Verizon Accused of Intentionally Slowing Netflix Video Streaming

colinneagle writes "A recent GigaOm report discusses Verizon's 'peering' practices, which involves the exchange of traffic between two bandwidth providers. When peering with bandwidth provider Cogent starts to reach capacity, Verizon reportedly isn't adding any ports to meet the demand, Cogent CEO Dave Schaffer told GigaOm. 'They are allowing the peer connections to degrade,' Schaffer said. 'Today some of the ports are at 100 percent capacity.' Why would Verizon intentionally disrupt Netflix video streaming for its customers? One possible reason is that Verizon owns a 50% stake in Redbox, the video rental service that contributed to the demise of Blockbuster (and more recently, a direct competitor to Netflix in online streaming). If anything threatens the future of Redbox, whose business model requires customers to visit its vending machines to rent and return DVDs, it's Netflix's instant streaming service, which delivers the same content directly to their screens."

Equal Opportunity Suckage

[Tablizer]

My provider solved the fairness problem by making everything slow and spotty.

Re:Google should buy netflix.

[Overzeetop]

Yeah, 'cause the rest of the country doesn't hate those with Google fiber enough yet.

More likely YouTube, too

[kriston]

More likely YouTube, too, is being throttled or at least left in a state of benign neglect. Verizon FiOS, supposedly to be the fastest anywhere, consistently has trouble delivering YouTube videos. I work on many different networks and peering points but the only one that has trouble with YouTube is Verizon FiOS. Even if the YouTube video is serving from a local edge server (Ashburn) it will pause within the first twenty seconds each and every time.

Oddly enough, and likely because we are only down the road from AWS-East, we never have trouble with Netflix or Amazon Instant Video on our FiOS connection.

Cox never had any sort of problem but that might be a lack of customers since FiOS came into town.

Cool... I predicted this!

[thule]

"Hey, we're not throttling. It is just that our peering is maxed out. Use this other service, it works better for our customers."

Totally legit way of doing this. I haven't seen any Net Neutrality discussions cover this possibility.

Re:aren't there laws against monopolistic practice

[osu-neko]

Sure they do! A few years ago, Microsoft was found guilty of violating the laws, and received a harsh sentence. They had to give people coupons or something...

Re:aren't there laws against monopolistic practice

[Jason Levine]

More importantly, Verizon's paying customers -- the ones who are requesting to stream from Netflix -- are expecting Verizon to invest in their network so that they can deliver the contracted-for services. The fact that Netflix uses Cogent versus Billy Bob's Bass Boat, Bait Barn, and Content Distribution Network does not really play a role here.

[BEGIN ISP REASONING MODE] Of course, it does. You see, Netflix makes lots of money. Partly, they make that money in a method involving Verizon's network. Verizon doesn't get any of that money. Therefore, it deserves lots of money from Netflix. What's that you say? Verizon gets paid by their customers and Netflix pays their ISP? *sticks fingers in ears* LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!! LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA GIVE ME MORE MONEY!!!! LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA [/END ISP REASONING MODE]

Re:Backfire?

[Jason Levine]

But Redbox has a streaming service now. Coincidentally, it's owned by Verizon. But I'm sure Verizon doing this in no way is a plot to make people think Netflix is horrible and Redbox Streaming is wonderful. I'm positive that they're not trying to leverage their network to benefit one of their unrelated services over a competitor. After all, big companies are owned by good, kind-hearted people who only seek to make as many people happy as possible. (Also, the sky is the most beautiful shade of orange in the world I live in.)

Re:aren't there laws against monopolistic practice

[mandark1967]

You do have mod points...it's just taking time for them to show up because you're throttled...