Re: : Music industry proposes a piracy surcharge on ISPs

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

________________________________________
From: dave () ddnets com [dave () ddnets com] On Behalf Of Dave Phelps [dave () metrocomp net]
Sent: Tuesday, March 18, 2008 9:17 AM
To: David Farber
Subject: Re: [IP] Re: Music industry proposes a piracy surcharge on ISPs

Brett, your subscribers paid for their use of your network to reach the rest of the internet. You charge each 
subscriber a fee for a certain bandwidth, and they pay that fee. Therefore, P2P is not "uncompensated." Your 
subscribers are paying for it. I don't care how you argue against P2P, your subscribers pay the rate you set for their 
bandwidth. You cannot dispute that. That means your claim of "uncompensated" is simply untrue. Perhaps you mean to say 
_undercompensated_, in which case I would again point out that YOU set the rate of compensation. Therefore, if you are 
"undercompensated" for P2P, then you can simply change the price you charge for bandwidth.

It is very simple. I pay my ISP for 512/3M or whatever it is. I expect to be able to upload at 512Kbps and download at 
3Mbps at any and all times. If 512/3M is going to be a problem, then they shouldn't sell it to me. If 512/3M is going 
to cost more than they charge, then the people who set the price have made a grave error.

You may certainly (absent network neutrality) tell your subscribers they can't use the bandwidth for certain things 
(you do inform them prior to or as part of any agreement, I presume). Obviously the subscribers who care will move to 
your competition, if they have that option. It would seem this would make everyone happy.

This is where the network neutrality part comes up, because many of your subscribers probably don't have a comparable 
option for internet access. This is certainly true throughout much of the country. In the interest of protecting those 
subscribers, network neutrality rules would require you, and all other ISPs, to not limit or block certain types of 
traffic, resulting in a requirement for the "common good."  Although I have a hard time accepting government controls 
on anything, I find it more difficult to locate something bad in network neutrality. My biggest concern is that once 
the government begins control of anything, there is no limit or end. For that reason, with mixed feelings, I'm against 
network neutrality overall. I like to think, perhaps naively, that the problem will resolve itself.

If P2P is consuming too much of your network bandwidth, perhaps your network is excessively oversubscribed. If you 
currently substantially block P2P, I expect you are still seeing traffic trends continue upward. Perhaps you will 
consider blocking youtube.com<http://youtube.com> or Google video in your next attempt at bandwidth conservation.

There are two solutions for an oversubscribed network: More bandwidth or less traffic. You have selected the latter. 
Good luck with that.

Dave Phelps



On Mar 17, 2008, at 8:01 PM, Brett Glass <brett () lariat net<mailto:brett () lariat net>> wrote:

> Fred:
>
> The problem with the EFF's solution is that it does not address the
> impact of P2P on ISPs, as illustrated in the slides at
>
> http://www.brettglass.com/ITIF/pg9.html
>
> and
>
> http://www.brettglass.com/ITIF/pg10.html
>
> No rational ISP would accept any "solution" which did not eliminate
> the crippling, uncompensated costs of P2P. Our ISP, in particular,
> intends to block it until and unless we are compensated for these
> costs, and would consider any attempt to force us to allow P2P an
> unconstitutional "taking" of our network resources.
>
> --Brett Glass

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