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Old 15th April 2015, 23:22   #106
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by msdivy View Post
To give an analogy, TBHP support might have one phone line that works between 9AM to 6PM.
ehhhhh we are 24/7 have mods across continents and support also.

Just kidding. But you are bang on brother!
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Old 15th April 2015, 23:28   #107
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

Calls to emergency numbers have high priority on mobile networks, so much so that other calls can be dropped to accommodate an emergency call. You should be able to make an emergency call on a mobile network even without a SIM. Mobile phone vendors and mobile network operators are usually very serious about any dropped/rejected emergency call. Of course, it works with known emergency numbers such as 911 or 112 and won't work if you call the nearest hospital for an ambulance. I guess in most phones sold in India, you can dial 112 without unlocking the phone (not that it is of much use currently, but I read somewhere that India is moving to single emergency number 112 soon).

Last edited by StarrySky : 15th April 2015 at 23:30.
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Old 15th April 2015, 23:33   #108
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by msdivy View Post
You are comparing time-critical function with non-time critical function. If somebody is building time-critical application, they would build enough redundancy for addressing worse cases.
Net neutrality in it's purest form would not differentiate between time critical or anything else.

Your call to an hospital, or the police to call for an an ambulance or to report a rape or a murder would, from a network point of view, be treated equally as a google search, or down loading the latest Bollywood movie.

Neutrality means every bit of information is treated in exactly the same way!! No matter what the individual bits of information represent.

Look at the definition of Network neutrality. The distinguish ion you appear to be making isn't there!!

The only way to treat every bit of information equally is to have an infinite amount of bandwidth and network resources. Technically nor legislatively that is the case.

Jeroen
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Old 16th April 2015, 00:08   #109
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by Jeroen View Post
Net neutrality in it's purest form would not differentiate between time critical or anything else.

Your call to an hospital, or the police to call for an an ambulance or to report a rape or a murder would, from a network point of view, be treated equally as a google search, or down loading the latest Bollywood movie.

Neutrality means every bit of information is treated in exactly the same way!! No matter what the individual bits of information represent.

Look at the definition of Network neutrality. The distinguish ion you appear to be making isn't there!!

The only way to treat every bit of information equally is to have an infinite amount of bandwidth and network resources. Technically nor legislatively that is the case.

Jeroen
I know the discussion started with a post about net neutrality in general but the change being proposed by trai and the government has nothing to do with emergency services or such. Also don't forget that data and voice channels are today different. So until we move on to make 911 or 100 calls from Skype this problem doesnt exist.

And no one is even demanding that the speed at which you can access all websites/services be made equal. That is just not possible considering all the technicalities of data centers in diffetent locations and all the latencies involved even if you take the mobile tower/signal angle out of it.
All that is being asked for, is to not intentionally make them unequal or try to regulate them with the intention of making profit.
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Old 16th April 2015, 00:32   #110
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by Jeroen View Post
Your call to an hospital, or the police to call for an an ambulance or to report a rape or a murder would, from a network point of view, be treated equally as a google search, or down loading the latest Bollywood movie.
Exactly. That is what is required. To get a bit technical, this is the network protocol stack,
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Since this is a layered architecture, network interface layer need not know whether the packet is for police or for hospital or a movie download. The application layer will ensure priority & redundancy.

But the bone of contention with ISPs is not priority of packets but whether a particular application (like WhatsApp, Skype) be regulated on cellular network. By regulation, I mean option to block these apps or charge extra for using these apps (depending on the wimps of the ISP).

Last edited by msdivy : 16th April 2015 at 00:34.
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Old 16th April 2015, 10:09   #111
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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There is only one Apple in the world. But there are 1000s of ISPs like Airtel around the world. Who all should vendors try to reach?
That is interesting, reason being right now vendors are not targeting any specific audience. The reason being the www is big wide and free. With people getting distributed eventually amongst ISP, and choosing what sites/kinds of sites they like to visit, it is easy to target audiences of particular needs and preferences. As a marketeer this kind of scenario could be my dream, where in I have specific defined audiences who have demonstrated by their internet choice of what they are looking for.


