Netflix ISP speed rankings

[cybercoma]

Last month Netflix began publishing a speed index for Canadian internet service providers (ISPs). Perhaps not surprisingly, the fibreop ISPs topped the list. Rogers on the other hand was dead last. Rogers vowed to improve their service and moved up 2 positions on the index this month with a nearly 1Mbit improvement in their average speeds. The VP of Social Media Relations for Rogers criticized the report by saying it had nothing to do with overall internet speeds, which he claims were much faster. The company improved its capacity for Netflix, which is what lead to the improvement. Rogers maintains the position that they "do not throttle internet traffic."

Michael Geist, however, pointed out the obvious. If they don't throttle internet traffic, then why was Netflix-speciifc capacity diminished in the first place? This is essentially throttling by not providing the necessary capacity to Netflix's customers. Rogers has its own video on demand service which makes them a competitor to Netflix. Think about it this way. Let's say Canada Post was also in the business of selling books. You buy some books from both Amazon and Canada Post one day. The books from Canada Post arrive the next day. The books from Amazon arrive 3 months later. When you accuse Canada Post of delivering their competitors books more slowly, Canada Post simply responds, "we deliver all books at the same speed." But the problem is that Canada Post has 1 truck delivering Amazon's orders and 36 trucks delivering their orders. This is essentially what Rogers has done. By improving their Netflix-specific capacity, they were able to increase their customers' average speeds when accessing Netflix by almost a full megabit.

So what do you all make of all of this? Should ISPs be allowed to pick and choose what they provide capacity for and what they don't? Should all internet traffic be treated equally by carriers? Or is it fair business practice for them to reduce the speeds or ignore capacity on things that compete with their own products? What do you think of Netflix's move to publish ISPs average speeds? Will this create more competition in the marketplace? Do you think ISPs will respond to these rankings or ignore them? Do you think consumers might respond by switching ISPs when they can?

What do you think of the average speeds themselves? I have Bell Aliant FibreOp and I have a 60Mbps connection. I was surprised to see the average Netflix speed for BellAliant FibreOp at only 3.16Mbps. The lowest speed they offer customers is 20Mbps. Why would the average be only 3.16Mbps? This means there are customers getting even slower speeds and some getting even higher speeds. However, when the slowest package you can buy is 20Mbps, why would the average Netflix-viewing speeds be 3Mbps?

There's a lot of different variables that go into the speeds that customers experience. Many of them outside the ISPs' control. Do you think it's fair that Netflix publishes these speeds? I think those kind of out-of-their-control problems would randomly average out between ISPs though. It's not like an Aliant customer would have different problems than a Rogers customer. If they all commonly had slower speeds, then it's far more likely that it's something Aliant has done. For instance, the routers that they provide (ActionTec R1000H) have absolutely pathetic radio transmitters. I had to bridge another router to act as the radio transmitter/receiver because the signal strength was pathetically weak from Aliant's modem. In that case, the fault is clearly with the ISP for providing such crap hardware to its customers. For the record, they don't want you changing out their modem and will not offer tech support if you bridge like I did. It's sad.

So what does everyone make of all this? What are your opinions on the ISPs and the battle with Netflix? Let's discuss.

[GostHacked]

You are going to need a beefy connection for HD streaming from Netflix. Also I would be curious on Netflix's back end and servers to judge any kind of comparison.

As an example, I can watch anything on YT with little to no lag. All in HD. Mind you Google/Youtube is a giant and Netflix is still a baby.

Does Netflix have the capacity to service their customers properly?

Is it fair to attack ISPs based on how traffic is routed though the Internet? (path can change all the time)

What is your home connection like?

I am with Rogers and I am very happy with the service. I do not have a high bandwidth connection, but for the most part, my streaming down is good. My streaming up is also good when I twitch my DJ mixes.

Also when home users have everything talking through their Internet connection, it can get bogged down. A couple computers, maybe a couple tablets, smartphones, smart TVs, smart appliances. All that created network traffic that can have an overall effect on your connection. And it depends on how much others are downloading/streaming. For example, you could watch Netflix on one device without issue. Stream to two or more at the same time, and this will get bogged down. Another thing to note, is that when you stream with Netflix you are upstreaming as well. Your PC is sending info back to the Netflix server in order to tell it to send the next packet of information.

Another thing is wired over wireless connections. Wifi tends to be a lot slower than a hard wired network connection. But that overall is only as good as your fastest internet connection.

Netflix knows and understands the technology and this is a stupid publicity stunt on their end.

