Posted by The Blogging Desk on Fri, Jan 07, 2011
Comcast High Speed DSL enthusiasts grab your guns, there’s a movement not far off in the distance that suggests the army of Verizon 4G will soon replace your home internet connection – I am sure this will not go over without a fight.
I suppose, at first glance, the idea seems very possible. Consider your land line phone, a staple in the homes of just about everyone walking the face of the earth – yeah maybe in the days of Ward and June Cleaver but now-a-days, the POTS line that was always the lighthouse on the shores of despair, the work horse of the phone family, the trusted friend that you could always count on in a time of need – in many homes replaced, without hesitation, for the cell phone. Abandoning your home internet connection cannot be far off.
Recently, Verizon made an announcement in which CEO, Ivan Seidenberg suggests their new 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) network may offer a reasonable substitute for home cable and internet. It seems from the information that I have read that he is basing this idea on the results of initial speed testing that has been completed on the network. Preliminary data that I was able to locate shows that max download speeds reached on the Verizon 4G network were as high as 10.6 Mbps (speed results seem to be dependent on geographic location). I suppose for a hand held device, this could be considered extremely quick download speeds but when I look at this DL speed versus my Comcast high speed DSL connection (sure, I may be biased) and I see download speeds at almost twice what Verizon 4G is reporting, I need look no further than my comfy DSL.
I think that with any technology or concept that is in its infancy or maybe even pre-adolescent years, it’s hard to buy in to the idea that this new technology may replace what you are currently familiar with. As more time, energy and resources are poured into its development, its worth may be proven. If this occurs, costs will begin to decline, availability will begin to increase and before you know it, that new confangled 4G network is the bees knees and your crummy old Comcast router will be given its walking papers and become the best dang coaster for your overpriced morning caffe-latte-mcswirl drinky poo. Don’t believe me – how about you go to the kitchen and pick up the mauve colored Bell Tel rotary phone and call your grandma and ask her how she’s doing (that is if she picks up, you may be interrupting her game shows) – ouch that’s smarts! Embrace technology, but don’t forget that in order to know where you are going, you need to remember from where you came. Comcast high speed DSL, you will always be my favorite. If you think 4G or LTE would be ideal for your small to mid-sized company, we'll talk you down from the ledge. Happy surfing gang!
Posted by The Blogging Desk on Thu, Dec 02, 2010
Engadget:
According to networking company Level 3 Communications, Comcast just couldn't wait for its NBC deal to go through before getting all jerky with the access to online video, telling Level 3 on November 19th that it would need to pay a fee to deliver video to Comcast customers. Level 3 delivers videos from many companies over its networks, but the timing is particularly notable since on November 11th it signed upbandwidth-chewing Netflix as a major customer.
At first glance, this seems like the sort of thing that would signal the end of days. Well, the end of net neutrality, anyway. Looking back, it can't get much worse than realizing that 95 of the candidates backing net neutrality lost on election day. I'm mentally prepared for Verizon to add a streaming video cost to my internet package any day of the week. I'm sure it will be worse on the Comcast end of things, since they now pretty much own TV networks. Good luck with that, friends!
But, hold the phone! Things may not be what they seem. Comcast has responded via their SVP of External Affairs. Seems like a made up job, but I digress;
Until Level 3 fomented this dispute, Comcast and Level 3 exchanged Internet traffic as part of a commercial interconnection agreement, under which Comcast paid Level 3 for interconnection facilities. Although the parties exchanged traffic at a ratio of about 2:1, with Comcast terminating more of Level 3's traffic, this was well within the industry's established bounds for "roughly balanced" traffic, and they exchanged their on-net traffic on a settlement-free basis. At some point, we are told, some of the traffic sent by Level 3 to Comcast came from CDN services operated by Level 3. Because this traffic was within the traditional industry criteria for "roughly balanced," this did not raise any issues for Comcast.
Now, Level 3 has decided to reinvent itself as a major CDN, in competition with other
commercial CDN players, all of whom pay for transmission of their traffic on Comcast's and others' networks. And in so doing, Level 3 would more than double the amount of traffic it sends to Comcast -- which would result in a traffic imbalance that could be in the range of about 5:1.
Phew. So it seems like it's not as bad as we feared. It also looks like Level 3 needs to relax with their streaming of data. BUT, this is helpful. it keeps the net neutrality issue in peoples minds. I don't want to live in a world where I need to pay my ISP an email tax just to check mail. Do you?
Twitter your congressperson!
Don't fret, though. Trigon won't approach Comcast levels of destroying your hopes and dreams. In fact, we can help those dreams happen! Just so long as those dreams involve creating a solid IT Infrastructure, and a heaping helping of security. Sweet!