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Originally Posted by mayankk View Post
If that is not rhetorical, let me ask.
Are you kidding me?
That is exactly what's wrong with this, in part, apart from what it may bring about in the future.
Do you think Fk backed out of some moral reasons?
This would kill any start up idea at inception. If this had happened when Fk was selling books, they'd have been screaming from the rooftops, rather than trying a sniggery deal. Theyd have been dead right now.

Edit: saw that it was rhetorical.
Sorry about that.
Ideas will not get killed if, they have a commercial benefit. Today the web is like a pond, anything and everything gets chucked in, all with the hope and prayer that somebody would like what I just coded, and I will get some venture capital funding and enjoy my life in a start up model. Infact it is easier to ideate if one knows who and what need is he targeting. Also if one knows if his kind of thought or idea will be commercially successful or not.
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Old 16th April 2015, 10:10   #112
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by Jeroen View Post

The only way to treat every bit of information equally is to have an infinite amount of bandwidth and network resources. Technically nor legislatively that is the case.

Jeroen
Infinite? How so? Data packs in India are limited by GB. After a certain amount your speed gets limited t 20kbps.
This infinite resources etc., is the spin by greedy telcos. How does giving a certain website priority reduce resources? If I give priority to my crook partner, does it mean that data from my crook partner will somehow magically shrink and become less?
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Old 16th April 2015, 10:54   #113
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by Jaggu View Post
Neither do it, but yes i would focus my energy on developing the technology to solve these issues, rather than trying to sideline a convenience or a public service utility.

Am pretty sure there is a way by which an essential service like ambulance can be given priority over, say a self driven car (that can afford to pay a premium to gain additional bandwidth) for accessing the same bandwidth.

Electricity meter for me is a public convenience utility which will reduce expense to government, increase convenience to all Vs Self driving car is satan in the eyes of a motor head
The technology to differentiate is already there for various services. So, I don't think any body is complaining. Implementing such things into the IP network might be a new thing but wireless being a continuation of grand old telecom always had such things.

What we are discussing on this thread is for just one type of service and denial of access to such a service by providing a free access for some. So I think we just need to focus on this point Its about swaying the customer by offering free things.

Last edited by srishiva : 16th April 2015 at 10:55.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:13   #114
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

I was kind of neutral in this net neutrality debate, but am increasingly moving to the less popular side.

My ISP gives three websites absolutely free.

1) Their own company website - (who needs that?)
2) www.yahoo.co.in - (do people still access yahoo?)
3) www.wikipedia.org - (there you have me...)

No 2 is a website I have no use of even if they give it for free. And no 3 is one which I would pay through the roof if made paid.

So irrespective of whether something is given away free, people will take it only if it gives value.

Now, coming to flipkart, what is wrong if they agree to pay my ISP fees, the exact amount I spend shopping at their website? If Shoppers Stop ties up with Ola to give free rides to their shop, would you rather take it, or cry about unfair competition because other shops would lose business?

If reliance says that I could browse some hundred popular websites for free, isn't me actually benefiting from it? Why should I be made to pay for accessing google.com, if google agrees to provide access for free?

The losers in this game seems to be the websites with not-so-deep-pockets. Now when did we start giving a damn for them - the ones with not-so-deep-pockets? Did we any time say that big companies should not advertise because it is unfair to those who can't afford to pay for ads? Or that newspapers should treat all advertisers equally and hence have all ads in the same size? Are we advocating socialism, BTW? Th every thing we decided to throw away a couple of decades ago?

Now lets get to the bit level. The proponents of net neutrality says that the ISPs should treat all bits equally, be it a bit representing voice, image, text etc. But do we treat a piece of metal in a Honda City equal to a piece of metal in a Merc? We pay for the "value" we receive, not what the underlying building block is. We don't pay for the atoms, we pay for the product. So we pay for the value we get from teh servoce, not the underlying bit.

