Penny Arcade sums up bandwidth throttling.
If you’ve ever wondered why it takes so long to download or load certain Webpages or other files to your computers – it’s all determined by the bandwidth of the connection between your computer and your and/or others Internet Service Providers (IPS).
Bandwidth is a rate of data transfer that is measured in bits per second (bps). Your ISP makes its money by renting little “chunks” of that high-speed connection to consumers who don’t want to spend thousands of dollars each month for a dedicated Internet connection. Since 2008, bandwidth usages has jumped up 100-fold.
For those that do not understand “Net Neutrality,” it is the way internet traffic is treated in terms of bandwidth usage. Right now, internet consumers don’t have to pay more to watch a YouTube video than you do to check your email, even though a YouTube video eats up a ton of more bandwidth and, in reality, costs your ISP more for you to watch. IPSs and major websites, like Google, Facebook and Microsoft pay millions a month for their bandwidth usage.
Obviously, websites owners and majority of consumers support net neutrality as they do free speech.
Costa Rica’s ICE is the leading government owned monopoly of Internet Services have been throttling their bandwidth for sometime now and that is why there are problems, especially in the mornings, establishing a connection.
Obviously, ISPs are becoming the greatest adversaries on net neutrality. Major ISPs’ are now attempting to charge websites and service providers more for “better” service on their networks. Now it looks like, the frailer to pay for that extra bandwidth, that YouTube video might take three times as long to download … or it may not download at all!
The problem all started with Comcast, one of U.S. largest cable company, began throttling certain types of downloads, like BitTorrents. Throttling is an effectively way of putting a speed limit on how fast one can download and/or view files to save the ISP money and to prevent crashing. Throttling is also very controversial with more and more hosting companies are using it to control bandwidth usage during peak hours. Servers like Blue Host and Gator are two that are known to throttle their customers websites. Fair? Not really, when a 10 page website with a few videos on it may takes longer to load than a 2000 page retail website when throttling is used to control “overall bandwidth” usage for the server.
Another example, how many times have you tried to Twitter and get an message, “to many connections?” – that’s because their bandwidth usage is on the verge of been capped off and have to throttle.
When the FCC got user complaints on Comcast’s throttling, they put the brakes on it, claiming “Net Neutrality.” So many ISPs, led by the mammoth Comcast, sued the FCC.
This week, a major legal ruling was handed down in the Comcast case. The District of Columbia Court of Appeals said that the FCC had overstepped its authority in mandating net neutrality and that ISPs should be free to manage their own traffic however they see fit, noting that under current law, the FCC does not have “untrammeled freedom” to regulate broadband services.
Now net neutrality is threatened, and could be a major costly battle for internet users. For example, with the ruling, Comcast can “now” charge you extra to view YouTube videos since you will be using more bandwidth than the person just checking his or hers email. It may also be able to limited or ban VOIP services like Skype, which has become a major wired telephone service in Costa Rica. In reality, Comcast users in the U.S may have to fork out an extra $20 for the use of Skype or any other broadband telephone services. And if you have a lot of videos on a website and/or like to send videos via email, chances are you can be changed extra for that usage. The dominoes for these extras are already lining up.
So what does this mean for Costa Rica? Back in June, 2009 the government did something somewhat unbecoming, they gave approval, or should I say, offered the rights to six companies to provide Internet and voice-over-Internet telephone services.
Will those companies and ICE follow in Comcast’s footsteps … it would be foolish not to think so…
The rest of the world is starting to invest in 4g technology and here we have the ICE still providing TDMA services, to get more than 4mg you have to pay a premium (business) fee when in the rest of the world for the price of the most basic internet service in CR you get 20mg, etc, etc, etc. I love Costa Rica but ICE and the telecommunications services in general need a real wake up call if they want the country to keep developing.