And yes Rogers would allow their service to have priority over anything else. I bet that is in the agreement that one would sign with a package from them.

[Boges]

The Net Neutrality debate will be the next battlefield in combatting piracy and cutting the cord.

If Net Neutrality is overturned, I can see Netflix suffering, they're already raising prices.

[GostHacked]

The Net Neutrality debate will be the next battlefield in combatting piracy and cutting the cord.

If Net Neutrality is overturned, I can see Netflix suffering, they're already raising prices.

It has already been part of the battlefield. However, they cannot stop piracy. They've been trying since the start, but have failed along the way. Mainly stuck in their traditional ways of doing business, do not translate well to the digital medium of the Internet.

The only service that I have seen that people are willing to invest money in is Steam. They make it really easy and inexpensive for me to buy games. The service and pricing is good enough to combat piracy. If you make a service/product that is good and easy for customers to use, then you have done the right thing. Steam saw this a decade ago.

Torrents are still going strong and in that case I can download a movie and watch it whenever I want. I am not wasting the bandwidth twice to watch the same show/movie.

[Boges]

Torrents are still going strong and in that case I can download a movie and watch it whenever I want. I am not wasting the bandwidth twice to watch the same show/movie.

Not if cable companies charge a premium for a connection that would allow you to download a movie in less than a few hours.

[GostHacked]

Not if cable companies charge a premium for a connection that would allow you to download a movie in less than a few hours.

But I can watch it right NOW on Netflix. I do not have to wait. If they want to charge a premium, I am not going to wait a few hours before it downloads, unless I can keep it on the hardware and watch it at anytime in the future.

ON demand should be on demand, anytime.

I do not agree with the ISP throttling the connection or certain ports where that kind of traffic takes place. I pay for the connection, and do not pay attention to their content or other services. Don't need them.

Most movie torrents I have used took less than an hour with my connection. If the premium service is slower, then it's not really premium in quality.

[Boges]

What Net Neutrality means, I believe, is you pay the same no matter how much you stream. A company can't charge you extra for Bittorrenting.

If laws change you'll have to pay more to your ISP if you do that.

Edited June 9, 2014 by Boges

[cybercoma]

You are going to need a beefy connection for HD streaming from Netflix. Also I would be curious on Netflix's back end and servers to judge any kind of comparison.

As an example, I can watch anything on YT with little to no lag. All in HD. Mind you Google/Youtube is a giant and Netflix is still a baby.

Does Netflix have the capacity to service their customers properly?

Is it fair to attack ISPs based on how traffic is routed though the Internet? (path can change all the time)

What is your home connection like?

I am with Rogers and I am very happy with the service. I do not have a high bandwidth connection, but for the most part, my streaming down is good. My streaming up is also good when I twitch my DJ mixes.

Also when home users have everything talking through their Internet connection, it can get bogged down. A couple computers, maybe a couple tablets, smartphones, smart TVs, smart appliances. All that created network traffic that can have an overall effect on your connection. And it depends on how much others are downloading/streaming. For example, you could watch Netflix on one device without issue. Stream to two or more at the same time, and this will get bogged down. Another thing to note, is that when you stream with Netflix you are upstreaming as well. Your PC is sending info back to the Netflix server in order to tell it to send the next packet of information.

Another thing is wired over wireless connections. Wifi tends to be a lot slower than a hard wired network connection. But that overall is only as good as your fastest internet connection.

Netflix knows and understands the technology and this is a stupid publicity stunt on their end.

And yes Rogers would allow their service to have priority over anything else. I bet that is in the agreement that one would sign with a package from them.

You bring up some good points, but wouldn't all those issues be equal across ISPs? If they're carrier invariant, then comparing speeds between ISPs is a fair assessment, no?

Edited June 9, 2014 by cybercoma

[cybercoma]

What Net Neutrality means, I believe, is you pay the same no matter how much you stream. A company can't charge you extra for Bittorrenting.

If laws change you'll have to pay more to your ISP if you do that.

Net neutrality is less about charging the end users for content-specific things and more about the ISPs hindering competition online. ISPs are carriers. They should be obliged to treat all content equally. Instead they slow the delivery of Netflix, then go to Netflix and demand more money for "ultra fast delivery," which really means delivery that hasn't been throttled. It's exactly like the mafia breaking businesses windows, then offering them security for a fee. It would be exactly like Canada Post slowing the delivery of Amazon's parcels, then telling them that they'll have to pay Canada Post an additional fee to speed up their deliveries. It's extortion.

