We here at The Geekery have problems of staying on topic with our posts. So we are enjoying our themed week posts. So next week we are dedicating a week to “rants”. Rants about everything we despise about technology and the companies that fuel certain technologies. This next week will be a fun week so stay tuned. We will cover everyone from Apple to Zobo, knowing us it will probably be all about Apple, and maybe a little more about Comcast . I have added more fuel to my Apple fire, man oh man have I. I want to begin now so very badly!

Does Comcast read TheGeekery? Wow, that would suck for us due to all the Comcast bashing we do here, but for some reason we still pay for their service. On Tuesday Comcast officially denied rumors the they were filtering BitTorrent traffic running over their network.

Broadband providers have also not been big fans of BitTorrent because the use of the peer-to-peer protocol can clog networks with huge files. The blog TorrentFreak claims that several Internet Service Providers have been “throttling” or limiting BitTorrent traffic on their networks for the past two years. And last week, the blog accused Comcast of going even further to limit the use of BitTorrent on its network.

The blog claimed that some Comcast users had noticed that their BitTorrent transfers were being cut off and that they experienced a significant decrease in download speeds.

Over the past few days, these claims have been widely circulated throughout the Web. CNET news claims they spoke to Comcast spokesman Charlie Douglas earlier today, “he flat-out denied that the company was filtering or “shaping” any traffic on its network. He said the company doesn’t actively look at the applications or content that its customers download over the network. But Comcast does reserve the right to cut off service to customers who abuse the network by using too much bandwidth.”

As CNET was pressing the issue they asked some serious questions that I think a lot of us would like to know. Obviously he danced a little bit around the questions, but overall answered pretty straight.

“So what constitutes “too much” bandwidth? Douglas didn’t specify exact figures, but he gave a few examples that would likely get subscribers into trouble. For example, someone who sends more than 13 million e-mails a month, which breaks down to about 430,000 e-mails a day or 18,000 e-mails an hour, would likely get a letter or phone call from Comcast about excessive use. Sending roughly 250,000 photos or downloading more than 30,000 songs a month might also raise an eyebrow at Comcast, he said.”

“More than 99.99 percent of our customers use the residential high-speed Internet service as intended, which includes downloading and sharing video, photos and other rich media,” he said. “But Comcast has a responsibility to provide these customers with a superior experience, and to address any excessive or abusive activities usage issues that may adversely impact that experience.”

In the rare instances the company has to enforce its policy, Douglas said that Comcast contacts subscribers to work out the issue. But he firmly reiterated that the company doesn’t filter or throttle back traffic.

I dont have really that much to say about this one. TorrentFreak has proven its legitimise in the past. So who do we believe? I would like to know all of your thoughts on this.

How much would you pay for an Internet connection from an ISP that guarantees a neutral network, bills itself as a “social enterprise” instead of a traditional business, and sends free Ubuntu CDs to every new customer?

In the US, the battle over network neutrality has captured the public imagination in a way that it has yet to do in Europe or Australia. Debates over network neutrality occur in the media and in Washington, but new ISP Copowi wants to give customers a way to vote with their dollars as well. When it opened its doors for business two weeks ago, Copowi billed itself as the country’s first ISP to guarantee network neutrality, and it now hopes to prove to other ISPs that the issue matters enough to consumers to provide a competitive advantage, even if prices are higher (and they are).

Copowi already offers service in 12 Western states, but “absolutely” wants to go national—even international. Copowi senior partner George Matafonov tells Ars that he sees no reason why the company couldn’t eventually expand into Australia, Canada, and the UK.

But for now, with a few hundred subscribers, selling service in Australia looks a long way off. I spoke to Matafonov (an Australian himself) about Copowi’s business model, its challenges, and whether it will really remain neutral if a handful of peer-to-peer users start slurping up most of the available bandwidth.

Your gateway to a neutral ‘Net

Copowi’s main pitch is a fully neutral network, which it defines as one that provides “equal access to all web sites and online services.” The idea is that usage will be unrestricted and traffic will not be shaped, throttled, or prioritized. According to Matafonov, the major telecommunications companies want to “privatize the Internet” because greater control leads to greater profits. The eventual outcome could become something more like cable television than like the open Internet we know now, and Copowi strongly supports SavetheInternet.com’s campaign to preserve an open ‘Net.

