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Akamai To Slow Video Game Downloads To Minimize Internet Congestion (bostonglobe.com) 41

Posted by msmash from the doing-something dept.
Online video gaming just became the latest victim of COVID-19. New submitter watha2020 shares a report: Akamai Technologies of Cambridge, the data delivery company that handles Internet traffic for many of the world's biggest companies, said on Tuesday it will deliberately delay downloads of video games during peak hours because of bottlenecks from so many people playing from home during the coronavirus shutdown. The slowdown will specifically affect downloads of games during daytime and evening hours, so that someone buying a downloadable copy of a new game such as "Doom Eternal" will have to wait a lot longer to start playing. Akamai said it will continue to allow normal high speed downloads late at night. In a posting on the company's blog Akamai chief executive Tom Leighton said the company is trying to ensure the demand for gaming downloads doesn't overwhelm the system's capacity to the point where other information is affected. "This will help ensure healthcare workers and first responders working hard to contain the spread of COVID-19 have continual access to the vital digital services they need," Leighton said.
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Akamai To Slow Video Game Downloads To Minimize Internet Congestion More

Akamai To Slow Video Game Downloads To Minimize Internet Congestion

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  • This is probably wishful thinking, but I kinda hope that limiting game downloads means that developers would be more reluctant to issue multi-GB game patch downloads... that seems to be the norm these days so with Doom Eternal in particular, it seems like in a week or so the first patch should be out.

    The full game is what it is, so you can't control that so much, but patches could seemingly have some graphical asset changes reduced without gameplay issue...

  • Where is this congestion?! I havenâ(TM)t seen any issues so far.

    I donâ(TM)t mean to sound like a conspiracy theorist it it looks like the best excuse and easiest way for all these businesses to cut costs and save a lot of money.

    • And can slashdot PLEASE fix their damn apostrophise :(

    • It is their main excuse for Getting Rid of Net neutrality and charging more for unlimited plans.

      The Telcos are pretending to play good citizens, but at the same time, they are trying to make their messaging straight that they have limited bandwidth.

      While there are limits, the nature of most internet traffic isn't a huge peak bandwidth going on all the time. Even big streaming services you buffer a block of data and play it with the network being idle. until it gets close to the next block then it downloads

      • I think your confusing "telco's" with ISP's.
        Otherwise what does cell phone plans have to do with computer/consul game downloads?

        • Most Telco are ISPs.
          Even the ISP that didn't start as Telco are now a Telco because they offer phone service.

          • Define "most" -- If you mean 1 out of four then sure, that would be AT&T. Verizon is not a ISP they sub out from cable companies.

            I work for T-MO/Sprint nether company is in the ISP business there only hoping for the future 5G rollout.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I work for an ISP. Our stats are:

      14% increase during the work day (up until 6pm), 9% off-peak. This is still far less than other peaks we've seen (online watching of Olympic opening ceremony for example which was more than 3x higher than the traffic we're seeing now and we handled it fine).

      Quite why you'd reduce game downloads during peak times when that's not when the additional load is I've no idea.

      The game YouTube, Netflix, Disney, Akamai et. al. are playing is disgraceful, they're trying to reduce their

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ruddk ( 5153113 )

      I am also looking for evidence that there are problems. Haven’t heard a thing from anywhere.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Sun ( 104778 )
      I don't think there is any congestion involved. The Akamai server you are downloading from is, almost always, local to your ISP, and often even the specific data center you are connected to the internet through.

      This sounds to me like a deliberate slowdown due to someone (probably the video game company) requesting it.

    • Where is this congestion?! I havenâ(TM)t seen any issues so far.

      Yep. I'm sure you and Akamai have the same information and that they must be wrong.

  • Just my prediction for the next headline. Actually I almost count this as a feel-good story in these feel-bad times.

    (Disclaimer: Old school ties.)

  • ... to say that their game download is far more important than people who actually have stuff to do? I could understand no downloads in the day, lower-speed downloads in the evenings, and full-speed downloads at night, but global economy... timezones... it's always daytime somewhere.

    • Re:Who's going to be the first dumbass... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by hax 109 ( 6610968 ) on Tuesday March 24, 2020 @03:19PM (#59867626)
      Even with all the additional traffic during the lockdowns, which isn't that much btw., the traffic peak is still in the evening. Throttling during the daytime is just going to leave more bandwidth unused.

      Akamai is a CDN operator. They send from servers close to the destination. Global backbones won't see an effect.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • this is just made up problems by the telcos.

        If it were, why are major companies agreeing with them and imposing measures at the expense of their customers. I mean Netflix and telco's have historically got a long so well so they must be in on this conspiracy right? /sarcasm.

  • My bank customer service is already overloaded, 'unable to complete your call, please call back later'. Wasn't for anything important, but annoying when you just want to use the automated telephone banking system. Of course people will read about this and it will get worse because people will get worried and want to check.
  • the other night steam was sending me farcry 5 at a rate thats technically impossible for the line i pay for and we were really surprised. as great as that was, it is totally reasonable for bandwidth to get nerfed. would be more worried if they were artificially increasing latency though.
  • Oh lordly : Just turn off AdD's that will free up bandwidth At least 50 %

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Bodie1 ( 1347679 )

      Kill MultiPly's and it will free up toilet paper at least exponentially.

    • 50%? Given that I downloaded 3 games in the past 3 days and that collectively consumed 210GB at 100MB/s you must get some seriously nasty ads. Can I recommend an adblocker?

  • Vital services for healthcare should be using private networks, not the public Internet. WTF.

    • Let me introduce you to an interesting new technology called the VPN...

    • Vital services for healthcare should be using private networks, not the public Internet. WTF.

      The only private networks left in the world are tunneled through public infrastructure.

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday March 24, 2020 @04:38PM (#59867868)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • We should all help them. Proactively block ads ourselves.

    • Video ads use a ton of bandwidth

      They really don't. It's a nice hit piece to go after, but a 5 second video add is nothing compared to the consumption of media in a month, hell the consumption of media is nothing compared to the 210GB of games I downloaded in just the past 3 days. (Doom, Half Life, and I had to reinstall Asgards Wrath). The tiny bitrate of the video also is nothing compared to the sustained 100MB/s I was downloading these games at either.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      I'm still getting physical print ads through my door for shops that aren't even open any more.

      Still with the toilet paper crisis that might not be a bad thing.

  • Only now? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I was working in the Akamai network operations center on 9/11. You would not *believe* the conniptions we went through to keep critical services up and running, swapping critical emergency services and new systems from the overwhelmed backbones of the Internet to Akamai services, using the DNS maps to route us and everyone else around the wrecked data centers in Manhattan, pouring brains and sweat and tears into keeping the Red Cross and CNN online while our technology leader and founder, Danny Lewin, died

    • "backstabbed while confronting a terrorist"

      This would being "backstabbed" would indicate that he was running away from the terrorist. You should probably keep quiet about this ...

  • Very surprising, so many companies taking advantage of a made up "congestion problem" during the apocaly...ehm..Coronavirus outbreak, and they get away with it thanks to governments supporting this BS. AND the media plays along with it and pretty much no one calls out this opportunistic anti-consumer BS.
  • Notice all the net neutrality idiots have stfu Thankfully itâ(TM)s legal to throttle garbage media to couch potatoes and instead keep important and vital services going.
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