[cybercoma]

I think the biggest problem we face going forward is legislators, regulators, and judiciaries that are completely incompetent when it comes to these technologies. They're expected to police it, but they're relying on the wolves to police themselves around the henhouse. They take the word of industry, but practically ignore consumers.

[overthere]

I think the biggest problem we face going forward is legislators, regulators, and judiciaries that are completely incompetent when it comes to these technologies. They're expected to police it, but they're relying on the wolves to police themselves around the henhouse. They take the word of industry, but practically ignore consumers.

More nails in the coffin for the role of the CRTC?

[Moonlight Graham]

Rogers is a steaming pile of crap. They are so outrageously expensive for minimal services compared to competitors. Also, of course they throttle specific sites. Especially high-volume sites like Netflix and bittorrent sites. I had a friend who switched to Teksavvy and the moment they did their bittorrent download speeds tripled above anything they ever got on Rogers.

Netflix speed performance is almost a non-issue. Even on Rogers, it takes only a few seconds to start streaming and watching an HD movie on Netflix so I don't get any big deal for that. The fact that Rogers costs DOUBLE the price for the comparable speed and more importantly total monthly GB download/upload capacity, that a competitor like Teksavvy charges is a joke. I just checked, it costs $42 a month for 25 Mbps speed (megabits not megabytes...25 megabits = about 3 megabytes) and 300 GB of data with Teksavvy, while Rogers charges $77/month for 30 Mbps speed and 270GB of data. There is also VMedia, which only charges $49.95/month for 30 Mbps and UNLIMITED GB data usage. For $52 on Rogers, their lowest package, you get 10 Mbps speed and 75GB total data.

Edited June 9, 2014 by Moonlight Graham

[TimG]

Net neutrality is less about charging the end users for content-specific things and more about the ISPs hindering competition online. ISPs are carriers. They should be obliged to treat all content equally.

I agree with this sentiment as long as ISPs are allowed to charge users based on what they consume. These kinds of backroom shenanigans only exist because CRTC prevents carriers from recovering costs from the actual consumers.

[GostHacked]

You bring up some good points, but wouldn't all those issues be equal across ISPs? If they're carrier invariant, then comparing speeds between ISPs is a fair assessment, no?

It can be, but your major backbones are operated by all the big players. Meaning the technology gets to places not possible some years ago. It's more of a collective collaboration to get the Internet to where it is today.

Major internet arteries and hubs are in major urban centers. and the links between cities are getting larger and faster. It's become a total mesh grid now.

I guess it can be a fair assessment. How how good is the network or ISP Netflix uses? And you can damn well they use an ISP via a large Datacenter. Unless it purchased a block of top level IP addresses to act as a self delivering product, through it's own internet connection where it is the ISP.

If that is the case, then that kind of tech is pretty damn slick.

Edited June 10, 2014 by GostHacked

[cybercoma]

Rogers is a steaming pile of crap. They are so outrageously expensive for minimal services compared to competitors. Also, of course they throttle specific sites. Especially high-volume sites like Netflix and bittorrent sites. I had a friend who switched to Teksavvy and the moment they did their bittorrent download speeds tripled above anything they ever got on Rogers.

Netflix speed performance is almost a non-issue. Even on Rogers, it takes only a few seconds to start streaming and watching an HD movie on Netflix so I don't get any big deal for that. The fact that Rogers costs DOUBLE the price for the comparable speed and more importantly total monthly GB download/upload capacity, that a competitor like Teksavvy charges is a joke. I just checked, it costs $42 a month for 25 Mbps speed (megabits not megabytes...25 megabits = about 3 megabytes) and 300 GB of data with Teksavvy, while Rogers charges $77/month for 30 Mbps speed and 270GB of data. There is also VMedia, which only charges $49.95/month for 30 Mbps and UNLIMITED GB data usage. For $52 on Rogers, their lowest package, you get 10 Mbps speed and 75GB total data.

You remind me of another thing. Why the hell do providers still have data caps? Why are there limits on how much people can download/upload per month. BellAliant has no limits. There's no reason every other provider can't do that too.

[cybercoma]

I agree with this sentiment as long as ISPs are allowed to charge users based on what they consume.

Sure, but that's like allowing Canada Post to charge you more to deliver mail from certain retailers. I don't think it should be allowed at all. The cost doesn't vary with the content they're delivering, all things being equal.

[TimG]

Sure, but that's like allowing Canada Post to charge you more to deliver mail from certain retailers. I don't think it should be allowed at all. The cost doesn't vary with the content they're delivering, all things being equal.

