Crystal Web (NEW ISP) ADSL Feedback

[Paul Hjul]

the bottom line is the people who want to p2p during peak hours should be the ones forced to upgrade. not the people who don't.

which is exactly how we see it

the particular concern you seem to have is for the person wanting to p2p during peak hours.

 

[saa044]

I omitted the comic sans ...

But in truth I am actually on your side of the issue - the streaming factor is a complication that really does surface especially if you look at the contention crunch that can happen (streamers more than downloaders contribute to the capacity constraints that are hitting sections of the network - certain exchanges) and one of the real benefits of NNTP, p2p and "downloaders" generally is that the considerate ones use the network when it is most available -- we haven't quite got to the point where streaming traffic picks up at 4am. The unfortunate reality though is that there is a market appeal dynamic at play here - people would buy the Model T Ford even if they thought it was butt ugly because it could be made cheap, to make it cheap they had to make it available to more people. I wouldn't call the streamers abusers, simply because I wouldn't call anybody not violating the law or causing actual harm to a network with the requisite intent, but it certainly is true that streaming is a more difficult usage case than scheduled downloaders. Gamers are a difficult case as well -- and don't get me started on Twitch (we thank Google for their acquisition of Twitch). While we may jest - particularly on the forum - trust me we take the challenges very very seriously. We will joke about the IPC price needing to come down rather than whine and bitch about Telkom, but underneath the joke is a very real knowledge that there is a serious problem with the underlying structures of the provisioning of DSL in SA: IPC needs to be reduced in price and Telkom needs to be able to generate sufficient revenue to allocate to the growing capacity needs, or somebody else needs to step up and join the party.

By getting p2p traffic (and the exact identification of p2p traffic is simplified) and NNTP and schedule-able downloads to be scheduled to off peak (and that is network off peak times) is a vital component of getting a network to work. Getting streamers on board allows for a situation where you have capacity well paid for that is only used at certain times (which can then be used by heavier use customers) and the reality is that in the main that section of the market uses their connection to a degree that makes it possible to invest in growing capacity across the board.

Trying to get the sort of usage mechanisms in place that allows the growth in on demand content to be matched by on scheduled content is one of the real challenges that remains with this industry and business - what we are really trying to accomplish is to perform the inverse of what has been the norm, where performance degrades as the network is unable to match usage patterns until the stage is reached where the network is hoping their more "demanding" customers leave the provider (and sometimes they accomplish this in rather direct means) and start insulting their users.

Well not really. If all 3 of us in my household watches Netflix on 3 different devices it uses about 1900kbps out of lets say 3800kbps. So lets say you download a movie at 3800kbps over a hour, and my 3 devices streams Netflix, you would use twice the data per hour and have only one movie to show for it whereas I would have 4 series and a movie that finished. Streaming size and download size is not the same. Visit any illegal streaming site, install video downloadhelper add-on and see the difference in size.

 

[Paul Hjul]

Well not really. If all 3 of us in my household watches Netflix on 3 different devices it uses about 1900kbps out of lets say 3800kbps. So lets say you download a movie at 3800kbps over a hour, and my 3 devices streams Netflix, you would use twice the data per hour and have only one movie to show for it whereas I would have 4 series and a movie that finished. Streaming size and download size is not the same. Visit any illegal streaming site, install video downloadhelper add-on and see the difference in size.

which is why by accommodating streaming you can accommodate more people (and potentially more accounts) - but in terms of what it does to demand it is still a bigger challenge
and is why ideally people should stream what they are watching now and schedule what they want to watch at some point to download later
-- of course the content rights holders are a bit of a spanner in the works (lets not say that they are just spanners)

 

[patrick123]

Ccproxy and activate cache. I suppose your household does not watch x episode or movie over and over like my 10 year old girl, but I find it works NICE.

Luckily, my children are out of their teens... but Grandkids follow! I have a Squid proxy available, but most of the time our needs are quite diverse so that it is actually ineffectual.

 

[snail112]

@CW guess what? Here we go again. I don't know if it is my freaking line or bloody something telscum did but my high-low-mid-high-low-high-mid-low-high latency to local BF3 & 4 servers are now back again. 10 bloody days after "they" said there is nothing wrong

Standard tests as before or what am I telling tel-bloody-scum to do what now?

I know this is not the support line, but not keen on doing more pingpaths until 1am over the next few days as the issue is 10000000000% the same as last time.



P.S. forwarding this to support anyway.

