Sony Put Video Service on Hold Due to Comcast Data Caps 348
suraj.sun writes with more fallout from Comcast's bandwidth caps that give preference to their own video services. From the article: "An executive from Sony said Monday that concerns about Comcast's discriminatory data cap are giving the firm second thoughts about launching an Internet video service, that would compete with cable and satellite TV services. In March,Comcast announced that video streamed to the Xbox from Comcast's own video service would be exempted from the cable giant's 250 GB monthly bandwidth cap. 'These guys have the pipe and the bandwidth,' he said. 'If they start capping things, it gets difficult.' Sony isn't the first Comcast rival to complain about the bandwidth cap. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has also blasted Comcast's discriminatory bandwidth cap as a violation of network neutrality. Comcast controls more than 20 percent of the residential broadband market, which means that Comcast effectively controls access to one-fifth of any American Internet video service's potential customers."
dirty dealers (Score:4, Interesting)
Comcast has been up to no good for years. We all remember the torrent throttling and god knows what else. They need to have the thumb screws put to them so they stop trying to squeeze every penny out of every MB by throttling traffic, applying data caps and the like. I hate Comcast's business practices but they're usually pretty damn fast.... there needs to be another choice. 20% is too large for a dickweed company that pulls this bull-shlaka.
This is confusing (Score:2, Interesting)
"These guys have the pipe and the bandwidth"
Yeah, but you own a bulk of the content they provide. Don't allow Comcast the rights to broadcast Sony properties, including working with PS Network. I'm sure Comcast would concede.
Re:This is exactly why... (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a difficult issue, not as straight forward as you might think.
There was no problem when the distributors who owned licenses to broadcast over the airwaves were the ones who also provided the content.
There was no problem when the distributors who owned cable networks were the ones who also provided the content.
But all of a sudden because the internet is involved, its now an issue - but only in that very select portion of the distributor/provider area, its still not an issue in the above scenarios.
What you mean to complain about is when content providers and distributors now have a general access product - an ISP element. Thats the problem here.
What I want to know is whether Comcast have actually denied Sony or anyone else the right to put a service end point within the Comcast network, and run a private line back to their main servers - in the same manner as the Comcast Xbox service - or have refused to exempt such a setup in the same manner. Anyone?
Re:This is exactly why... (Score:5, Interesting)
>>>It was illegal until...if I recall correctly, the FCC commissioner approved it. Then, only a few months later, the commissioner resigned to take a high-paying top level exec job at Comcast.
Wow.
Sony just needs to sue Comcast.
The Sherman Antitrust law is still in effect, forbids companies from using their monopoly or near-monopoly for unfair competitive advantage, and the FCC can't overrule that law.
it could be considered neutral (Score:5, Interesting)
As long as they apply the same rules to everyone, it could be considered neutral to not count "internal" traffic towards the cap. My own ISP has said that their upstream internet costs are significant and growing so this isn't so far-fetched.
The logical solution is for Sony to install a local caching server inside the Comcast network--if Comcast were to prevent that, then it would violate net neutrality.
Ah, the old victim routine... (Score:5, Interesting)
What is it about conservative/authoritarian political movements that causes them to do this? The Nazis were convinced they were being persecuted by Jews even as they stuffed them into ovens en masse. Apartheid South Africans were convinced they were being persecuted by dark-skinned Africans. And of course American conservolibertarians are convinced that the rich are being persecuted by the poor, men are being persecuted by women, Christians are being persecuted by homosexuals, whites are being persecuted by minorities, etc.
It's not just that they are convinced they are victims. They are convinced they are victims when precisely the opposite is happening. I cannot fathom the level of delusion necessary to make people think this way, but it seems that every major conservative political movement does this.