What it is like now is the CRTC is telling Canada post that it has to allow other companies to use its postal carriers to deliver mail and then telling Canada Post that it can't charge per piece of mail delivered via these private companies.

The rules as they stand distort the free market and, as result, network owners are looking to make backroom deals to recover their costs. I would rather see it upfront: consumers should pay for the bandwidth they use whether it is direct from the network owner or via a private ISP renting the network and in return prohibit ISPs from filtering traffic.

Edited June 10, 2014 by TimG

[GostHacked]

Sure, but that's like allowing Canada Post to charge you more to deliver mail from certain retailers. I don't think it should be allowed at all. The cost doesn't vary with the content they're delivering, all things being equal.

Another thing are long distance charges. Why is that even a thing now with modern tech?

[GostHacked]

What it is like now is the CRTC is telling Canada post that it has to allow other companies to use its postal carriers to deliver mail and then telling Canada Post that it can't charge per piece of mail delivered via these private companies.

It would be better equating it to the roads that all carriers use to deliver goods. Toll roads deciding to charge one carrier more than the other for the delivery of content.

I guess to go even further, throttling would be equivalent to the speed at which one carrier can operate at. Allowing one to travel faster than the other. Priority service.

Edited June 10, 2014 by GostHacked

[Moonlight Graham]

You remind me of another thing. Why the hell do providers still have data caps? Why are there limits on how much people can download/upload per month. BellAliant has no limits. There's no reason every other provider can't do that too.

I think it has to with total data line capacity. Cable lines can only handle a certain amount of data at certain speeds. If ie: every house in a suburban area had unlimited data, that would mean more data use would be taking place on those shared lines and everyone's speed would be reduced because the lines would be clogged. This is also why the throttle certain websites that use a high amount of data, like Netlfix and torrent sites.

It's like driving on a highway, less traffic means everyone can drive faster but more traffic like at rush hour means clogged lanes and everyone can't go as fast. Rogers is trying to limited the amount of traffic on the highway so people have more reasonable speeds.

[TimG]

You remind me of another thing. Why the hell do providers still have data caps? Why are there limits on how much people can download/upload per month. BellAliant has no limits. There's no reason every other provider can't do that too.

Getting rid of bandwidth caps is NOT free. All it means is everyone has to pay more. I would rather see lower cost internet made available to people who don't need high caps than to force everyone to pay for unlimited usage they do not need.

BellAliant probably has no limits today because fiber has so much capacity that they can use it as selling feature at little cost. As demand increases even fiber networks will reach their capacity and not having caps will get expensive for ISPs and everyone's prices would go up to allow a small number of people to benefit.

Edited June 10, 2014 by TimG

[Boges]

I used to have a 60 gig cap but rarely used more than 20 gbs so I scaled back to a 35 gb cap to save money. I pay a lot for HD cable so it's fine. A DVR is much better than Netflix and Hulu.

With the media companies owning the ISP lines, we're going to see a huge push to make people pay more for their internet if they're using it as a free way to view content that they want you to pay for.

It's protecting their business.

[GostHacked]

I think it has to with total data line capacity. Cable lines can only handle a certain amount of data at certain speeds. If ie: every house in a suburban area had unlimited data, that would mean more data use would be taking place on those shared lines and everyone's speed would be reduced because the lines would be clogged. This is also why the throttle certain websites that use a high amount of data, like Netlfix and torrent sites.

Hoever your modem determines your connection speed. A file is uploaded to the unit to match your connection speed.

It's like driving on a highway, less traffic means everyone can drive faster but more traffic like at rush hour means clogged lanes and everyone can't go as fast. Rogers is trying to limited the amount of traffic on the highway so people have more reasonable speeds.

A good analogy and one I used. But the amount of fiber that is out there now negates this limit. When I worked at the warehouse and we installed two new internet lines. Allstream has put a fiber bundle in of 250 strands. We only need one. And it was a dedicated 10/10 connection. That one strand could be maxed out if the hardware was configured for it. And then we could have tapped the other 249 in the bundle.

When fiber is laid, you are looking at 250 and up. A sole single line is never never done.

But then again out information passed through Bell and Allstream networks to talk to the datacenter in Toronto. So in a way that traffic did get priority over others as it was a dedicated line.

Large businesses are going to get priority traffic, and your home connection can be affected by it.

It's Rogers fault then for upping most people's connections to 4x what it was 5 years ago.