If we derive more value from voice than data, then the ISPs are right in charging a more for it. Whether there is more value in the product is for the market to decide.

Last edited by blacksport : 16th April 2015 at 11:18.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:22   #115
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by apachelongbow View Post
That is interesting, reason being right now vendors are not targeting any specific audience. The reason being the www is big wide and free. With people getting distributed eventually amongst ISP, and choosing what sites/kinds of sites they like to visit, it is easy to target audiences of particular needs and preferences.
There are two misconceptions in your argument/thinking

1. People are distributed today amongst ISPs; it is not a scenario of the future. But the ISP today has no say in what to classify as billable bandwidth and what to classify as non-billable. All access today is considered equal.

2. If this entire trai proposal gets accepted, it is not the people who will be choosing what sites/kind of sites would be free/cheaper for themselves, it will be the other way around. It will be Airtel choosing that for the people along with that service provider with the deepest pockets.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:25   #116
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by blacksport View Post
Now, coming to flipkart, what is wrong if they agree to pay my ISP fees, the exact amount I spend shopping at their website?

The losers in this game seems to be the websites with not-so-deep-pockets. Now when did we start giving a damn for them - the ones with not-so-deep-pockets? Did we any time say that big companies should not advertise because it is unfair to those who can't afford to pay for ads?
While i got your other points, the part where you missed the crux of the issue is that once upon a time, even Flipkart was a small time vendor who started out small scale. As they had a level playing ground against competition, they stuck to their strengths and emerged to their current position.

Now, if net neutrality didnt exist then, and Amazon was paying Airtel to route to their platform, Flipkart would have flipped their cart even before they started.

Coming back to your point about big spending advertisers, anyone with money can buy eyeballs. But it takes someone who gives the customer what they want which converts those eyeballs into customers.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:27   #117
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by Pri2 View Post
The pricing maybe same for Airtel but not the consumer. For someone accessing the internet though airtel, access to Amazon is more expensive compared to Flipkart if it is a part of the free internet zone.
Correct to some extent, so why do you think Amazon will not jump into deal with Airtel and also pay for customer's access to its site, similar to Flipkart???

In fact I believe that e-commerce sites SHOULD finance the traffic of people visiting their sites. They ultimately make money out of it.


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Originally Posted by Samurai View Post
No, it is not that simple. People keep comparing it to tollfree, which is not correct.

If it was as simple as tollfree number, here is how it would work. If I am an app maker registered with Airtel Zero, any customer on Airtel, Vodafone, Tata-telecom, BSNL, Idea, Aircel, office/home Wifi, etc., should get free data access. That is how tollfree phone works.
I never intend to compare it to toll free.
All I am saying is this: in a deal between buyer and seller, there is transportation company involved. The transportation company has all the right to quote higher for certain goods (even though they occupy the same truck area). [As a side note, therefore I am opposed to the concept of net neutrality altogether, something quite similar to what Jeroen has posted - but he has socialist reasons - definitely European influence and I have capitalist reasons - definitely anarchist laissez faire influence].

Who pays for the transport? Perhaps the seller had made an agreement with the transport company and "pays" for it. Making it look like free for the buyer.
Maybe seller says to buyer - make your own arrangements.

Quote:
Also unlike tollfree numbers, apps are used worldwide. When an tiny app maker publishes an app in a Rhode Island server, he knows people from all over the world have equal chance of getting to his app. But a plan like Airtel Zero suddenly incentivizes their customers to stay away from any app that doesn't register with Airtel. There are 1000s of ISPs around the world, if each one starts incentivizes their customers to stay away from apps that don't register with them, small app makers will die a quick death. This is not good for the customers at all, such monopolistic practice should be regulated.
Agreed that in this scenario, the small app maker will face the odd staring against it. But let the customer's decide that!
In android stores - initially at least for quite some years - whatsapp was charged. Still people used it. In spite of a gamut of alternative apps that were for free! What about apple store? People didn't make a move from Apple to Android simply because android stores offered free apps where the same were offered for monies in apple.

