Google Spends $1 Million For Throttling Detection

foamrat writes "Google has awarded $1 million to Georgia Tech researchers so that they can develop simple tools to detect Internet throttling, government censorship, and other 'transparency' problems."

Good - more transparency

[GFLPraxis]

The easier to detect, the harder it is for ISP's to keep such practices out of the spotlight.

I for one...

[Aighearach]

Really appreciate that google consistently places them in the proper position of an infrastructure provider, setting up their monetization to be supported by open, fair access.

I don't trust "intent," but I do trust a business that is set up to maximize profit when things are best for the "little guy."

Their APIs are a joy to work with, too.

Re:Google

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I don't trust Google's altruism further than I can throw it(though it is likely that the founders are better than the outside CEO in that regard...); but it is somewhat convenient that Google's business model and business interests happen to be fairly strongly aligned with most of the internet's virtues.

It cannot be ignored that they want to data-mine you to dump ad impressions down your consumer gullet; but this does mean that they view anybody else trying to do so as "competition" rather than "our bestest buddies in profit"(as with ISPs and Phorm/NSA for instance).

Similarly, their desire to operate communications services without hindrance is not identical to an ideological stance in favor of freedom; but the end results are substantially closer than are those of entities that wish to hinder communications services in order to raise prices, or prevent "piracy", or the like.

I don't trust them; but I would say that their self-interest aligns atypically well with much(though certainly not all) of what would want from the ideal internet. I do trust them to follow their self interest. I would certainly prefer the internet according to some genuinely freedom-focused entity; but those tend to be penniless ragtag optimists, rather than corporate behemoths....

Re:ISPs

[Anonymous Coward]

I also live in Ontario, Canada. I was on Rogers until about a month ago when I got fed up of their throttling. I switched to Teksavvy cable, which rents/leases the bandwidth from Rogers. As soon as the switch happened I noticed a HUGE difference in my download and upload speeds, and this was before I switched to the new cable modem that I bought from Teksavvy! The comparison is like night and day.

Proof enough that Rogers throttles? It's obvious to me and anyone else thinking logically. How they can deny that they are not throttling people and get away with it, I don't know. And now this new "Speed Boost" technology they are advertising? In other words, they're basically reducing the amount of throttling they're doing when there is a lot of bandwidth available, to give the appearance of a "speed boost". Criminal behaviour, if you ask me.

Re:Google

[shutdown -p now]

What's funny about it? He's basically saying that Google (mostly) does things that he likes, just not for the reasons he'd like them to. It's a perfectly reasonable position to take.