes, you are ripping people off. We all agree the MPAA and RIAA exaggerate the damages, but
Looking the other way... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Adobe made it impossible for him to get an illegal copy of Photoshop, guess what? He'd learn something else. And when he arrives at his first job and they ask him which version of the Creative Suite he needs, he very well might say "That's alright - I know Gimp and Inkscape, and I already have them. Just get me a bigger monitor instead."
It's a nightmare scenario, and one of those things I wish they (Microsoft/Adobe/Autodesk/Apple) would be more honest about. I hope they do lock down Windows with DRM so it is nearly hackproof and rejects the installation of pirated software, because Linux would gain a few million users overnight. In the end, the best thing the OSS movement has going for it is the greed of the big guys, so here's to hoping they only get more delirious with it.
Re:Looking the other way... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, rentals, I do consider to be reasonable prices -- but I'd much rather not have to actually go to the store. Netflix is a good idea, but their "watch now" service is heavily DRM'd.
So tell me where else I can go, when I want to watch a movie right now, without going to a video store -- or maybe it's not even at the video store yet -- oh, and I want to watch it on Linux.
The business model is just screaming for someone to implement it.
And there are certainly monopolies within software. Microsoft, anyone?
I will go out of my way to pay for indie music, when I find a band I like. But with the things the MPAA and the RIAA does in response to piracy... Seriously, proposing a "piracy tax" on ISPs? If they already assume their customers are their enemies, then I really don't care.
Re:Good (Score:4, Interesting)
Did I ever say I had the right? No, I'm countering the point about "many fine stores" -- fact is, piracy currently provides features not found anywhere else, for any price. And, for software, it may also provide better quality, given how harmful the DRM schemes themselves can be until the pirate group removes their teeth.
I went to an Umphrey's McGee concert. Right outside, on your way out, they had a couple of towers of CD burners. They would burn and sell you a CD of the concert, right there and then.
Wait a couple of days, and it's up on the website, for a reasonable price, and in DRM-free flac. Yes, flac, not just mp3.
You really want to play that game? Alright, how's this: Major studios and labels are finding that their business model is failing in the marketplace. They can't compete with "free" without drastically revamping their business model. Get over it.
Or you could, y'know, actually agree that it's wrong.
Oh, by the way, notice how I was modded insightful, and you were modded troll?
This time, read my signature. Then read my comment. Then take a deep breath, take a walk, get some fresh air, and calm the fuck down.
And then come back with something better than calling me a "petulant child" -- that's called an ad hominem [wikipedia.org], and using it is a flaw in your argument, not mine.
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Oh give me a break. You are saying it is ok to rip people or companies off?
I'm not.
Mind if I grab into your pocket to steal your wallet?
If you don't see the difference between theft and copying, there's not really much intelligent I can say to you.
If you grab my wallet, I'm out something like $50 -- which you actually took from me. If you copy my movie, I'm out... $0. Because you didn't take anything from me.
I'm not saying copyright infringement is OK, but be clear in your analogies. Stealing potatoes is, again, quite different than copying.
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> Or would the person be charged with trespassing and petty theft by the local DA? In other words, you're being ridiculous. There is juuuuust a bit of a difference between "no punishment" and being sent to a "federal pound me in the ass penitentiary."
You just trivialized the stealing of potatoes. You don't think its a big deal. Just a little crime. nothing to worry about. My father-in-law would love to fine people 200,000 per potatoe because maybe then people would think twic
Wow, perfect example of a Troll (Score:3, Funny)
tm
Re:Wow, perfect example of a Troll (Score:4, Funny)
It somehow manages to push so many buttons that people who should know better reply to it before engaging their brains.
Now that I think about it, your post may also be a troll, and maybe it's so elegant that I've failed to recognize it as such prior to replying to it. Perhaps now I'm feeding a troll that was itself replying to a previous troll. Whoa. I think I need to go lay down, my mind has just been totally blown.
Re:Wow, perfect example of a Troll (Score:4, Funny)
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While I don't argue that bittorrent is being used for distributed pirated works, there are legal uses for it. For the most part bittorrent is used for large files because it is more efficient. Because of this, Linux distributions are distributed via bittorrent. If you don't believe me, get a copy of Redhat Fedora. [fedoraproject.org] World of Warcraft players get their updates from Blizzard using Blizzard's cust
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, the Parent Poster is a thief! To access *any* website (including /.) you need to download a copy of the files on the slashdot servers. Opps, score one for holistic generalizations!
Then again, the AC poster was obviously just trolling. No one is stupid enough to actually mean that.
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No. No it isn't.
Circumstance matters. Copyright laws are about who has the Right to produce copies, and in case you haven't read or bothered to look up any of the US laws the copyright holder does not have exclusive rights in all cases.
Furthermore, blocking P2P isn't just used for copyrighted material. It is also used for distributing legal software and files and those users are also getting punished.
Though the reality of it has nothing to do with punishment. It has more to do
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
What about Linux? I download Ubuntu install DVDs via BitTorrent.
How about music and movies which I've bought? There are now at least two major services through which I can buy a movie online, and download it via BitTorrent. Allow me to take a moment to mock you:
Remember -- these fucktards are throttling BitTorrent, which is a protocol. It happens to be popular among filesharing, but this is not the way to go about stopping these "thieves".
In fact, copying stuff which I bought, to other devices which I own, so that I can enjoy it for myself, is also legal, but often prevented by DRM, because morons like you couldn't wrap your head around the difference between copying and copyright infringement, let alone stealing.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I hope you don't mind-- I just stole-pasted your last sentence.
Stupid Putative Waste (comcast self-screw progrom) (Score:5, Informative)
The _stupid_ thing about this disruption is that it actually causes the transfers to use _more_ bandwidth.
Consider:
The participant will _still_ download the entire content.
The participant will, for every segment downloaded, now have several false starts and partial segment transfers.
Participants who elect to stop their transfers will most likely go to another means (http etc) of transfer so 100% of the content will be transferred again on top of the partial transfer that was aborted.
A given provider pays cash money only for bandwidth usage that "crosses" the boundary of their service. So every Comcast/Cox customer who would have gotten a percentage of their transfer from a peer on the same service instead gets their transfer from original source, raising Comcast/Cox/etc's upstream service usage.
Now a big company like comcast _may_ be able to soak some of this cost in proxy space so that several transferers are actually not leaving their net, but are instead getting the contents from their proxy. But that would make Comcast/Cox/etc's proxy server the agent of "illegal sharing" in those cases where the content was infringing, so I doubt they are doing that to any useful extent.
As an added bonus, by interrupting the TCP connections, they _do_ prevent the TCP window sizes from scaling up to speed, but they don't prevent the outstanding window-size-worth of packets to be delivered and discarded by the target host. That is, by inserting the reset artificially, _neither_ side had the opportunity to discard their "already queued" packets, so that buffer skid goes all the way across the internet, costing time and money and congestion but now artificially devoid of benefit to anyone.
So by sandbagging their own customers they are actually raising their bandwidth costs and in-network infrastructure usage. And an infinite number of their customers can raise their "simultaneous connections per torrent" for free. I raised my limit to something like 200 in each direction, which restored my throughput and cost Comcast one hell of a pile of churn. [I also use advanced packet shaping where my packets leave my network and hit the wire, ensuring that I never "drop" a connection request locally due to modem buffer sizes etc.]
The technique being used by the provider is a classic foot bullet by every technical measure.
quiet you! (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)