Why do you want a govt regulation to spell out what prices should be charged to the customer?
In fact this govt regulation would be termed as a monopolistic practice, since it stops the free market price movements.

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Originally Posted by Samurai View Post
Because Airtel is picking the vendors for you. Eventually, you will start buying only from vendors blessed by Airtel, which may not get the best deal for you.
AH!
Now you are coming to the real point.
The issue is that all vendors are forced to go to ISP-A, becuase ISP-A holds the sole license to operate internet service. This is the crux. If there were no licensing policy here, vendor-A ties up with ISP-A for lower price to buyer.
Vendor-B ties up with ISP-B for lower price to buyer.
The buyer now has a choice.

Instead of asking Airtel to procide a level playing field, why don't we ask the govt to provide a level playing field so that we have more telecom vendors?


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Originally Posted by blacksport View Post
I was kind of neutral in this net neutrality debate, but am increasingly moving to the less popular side.

My ISP gives three websites absolutely free.

1) Their own company website - (who needs that?)
2) www.yahoo.co.in - (do people still access yahoo?)
3) www.wikipedia.org - (there you have me...)

No 2 is a website I have no use of even if they give it for free. And no 3 is one which I would pay through the roof if made paid.

So irrespective of whether something is given away free, people will take it only if it gives value.
You have hit the nail on the head.
Perhaps you will find it amusing, all this while I was with Net neutrality camp, without making a conscious efforts to understand the other side. Heck, till day before I was "against" the Airtel Zero platform.

But after reading around about the concept and thinking, instead of just takes sides - I have just realized how wrong I had been.

Quote:
The losers in this game seems to be the websites with not-so-deep-pockets. Now when did we start giving a damn for them - the ones with not-so-deep-pockets? Did we any time say that big companies should not advertise because it is unfair to those who can't afford to pay for ads? Or that newspapers should treat all advertisers equally and hence have all ads in the same size? Are we advocating socialism, BTW? Th every thing we decided to throw away a couple of decades ago?

Now lets get to the bit level. The proponents of net neutrality says that the ISPs should treat all bits equally, be it a bit representing voice, image, text etc. But do we treat a piece of metal in a Honda City equal to a piece of metal in a Merc? We pay for the "value" we receive, not what the underlying building block is. We don't pay for the atoms, we pay for the product. So we pay for the value we get from teh servoce, not the underlying bit.

If we derive more value from voice than data, then the ISPs are right in charging a more for it. Whether there is more value in the product is for the market to decide.
You know I think the problem in today's world is that all of us are reaping money made from capitalist endeavors (yes even the laborers), but we love to think that we are communists and support the fairy tale world of fairness.

Last edited by alpha1 : 16th April 2015 at 11:35.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:32   #118
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

Netflix had the same arrangement in Australia and had unlimited bandwidth for its service provided to it by ISPs. Quotes below as mentioned in cnet.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings that "Net neutrality must be defended" and ISPs must not "restrict, influence, or otherwise meddle with the choices consumers make."

The US Federal Communications Commission voted in March to reclassify Internet service as a Title II service under the country's Communications Act. In short, the decision means that ISPs in the US will be prohibited from blocking or slowing down traffic on their networks, or from offering paid services to content providers to ensure priority access -- similar to the deal Netflix struck in Australia.

So, we should see the same categorization as FCC has done in U.S.

@msdivy, Application layer cannot take care of the priority services without using such services offered by the lower layers. Wireless has a lot of complications (fade, noise, interference etc) and without it knowing what is being transported over it, applications will not work.

Last edited by srishiva : 16th April 2015 at 11:33.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:35   #119
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by blacksport View Post
I was kind of neutral in this net neutrality debate, but am increasingly moving to the less popular side.

