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[ NNSquad ] Re: T-Mobile UK: Don't Download, Stream, or Watch Video On Your Phone! 


[ I think we're coming to the end of the useful life of this thread.
 I believe my analogy is completely valid, Matt does not.  One thing
 is certain, like it or not, video is taking over the Net.  It wasn't
 so long ago that some parties were arguing that video shouldn't be
 sent over the Net at all.  In the relatively near future, some
 estimates are that it will be 90% of the total bandwidth (there's a
 joke I could make here about the remaining bandwidth and spam, but
 we'll let it pass for now).

 As for regulations, I have personally always been of the belief that
 exceptions to generic rules, tailored for smaller ISPs in especially
 constrained situations, would be entirely appropriate.  However, the
 problems of these smaller ISPs can not be reasonably used as an
 excuse to allow the vastly dominant telco/cable ISPs to indefinitely
 treat the critical infrastructure that is the Internet as their
 totally unregulated personal fiefdoms and piggybanks.

     -- Lauren Weinstein
        NNSquad Moderator ]

- - -


 [ "Toy broadband," eh?  Tut tut.  As I recall, Western Union said
   something very similar about the telephone when they were offered
   the key Bell patents for a song.  Broad (no pun intended)
   generalizations about technology limitations are among the most
   likely ones to be proven wrong over time.  I remember how people
   laughed decades ago when I speculated that it might be possible to
   send full-motion video TV channels to telephone subscribers over
   the same physical copper wire pairs that were providing their
   phone service.  "Yeah, right Lauren.  And maybe you'll be able to
   call around the world for a penny a minute too!  Get real!"

I'm not making broad generalizations about technology limitations, I am making a very specific observation about the mobile wireless ecosystem - in its current form it will not be able to support real broadband. Considering the investments that the incumbent carriers have in spectrum, equipment and politicians - it is going to remain true for the next several years. It will take at least several years for the mobile networks to get to the point that they are anywhere close to what fixed networks can do now - and it may take even longer.

   The improvements in effective data bandwidth over mobile wireless
   since the days of IMTS are staggering.  The important question
   isn't whether mobile data systems will have the same bandwidth as
   wireline data systems, but whether the mobile system will have
   *adequate* data bandwidth for the number of users and applications
   at any given time.  You may have misundstood my analogy that you
   complain about below.  My point was exactly that there is
   variability based on number of users and types of apps at any
   given time at any given serving cell sector.
I understood your analogy, its just that your analogy is wrong. The variability itself is what will prevent mobile data systems from being able to provide *adequate* data bandwidth for the number of users and applications. If our power grid operated like mobile broadband, we would be living in constant brownouts throughout the entire day, and our apps (appliances in this case) would be struggling to maintain their operation.
But to assume that this means it is impossible to provide enough
bandwidth to serve expected applications at service levels that
subscribers will find adequate (as you seem to assume) is a gross
and inaccurate generalization.
I amend my statement to say that "considering the political, technical and operational limitations, mobile broadband will not be able to deliver adequate broadband services over the next ten years." After that, who knows. Ten years is forever in Internet time.

Obviously, keeping up in the
   bandwidth battles requires both capital and *access* to bandwidth
   and backhauls at reasonable prices.  That's where smaller
   operators have been given the shaft, at the hands of the massive
   dominants.  And that's another area where regulation could be a
   big help.  Without it, the smaller operators will be at an ever
   greater disadvantage, to the glee of the big telco and cable boys
   in ISP-land.

       -- Lauren Weinstein
          NNSquad Moderator ]
I can't complaint about access to bandwidth and backhauls at reasonable prices. I don't do business with telcos and have two (soon to be three) fiber networks to my NOC. This summer, I will turn on a GigE Internet backbone for less than what my current 100meg connection is costing me. Where I don't have access to fiber, I put up my own microwave backhauls. It would have been easier if I could have had access to the telco networks, but they are so crooked and the networks are so unreliable that it made more sense to just put up our own and control our own network.

And that is where regulation is a bigger hurt than it could ever be help. NN regulation will attempt to impose restrictions on what I do with my privately funded, non government subsidized network. It is not going to happen. I have to walk a pretty fine line between investing in network upgrades and managing capacity. Reasonable network management is a very important part of that equation, and taking that away would do far more damage to my viability than anything that the big telco or cable boys would ever do.

NN advocates may get a win in the legislation, but be careful what you wish for - you might just get it. Internet Brownouts for everyone!

Matt Larsen
wirelesscowboys.com