Not sure if anyone is reading posts anymore, but this was posted on slashdot. We already knew that government agencies have been buying our data from data brokers, but according to this article, some law enforcement agencies are buying things like phone records that are most likely obtained illegally through pretexting or other means.
I think I’m behind by a post or two, and I never got to write about net neutrality after the class discussion, so here’s a double-length post with some of my ideas…
In class we discussed how our intuition contradicts itself for net neutrality. We generally feel that ISPs should be allowed to build their own networks and use them as they see fit. (e.g. build 2 pipes — one for internet and one for proprietary video content. This is the same as 1 pipe, twice as large where they restrict half the bandwidth for video.) At the same time we feel they shouldn’t be allowed to discriminate against certain traffic that might compete with their own services, or charge companies like Google to have their content carried faster. We found that these viewpoints will often contradict each other. Why can’t an ISP add new capacity to their network and then sell that bandwidth exclusively to “preferred” providers? Also, many design tradeoffs must be made, perhaps between bandwidth and latency, and some applications like VOIP or streaming video might be adversely affected by prioritizing one over the other. As an otherwise legitimate design decision, the ISP could design their network for exclusivity in a particular market.
Having given some thought to this contradiction over the past few weeks, I think the problem lies in the abstractions regarding “the Internet” and how we purchase access to it. While we might picture the internet as a giant cloud and we purchase a connection into that cloud with a particular capacity, the real Internet is not so uniform. We buy a connection to our ISP, who has connection points to some larger ISP, who runs part of the backbone and connects to the backbone’s of other ISPs. So some points on the internet at “closer” than others and we can observe the difference. The most obvious is comparing the speed at which we can connect to U.S.-based as compared to those overseas.
For the longest time however, most end-users have been mostly blind to the non-uniformity of the internet. Before wide-spread broadband and fast university connections, we were all on slow modems. Our connection to the local ISP was the bottleneck to get to anyone. Once we got past that and onto the “net”, it didn’t matter very much who we were talking to, where they were, or how we were connected to them. Furthermore, the ISP could have many dialup customers connected aggregated over their own connection to the internet backbone since each user was limited in speed. With broadband, that picture is beginning to change, and the abstraction of the cloud internet will erode even further as individuals have fiber-optic connections in the “last-mile”. It is becoming simple for each user connected to an ISP to have more capacity to the ISP than the ISP can provide him to the rest of the internet or farther away points. As a result, the closer someone is to me on the network, the faster I can communicate with them. If Google happens to use the same ISP that I do, I will get a faster connection than others, without any intentional network discrimination taking place.
This distinction isn’t all bad. For efficiency of the network and reducing cost, it might make sense to design high-bandwidth applications closer to the end users. As an ISP with a customer who wants video content that uses 2 megabits of bandwidth (2 Mbps), I can have an extra 2Mbps in bandwidth to the internet backbone if the provider is remote, or provide that connection directly on my network to a closer provider. The latter would save quite a bit of money since I already have a fast connection within my own network.
Now hopefully we all can visualize the problem a little more, I suggest that we change our abstraction about purchasing “Internet” connections. We need to look at more details. Instead of buying a single Internet connection through an ISP for x Mbps, we should split it up into two components: our connection to the ISP (x Mbps), and our portion of the ISP’s connection to the “Internet” (y Mbps), where x>y . We can still abstract the connections that make up the rest of the internet, the design tradeoffs and even the aggregation of bandwidth, but now we would recognize that my connection to the ISP, and anyone else directly connected to them, is faster than to the rest of the network. For neutrality, we simply ask (or require) that the internet portion of my connection (y Mbps) be blind to the content and destination. We can then give the ISP discretion about what x & y should be and what services they want to offer me directly, and let the market set prices.
So now my ISP can sell me a 20/15 Mbps connection for $20 per month, with 20 Mbps direct to the ISP and 15 Mbps to the rest of the internet. I can use my 15 Mbps to search, buy video, use VOIP, etc from anyone I like, knowing how my capacity is limited. The 40/30 Mbps plan might cost $40 per month, but the ISP could offer me an upgrade to a 40/15 Mbps connection for only an extra $5 per month. Now if I buy their cable TV service which takes 10Mbps, I still have my full 15 Mbps of internet bandwidth, whereas if I choose another cable TV service, I may limit myself to 5 Mbps. The market will help determine what each component of the connection is worth.
Also, this would help make internet connections less of a commodity product. I might choose the cheapest ISP, or I can pick the one that has a direct connection to Vonage and Google, knowing that I’ll need less bandwidth for other things. Maybe the ISP will even pay Google for the privilege, instead of the other way around. The ISP that wants to limit my Internet connection so I’m forced to buy their cable TV service will either reduce my internet bandwidth, or raise the price, and in doing so might price themselves out of the market.
I’m not sure if anyone else is still writing, but it would be great if someone wants follow-up and look at this from the other side. In this model of buying network connections, will the ISP, by setting prices, bandwidth, and choosing when and how to upgrade their network, be able to discriminate against their competition in spite of a content-blind internet component.