 

[savage]

We recognise that traffic and classify it already. We've already discussed your specific usage case - this product is not right for your requirements. We have something more suitable though and you're on my list of testers for it.

This isn't about me, it's about the (wrong) road your walking on. The outcry on this thread in the last hour or so speaks clearly of it.

Here's how we can maintain current pricing while ensuring customers have an awesome experience day and night: when you're not using UTorrent, please close it.

There's reasons why the application must remain running... RSS feeds for example? And now you're not only dictating to us when we must download, but you're dictating to us what applications we're allowed to have running on our own personal computers?

If you connection is performing poorly and you are using p2p the answer is to pause your p2p and schedule it to an offpeak point IF you are on the standard entry consumer product - if you are on a different product different rules. Currently corporate clients in this market "pay more to block p2p" because there are huge benefits for them in doing so.

So I have a permanently connected VPN, mainly routing data being sent through it, and the odd email between MTA's here and there - which I encapsulate in a VPN as I do not have a static IP. At MOST, MAYBE, 20kb/s worth of traffic.

Now I am permanently shaped < 100kb/s on my entire account, SSH is as laggy as hell - I can't even properly work remotely on a machine, and heaven forbid to even attempt to watch the odd youtube video here and there that I never even do...

The fact is (let's forget about what *I* do, and *my* specific requirements), you're expecting your customer to pay a premium to use something as simple as a VPN (for what ever reason). Whether there's actual traffic (usage) or not. The same goes for P2P.

If thats the road you guys want to go down... Fine - it's your choice. Just remember there are a VAST number of other ISPs which does not charge a premium for the basic functionality of being able to use a VPN. If you want to shape the traffic that is fine, shape it. If you shape it and a VPN is THAT serious of a issue, we have the option to upgrade to a different account.

Shape the entire account and my entire Internet experience goes down the line. There are others that manages this much better, and I would rather have slow torrents, than not have no usable Internet at all. Paying you for a premium service JUST to have a VPN (and hopefully a working Internet connection), vs. paying someone else (the same or even slightly more) for having a working VPN *and* a working Internet connection... Well yes.

 

[Crystal Web]

@CW guess what? Here we go again. I don't kwnow if it is my freaking line or bloody something telscum did but my high-low-mid-high-low-high-mid-low-high latency to local BF3 & 4 servers are now back again. 10 bloody days after "they" said there is nothing wrong

Standard tests as before or what am I telling tel-bloody-scum to do what now?

I know this is not the support line, but not keen on doing more pingpaths until 1am over the next few days as the issue is 10000000000% the same as last time.

Without actually looking into what you're experiencing it's simply not possible for me to tell you the best course of action. I'm afraid that is what the support desk are there for, and they will ask you to run some tests again.

I just had a look at your previous tickets and the previous issue we confirmed existed on both our accounts and other ISP accounts, and your exchange responses were incredibly slow. If you're seeing the same things again then it may in fact result in us coming to the same conclusion again.

Telkom have a very different interpretation and definition of exchange congestion to what we as the general market would. Just because you're dropping packets and having unstable latencies at your exchange, doesn't mean that they will classify it as exchange congestion, as they define it by maximum contention instead. So they'll often run all of the tests under the sun and tell you that there are no line faults, when in fact the issue is not the line, or run a test on the exchange and conclude that by their standards all is fine.

Then we're left fielding angry calls from people who tell us that Telkom say all is fine, yet, as in your case, you're having triple-digit exchange response times, which is in all likelihood what we're going to find again considering it wasn't addressed the last time on their side.

 

[Crystal Web]

This isn't about me, it's about the (wrong) road your walking on. The outcry on this thread in the last hour or so speaks clearly of it.




There's reasons why the application must remain running... RSS feeds for example? And now you're not only dictating to us when we must download, but you're dictating to us what applications we're allowed to have running on our own personal computers?




So I have a permanently connected VPN, mainly routing data being sent through it, and the odd email between MTA's here and there - which I encapsulate in a VPN as I do not have a static IP. At MOST, MAYBE, 20kb/s worth of traffic.

Now I am permanently shaped < 100kb/s on my entire account, SSH is as laggy as hell - I can't even properly work remotely on a machine, and heaven forbid to even attempt to watch the odd youtube video here and there that I never even do...

The fact is (let's forget about what *I* do, and *my* specific requirements), you're expecting your customer to pay a premium to use something as simple as a VPN (for what ever reason). Whether there's actual traffic (usage) or not. The same goes for P2P.