My ISP gives three websites absolutely free.

1) Their own company website - (who needs that?)
2) www.yahoo.co.in - (do people still access yahoo?)
3) www.wikipedia.org - (there you have me...)

No 2 is a website I have no use of even if they give it for free. And no 3 is one which I would pay through the roof if made paid.

So irrespective of whether something is given away free, people will take it only if it gives value.

Now, coming to flipkart, what is wrong if they agree to pay my ISP fees, the exact amount I spend shopping at their website? If Shoppers Stop ties up with Ola to give free rides to their shop, would you rather take it, or cry about unfair competition because other shops would lose business?

If reliance says that I could browse some hundred popular websites for free, isn't me actually benefiting from it? Why should I be made to pay for accessing google.com, if google agrees to provide access for free?

The losers in this game seems to be the websites with not-so-deep-pockets. Now when did we start giving a damn for them - the ones with not-so-deep-pockets? Did we any time say that big companies should not advertise because it is unfair to those who can't afford to pay for ads? Or that newspapers should treat all advertisers equally and hence have all ads in the same size? Are we advocating socialism, BTW? Th every thing we decided to throw away a couple of decades ago?

Now lets get to the bit level. The proponents of net neutrality says that the ISPs should treat all bits equally, be it a bit representing voice, image, text etc. But do we treat a piece of metal in a Honda City equal to a piece of metal in a Merc? We pay for the "value" we receive, not what the underlying building block is. We don't pay for the atoms, we pay for the product. So we pay for the value we get from teh servoce, not the underlying bit.

If we derive more value from voice than data, then the ISPs are right in charging a more for it. Whether there is more value in the product is for the market to decide.
Flipkart is not paying your ISP fees. Unless you plan to spend all day on flipkart exclusively.
Nobody asked anybody to give a damn about the smaller players But the concept of the internet is built upon freedom,and per se, suppressing that concept would be fascism, if anything.
Your comparison of bits and metal parts is non-commentable, unfortunately.

Flipkart pays for your ISP)), so youll shop only from fk, Some grocery chain does too, so youll only buy from that, fabfurnish pays for your ISP, so youll only buy from Fab.
Even if fabfurnish start charging you for every nut and bolt.
Seperately.
On each side.
per day.

Why?
Because it has paid for your access.
But the troubling outcome and reason is because you will never know better. You will never even have heard of, lets say, pepperfry. since it did not have deep pockets, and since you cant get around to it.
Fantastic.
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Old 16th April 2015, 11:49   #120
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Re: The fight for net neutrality is on! Time to reclaim the internet

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Originally Posted by blacksport View Post
My ISP gives three websites absolutely free.

1) Their own company website - (who needs that?)
2) www.yahoo.co.in - (do people still access yahoo?)
3) www.wikipedia.org - (there you have me...)

No 2 is a website I have no use of even if they give it for free. And no 3 is one which I would pay through the roof if made paid.

So irrespective of whether something is given away free, people will take it only if it gives value.
Well, you already know about what is giving value and what is not as you have had the ability to experience everything so far for free thanks to net neutrality.
Imagine someone just getting started with the concept of internet and its possibilities and is offered only a set of 4/5 services in the name of it as they are already being paid for by the service provider. None of the other competitors of these 4/5 services ever have a chance now considering the customer has no way to ever reaching them. That's what's wrong with Airtel zero.
Even if the customer did have a way of reaching them using a paid data plan, if the set of 4/5 services will enjoy faster speeds Vs the others/competitors get throttled, nothing new will ever come to you.


One more thing I would like to point out, others can correct me if I am wrong. None of this would have been an issue if the infrastructure that Airtel uses to connect to these service providers was their own/private. It is not, they use the internet infrastructure for it which is the main issue. If all traffic comes to the ISPs door free, what right does the ISP have to discriminate based on who is giving them what amount of money.
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