Professor Felten asked for some feedback about the class so I wanted to make my last post about a topic that was not covered. We covered a wide range of topics in this course, but one of the ones left out was electronic voting. I’m not exactly sure how it ranks with respect to the other topics, but just like the other, it is currently a very hot issue.
I tried to figure out what would be a good reading list for a discussion about electronic voting and quickly became overwhelmed with the amount that was out there. I think it could be a very interesting discussion since there are a number of recently passed and pending legislation in this area. Some focus strictly on paper voting records for electronic voting machines but others are much broader.
The Black Box Voting website keeps an up-to-date collection of news events regarding electronic voting issues. The corresponding book gives a pretty good overview of some of the issues and PDF files of the chapters are available for free download. The book was published in 2004, so is a bit out of date. Chapter 2 and the appendix contain a listing of e-voting problems throughout the country. It is a bit scary to read about all of those machine problems and I think Chapter 2 would be a good read for the class (it’s a very easy 22 pages)
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
Verified Voting is another good website for e-voting. It keeps track of the legislation (in all stages) regarding e-voting.
http://www.verifiedvoting.org/
NJ has a e-voting bill that requires a permanent paper record that can be verified and kept for audits (by 2008). Most states have new legislation with various requirements with regards to e-voting machines. There are also a variety of federal e-voting laws that are in Congress. The class should read the current NJ bill (which is very short) and some of the federal legislation.
One of the more aggressive paper verified e-voting bills, H.R.550, the “Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005″ was introduced by Rep. Rush Holt (the House representative for Princeton) Maybe he could even come to speak about the bill (in a class specific session or a more general setting). It would also be a nice touch to schedule this week in November if this class is offered during the fall semester.
I’m not sure if this would combine too many issues, but this topic could be done right after the week on copyright and the class could do a reading about Diebold and DMCA takedown notices. In 2003, Diebold, one of the larger e-voting machine manufactures, was sending DMCA notices of copyright violation to website posting Diebold corporate documents. The documents suggested that the company knew about security problems with the machines before they were sold. Diebold was asserting that the documents had copyright and the posting of that material was in violation.
The Electronic Freedom Foundation also has a large collection of e-voting documents. http://www.eff.org/Activism/E-voting/
The French Government is currently considering controversial new legislation that may cause Apple to remove its iTunes service from the country.
Last month, the French National Assemble passed legislation that was meant to prevent one company, via Digital Rights Management (DRM), from dominating the online music market. The legislation would force Apple, Sony, Audible.com and other companies offering DRM music to share their DRM technologies so competitors can offer music playback devices and online music stores that worked with the DRM software. The bill requires providing the DRM source code to allow conversion from one form to another.
Apple was very concerned with the new legislation, calling the bill “state-sponsored piracy.”
“The French implementation of the EU Copyright Directive will result in state-sponsored piracy. If this happens, legal music sales will plummet just when legitimate alternatives to piracy are winning over customers. iPod sales will likely increase as users freely load their iPods with ‘interoperable’ music which cannot be adequately protected. “
Apple does not want to provide its DRM technology and is threatening to vacate the French market with its iTunes and iPod products if the bill is passed in this form.
I can see inter-operability as a valid objective. Companies often use DRM as a way to lock consumers into a specific line of products, like iTunes music store and iPod music player. DRM increases the cost of switching to another music player because the new music player will unlikely play the music purchased from iTunes. Also, the iPod will be unlikely to play music purchased from other online music sites with DRM.
Conversion between different DRM technologies is a difficult (if not impossible) process. Putting aside the technical difficulties, different DRM technologies may provide different features. If one version (A) does not allow copying, but version B allows copying the file 3 times and version C allows unlimited copying within 2 weeks, how should copying be managed when converting between A, B, and C?
Just last week, in the French Senate, a similar bill was proposed. This new bill would require basically the same sharing of DRM compatibility, but has a significant clause that would allow companies to avoid sharing.
The new bill would create a new French authority to handle compatibility disputes. This agency would have the ability to enforce compatibility between specific DRM music formats. The significant change is that the agency would only do so if the DRM causes operational issues “additional to, or independent of, those explicitly decided by the copyright holders.”
Basically, Apple (and others) can alter the contract with the copyright holders of the music to specifically state that the DRM and corresponding compatibility issues are acceptable to the copyright holders. I’m not sure how difficult it will be to amend the contracts of online music sold to the French iTunes, but it seems that if this version passes, additional paperwork would be better then vacating the market.
Just today, the Senate passed its version of the DRM compatibility bill. Now, representatives from the two houses of government will meet to compromise on the differences between the bills.
Avi’s recent post “The New Ads” asserts the death of the 30 second ad and points to viral advertising as the new frontier in pushing products. While his points are well taken, focusing exclusively on the new forms that commercials will take as television moves online misses the larger picture: content, not just advertisements, is sure to evolve.
Between Tivo, Slingbox, piracy, ad-blockers, desensitization and competition from an ever-increasing array of media, it certainly looks like television producers are in for a rough period. Only very recently, with the introduction of itunes, the online broadcast of sports events and ABC’s next-day streaming of popular shows, have they started to take advantage the new distribution channels the internet offers. Even more nascent is the use of the internet to supplement media content.
