News came out this week that Google Inc. filed a complaint with Canadian regulators saying Bell Canada should be prohibited from slowing P2P applications. Of course, this is just the latest in a long line of battles in the war over bandwidth metering/net neutrality.

Comcast and BitTorrent began a similar exercise earlier this year. Time Warner Cable’s test of bandwidth metering also has created a stir.

Of course, the whole problem centers around the fact that new bandwidth-loving applications like video, particularly in peer-to-peer applications, is sucking up a lot of bandwidth. And the network operators say the investment required to support heavy users of such applications often is more than the revenue they receive from those customers via their current Internet access pricing.

Deep packet inspection (DPI) vendor Sandvine recently released research that shows many of its service provider customers still are finding both sides of their residential Internet connection to be dominated by peer-to-peer file sharing traffic.

So, the question remains: What is a network operator to do so it can continue to justify investment in its network? It seems like a tough question.

However, one account I read mentioned that all the fuss over bandwidth metering is overblown given that if the Time Warner Cable test results in heavy Internet users fleeing to find other ISPs, then the cableco’s trial will have been a success, with both Time Warner Cable and those customers getting what they want.

Nonetheless, a lot of people in the communications industry believe finding the right balance between an open Internet that allows customers to pick and choose their applications and service providers while at the same time providing a model that enables network owners to justify the ongoing expenses of investing in and operating the underlying infrastructure is a huge deal.

Some folks have suggested that perhaps the solution is bringing together the network operators and over-the-top providers like Google and Vonage to work out a solution, preferably without involving regulators any further. But when this discussion arose as I was moderating an ATIS TechThink panel at NXTcomm earlier this summer, an audience member indicated that companies like Apple, Google, et al, have no incentive to come to the table for such a deal.

What do you think is the most workable solution?

User Comments !

In the days of dial-up, telcos complained because the PSTN was designed for short calls, not hours on end of dialing into the modem bank. Today, the ISP's (and I use that term loosely) have created networks that aren't designed for heavy internet usage. Funny really.

Posted by: Peter Radizeski | July 10 2008 13:21:20

5% of our subscribers use 90% of our resources.
Time to change all the plans to metered services I guess.
Then we can lower the price for our light users and the 5% can pay their fair share or go elsewhere.

Unless you run an ISP, you have NO CLUE...

Posted by: Paul | July 11 2008 16:00:38

No surprise this issue is affecting Cable Co's more accutely than DSL providers. When you boast about huge download speeds by dropping 8meg or 20meg to a node to be shared in a neighbor and then complain that someone is using too much bandwidth at the expense of other customers satisfaction... what is the problem again??? If you advertise it you darn well better be able to provide it.

Posted by: Brian | July 15 2008 11:46:33

No clue???  The current architecture of the Internet was never designed for heavy streaming applications like Netflix. The attempt to give faster downloads is an attempt to make these apps get over quickly, opening up space for other users.  However, for some users, more is never enough and uneducated consumers with wide open P2P apps have no idea the ammount of data being sucked from their machines and are suprised when they find out the reason things are so slow on their machines is due to these apps. 
There remains a fundamental difference in opinion between ISP's and Heavy users-using the Buffet analogy.
 The Buffet owner has to decide if the individual who paid their fee, and eats up all the food, is a customer worth serving.  The customer says he paid his fee, same as everyone else, he should get to eat everthing if he wants, it is the Buffet owners problem he didn't order enough food.
Each has their own opinion what is right, but the reality is, if everyone shows some measure of restraint (The Buffet owner has enough good food, and the customer eats reasonably), everyone benefits and everyone is happy.

Posted by: Al | July 17 2008 08:14:53