But Copowi doesn’t own any “last-mile” lines to people’s homes, which means that it needs to lease DSL lines from local telcos out west in order to offer service (interesting side note: although companies like Verizon and AT&T scoffed at the idea of offering part of the 700MHz band as a “wholesale-only” license, both firms run thriving wholesale businesses of their own already). This puts Copowi at the mercy of the telcos that it leases lines from and means it has only limited control over its network neutrality guarantee.

Matafonov says that Copowi has had no problem in its negotiations yet, though. The telcos have so far been happy to provide unregulated access if Copowi is willing to pay for the bandwidth.

Because of this, and because telco wholesalers rarely resell lines at competitive prices (they don’t want to create their own competition), Copowi’s service runs toward the pricey side of the broadband spectrum. Users in Colorado, for example, will have to cough up a staggering $33.95 a month for a 256Kbps DSL connection—expensive by any standard.

Copowi’s higher-end plans are actually far more competitive when it comes to price. A 1.5Mbps connection is still not cheap at $49.95 per month, but a 7Mbps link isn’t a bad deal at $59.95 a month.

Matafonov admits that high wholesale rates are “one of the key questions” that the company faces, but he hopes that a small niche of customers will be willing to pay the premium for a guaranteed neutral connection. He also hopes that prices will drop as subscriber numbers grow and Copowi can negotiate better contracts. For now, though, Copowi targets those who don’t make “cost” their primary concern when choosing an ISP.

(more…)

 
Fridays are usually good days but when I read this I went nuts. Our beloved online freedom is being stolen from us day in and day out. And the gigantic monopoly which is known as Comcast is fronting this war on stealing more of our freedom every day.

So let me break it down for you what the ISP thought police are doing today. ISPs have been throttling BitTorrent traffic for almost two years now. Most ISPs simply limit the available bandwidth for BitTorrent traffic, but Comcast takes it one step further, and prevents their customers from seeding. And Comcast is not alone in this, Canadian ISPs Cogeco and Rogers use similar methods on a smaller scale.

“Unfortunately, these more aggressive throttling methods can’t be circumvented by simply enabling encryption in your BitTorrent client. It is reported that Comcast is using an application from Sandvine to throttle BitTorrent traffic. Sandvine breaks every (seed) connection with new peers after a few seconds if it’s not a Comcast user. This makes it virtually impossible to seed a file, especially in small swarms without any Comcast users. Some users report that they can still connect to a few peers, but most of the Comcast customers see a significant drop in their upload speed.

The throttling works like this: A few seconds after you connect to someone in the swarm the Sandvine application sends a peer reset message (RST flag) and the upload immediately stops. Most vulnerable are users in a relatively small swarm where you only have a couple of peers you can upload the file to. Only seeding seems to be prevented, most users are able to upload to others while the download is still going, but once the download is finished, the upload speed drops to 0. Some users also report a significant drop in their download speeds, but this seems to be less widespread. Worse on private trackers, likely that this is because of the smaller swarm size” says Ernesto from TorrentFreak.

Although BitTorrent protocol encryption seems to work against most forms of traffic shaping, it doesn’t help in this specific case. Setting up a secure connection through VPN or over SSH seems to be the only solution. More info about how to setup BitTorrent over SSH can be found here.

Customers on the other hand (like Myself) like to fully use their connection, and don’t agree that traffic shaping is the correct solution.If you pay for an internet connection, that’s what you should get from your ISP — an internet connection. Not a connection that will let you browse the web and check email, but little else. If an ISP has issues with the amount of data a customer is transferring, then the ISP needs to address that issue with that customer, and not restrict every user in one class of traffic. For me Comcast rates rise and rise every year. I am paying close to $200 dollars a month for internet

I guess this battle will go on for a while and I would advise Comcast users to try setting up a VPN connection to get around the traffic shaping, other users who find out that they are throttles might try BitTorrent encryption first, that seems to work quite well in most cases.

I am so sick of the Comcast monopoly, users have no other choices around my area. This has upset me to no limit. Yes people use P2P for illegal downloading (which is another story for another day) but some people use p2p for good use. I guess Comcast is now another enemy in the smoke and mirrors game we will all have to play. When will companies start to understand they these types of changes cost them more money in the long run. When they change something like this all it will do is enable more and more people to create new ways of creating freedom once again online. Its a vicious cycle. Goodbye online freedom.

So I make a plea with SCAMCAST, take the shaper out of the loop. Bring your service back to what it once was. Stop trying to control everything. 

But obviously no one will listen to me, maybe someday…..