ABC has been a pioneer in this area, particularly with Lost, its breakout hit, now in its second season. For the uninitiated, Lost follows a couple dozen survivors from the crash of Oceanic Airlines Flight 815, who are trapped on a mysterious island. When the show first launched, ABC created a web site for Oceanic Airlines complete with the ability to look up flights and make reservations to create buzz about the show. More recently, in anticipation of the summer break between seasons, ABC has launched “The Lost Experience,” a game set to run in parallel to the show that includes web sites, commercials airing during the show, billboards, phone calls and other interactive multimedia. The show has also made a serious effort to have its cast and writers engage the fan-base by taking part in online forums and actively responding to feedback and theories about the show.
In a way, The Lost Experience can be seen as the direct descendent of Majestic, a PC game that EA introduced and then swiftly abandoned about 5 years ago. Majestic was a fully immersive mystery game; not only would you play around on the computer to try to figure things out, but the game would contact you by email, phone, fax and IM and would tailor its content to you specifically. For instance, the game might send you a handwritten, threatening letter that mentions your family by name. While Majestic proved to be staggeringly unpopular, largely a function of being too involved, it and its derivates represent the sort of total immersion that will likely become increasingly common as the internet enables new content, not just new ads.
As we’ve discussed in class, a pair of consortia, led by Sony and Toshiba with Blu-ray and HD-DVD respectively, are competing to position their next generation technology as the market leader in portable data storage. HD-DVD is going to hit the market first, be cheaper and easier to produce, and posts entertainment heavyweights like Paramount, Warner Bros and Universal Studios on its side. Blu-ray, on the other hand, will have a greater storage capacity (50gbs compared to 30), an army of hardware manufacturers (Dell, HP, Hitachi, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Thomson &c.) as well as its own team of content providers (Sony Pictures, Metro-Goldyn-Mayer, Disney, EA and Vivendi Universal) and the advantage of being tied into the Playstation 3. Yet, lost in the wild speculation over which system will prove to be the alpha male and which will be the Beta, is the question: is this manner of competition good for consumers?
Competition should only be encouraged insofar as it produces positive outcomes for consumers. The Beta/VHS war illustrates that the best product may not necessarily win out and that consumers will be shortchanged throughout the fight because they may end up with obsolete equipment. But the most galling aspect of this whole competition is the content providers who are lining up on one side or the other, limiting competitors’ access to their media in order to bolster the prospects of their chosen technology.
While Sony and Toshiba should be free to compete on quality, price, time to market, customer support, backwards compatibility and any number of things related to the data storage technology, competing on the basis of content should be prevented by antitrust regulators. Lining up exclusive rights to studio content in return for a cut of the royalties prevents consumers from enjoying content they otherwise would without purchasing both devices. And the particular content that is being restricted has no inherent compatibility with Blu-ray or HD-DVD; it is as if Sony managed to line up VISA to ensure that customers hoping to buy their HD-DVDs could only pay with Mastercard.
While regulators would not typically permit a monopolist to tie his product in exclusively with another in hopes of capturing some royalties from that secondary market (hold your Microsoft jokes), studios are typically thought to operate in competitive markets without monopoly power. Regulators need to realize that media is not so perfectly substitutable and is in some ways an addictive good (which has increasing marginal returns with consumption, as opposed to diminishing ones). As such, there is an important role for them to play in making sure studios are neutral in their provision of content, a role they seem to be shirking from in the Blu-ray / HD-DVD battle.
As we discussed in class a month or so ago, the first Microsoft anti-trust case in the US involved Microsoft’s alleged unfair use of its operating system monopoly to push the use of Microsoft’s internet browser Internet Explorer. The second Microsoft anti-trust case was in the Europe Union and involved Microsoft’s alleged unfair use of its operating system monopoly to push its own brand of video player Microsoft Media Player. The EU forced Microsoft to offer a version of its operating system without the Microsoft player. They also fined Microsoft for its behavior, and that fine is currently under appeal.
I want to talk about the recent Google complaint that Microsoft is bundling its MSN search engine as the default search engine in the new version if Internet Explorer (IE7). Google complained :
“We don’t think it’s right for Microsoft to just set the default to MSN on install,” Marissa Mayer, vice president for search products and user experience at Google, said then.
This may start to sound like the previous two antitrust cases, but there are a few key differences. Google is complaining about the default setting in the internet browser, not the Windows operating system. While IE is the most popular browser, Microsoft does not have as strong a monopoly in the internet browser market as it does in the operating system market. Aside from pure market share, the burden to users switching browsers is much lower. This weakens the monopoly claims because users are not locked into just one browser.
The Department of Justice looked into the claims of unfairness with regards to the default search engine. Just recently the DOJ concluded that the default search engine is easy to change, so does not represent a problem.
The court document noted that personal computer makers are free to set the default search engine to any service they choose. …[the browser] included “a relatively straightforward method for the user to select a different search engine from the initial default.”
To me, this seems like the right decision. Google, however, is still unsatisfied and commented that if Microsoft wanted to make it easy for users to switch, they could have made the default search box configurable with just one click.