Re: Verizon Public Policy on Netflix

[Brian Loveland <brian () aereo com>]

In what world is Verizon an XO customer?

But I think the whole premise of blaming XO is broken, just because your
traceroute shows inbound to Netflix via XO does not mean Netflix is sending
bits to you via XO.  If you are sitting on AS701, Netflix certainly has
many routes with aspath length = 2 (Transit, VZB) and its going to be
pretty hard to know what path they are taking into VZB for yourself.

On Thu, Jul 10, 2014 at 9:50 PM, Keenan Tims <ktims () stargate ca> wrote:

> > A little experimentation validates this:  Traffic from my FIOS home
> router
> > flows through alter.net and xo.net before hitting netflix. Now alter.net
> is
> > now owned by Verizon, but when I run traceroutes, I see all the delays
> > starting halfway through XO's network -- so why is nobody pointing a
> finger
> > at XO?
>
> Traceroute is pretty meaningless for analyzing if there is congestion or
> not. The presence of delays could mean many things that don't indicate
> congestion. Most large networks are well managed internally; congestion
> almost always appears at network edges.
>
> In this case, the assertion is that XO's link to Verizon is congested. If
> that is in fact the case, it's because Verizon is running it hot. Verizon
> is (presumably) an XO customer, and it is on them to increase capacity or
> do network engineering such that their links are upgraded or traffic
> shifted elsewhere. It's worth pointing out that if Verizon is running a
> transit link hot like this, Netflix is not the only traffic that's going to
> be impacted, and that is in no way Netflix' fault. Even if it is a peering
> link, their dispute should be with XO.
>
> What people seem to miss here is that there is no other out for $ISP than
> a) increase transit capacity, b) sufficiently peer with $CONTENT or c)
> allow performance to degrade (ie. Don't give customers what they are paying
> for). If we take c) off the table, it tells us that settlement-free peering
> would be the preferred alternative as it would usually cost less than
> buying more transit.
>
> > I'll also note that traffic to/from google, and youtube (also google of
> > course) seems to flow FIOS - alter.net - google -- with no delays.  So
> again,
> > why aren't Netflix and Verizon pointing their fingers at XO.
>
> Verizon (apparently) refuses to peer with Netflix, since Netflix has an
> open polic. They do, however, appear to peer with Google. Why?
>
> > This is the classic asymmetric peering situation - which raises a
> legitimate
> > question of who's responsible for paying for the costs of transit
> service and
> > interconnections?
>
> If this were a question of Verizon transiting traffic for Netflix
> asymmetrically, then sure. However they are terminating the traffic in
> question, the only "transit" is to a paying Verizon customer on Verizon
> equipment; this is the part of the network their customer pays them to
> maintain.
>
> > And, of course, one might ask why Netflix isn't buying a direct feed into
> > either alter.net or FIOS POPs, and/or making use of a caching network
> like
> > Akamai, as many other large traffic sources do on a routine basis.
>
> They likely can already meet easily at many points across the country,
> with little cost to either party. It is quite obvious that Netflix is very
> open to doing so. Why doesn't Verizon want to play? Apparently because they
> think they can successfully convince users that the problem is Netflix' and
> not Verizon's. Content peering with eyeballs should be a no-brainer - it
> saves both parties plenty of money and improves performance across the
> board. Netflix seems willing to bring their traffic to Verizon's edge for
> free, all Verizon needs to do is turn up the ports and build whatever
> capacity they would need to build anyway regardless of where the traffic
> comes from or what it is. Or, if the power and space is cheaper than the
> transport from where they meet (or to where they can meet), they can
> install Netflix' appliances. They always have the option of just buying
> more transit too, but the bottom line is that this expansion is required to
> carry their customer's traffic, it's not something they would be trying to
> charge content/transit for if it were organic traffic growth from diverse
> sources, they would simply upgrade their network like the rest of us.
>
> Keenan
>
> > Personally, I think Netflix is screwing the pooch on this one, and
> pointing the
> > finger at Verizon as a convenient fall guy.
> >
> > Miles Fidelman
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
> > In practice, there is.   .... Yogi Berra