If thats the road you guys want to go down... Fine - it's your choice. Just remember there are a VAST number of other ISPs which does not charge a premium for the basic functionality of being able to use a VPN. If you want to shape the traffic that is fine, shape it. If you shape it and a VPN is THAT serious of a issue, we have the option to upgrade to a different account.

Shape the entire account and my entire Internet experience goes down the line. There are others that manages this much better, and I would rather have slow torrents, than not have no usable Internet at all. Paying you for a premium service JUST to have a VPN (and hopefully a working Internet connection), vs. paying someone else (the same or even slightly more) for having a working VPN *and* a working Internet connection... Well yes.

You're not on the new account. You're on the same IP range, but on an old account issued prior to your unshaped account. It's not the new one, which is why when we spoke in private I asked if I could sort things out for you and you mentioned it wasn't necessary.

 

[snail112]

.............

OK, I'll start with the pingpaths on this account & my capped account to the same servers & bbc website as previously then we take it from there.

 

[savage]

You're not on the new account. You're on the same IP range, but on an old account issued prior to your unshaped account. It's not the new one, which is why when we spoke in private I asked if I could sort things out for you and you mentioned it wasn't necessary.

Again... This isn't about *ME*.

This is exactly what will happen to *anyone* when this "rate-limiting" is imposed. Just like I wasn't the only one assigned a 10.x.x.x IP when reaching the mythical "cap", everyone else will be hit by this one, by one, by one... The moment a torrent connection, nntp connection, vpn connection, etc is detected - everything dies and becomes virtually useless...

 

[Crystal Web]

Again... This isn't about *ME*.

This is exactly what will happen to *anyone* when this "rate-limiting" is imposed. Just like I wasn't the only one assigned a 10.x.x.x IP when reaching the mythical "cap", everyone else will be hit by this one, by one, by one... The moment a torrent connection, nntp connection, vpn connection, etc is detected - everything dies and becomes virtually useless...

I appreciate you advice here. This is not the only account we're releasing. VPN use by your general consumer is incredibly tiny, and we're not catering for it on the standard uncapped product intended for gaming, streaming, downloading, and browsing, and it will not be advertised as being intended for this use either. We're not beating around the bush on this one - the standard account is not designed for VPN use - we have other products coming along intended for these needs, however if a customer has a legitimate need for VPN on these accounts as some have already indicated (and we've answered them on the forum on this topic) and we can see on our side that it's for legitimate purposes, we can and will whitelist it and there shouldn't be issues. It requires contacting support though, as it's done on a case by case basis.

 

[patrick123]

/snip

So I have a permanently connected VPN, mainly routing data being sent through it, and the odd email between MTA's here and there - which I encapsulate in a VPN as I do not have a static IP. At MOST, MAYBE, 20kb/s worth of traffic.

/snip

I have a 24/7 VPN that RSYNC's every 2'nd hour. Even at 200MB per day that is a hell of a lot, and I guestimate it is waaaay less than that.

If VPN is used correctly, I cannot see any ISP thinking that you are using it for nefarious reasons.

 

[slasherjdc]

which is exactly how we see it

the particular concern you seem to have is for the person wanting to p2p during peak hours.

Not exactly. my concern is for the people who don't have the knowledge or means to stop anyone p2ping.
it's not a double edge sword it a single sided sword pointing at the holder. there is no added benefit but alot of danger.

Well not really. If all 3 of us in my household watches Netflix on 3 different devices it uses about 1900kbps out of lets say 3800kbps. So lets say you download a movie at 3800kbps over a hour, and my 3 devices streams Netflix, you would use twice the data per hour and have only one movie to show for it whereas I would have 4 series and a movie that finished. Streaming size and download size is not the same. Visit any illegal streaming site, install video downloadhelper add-on and see the difference in size.

And in this case if even one of those 3 users has ttorrent on their phone and leaves it running by accident with a dead torrent it could take you several hours to find out what the problem is :/

I can think of thousands of real life scenarios where this could hurt the average user. but I cannot think of a single case where it benefits them.

It's like adding an extra gear on an automatic car that automatically slows you down to 10kmph when you reach it because you don't want people "speeding" then simultaneously offer to remove it if they pay extra.

 

[savage]

If VPN is used correctly, I cannot see any ISP thinking that you are using it for nefarious reasons.

CW does. As soon as it's detected, you're shaped beyond anything resembling any form of useful Internet, or you have to request special permission to use it...

Frankly, why not just firewall everything, allow HTTP/HTTPs/Streaming/Gaming ports, and then open up anything else on a case by case basis as your customer request it... You can charge then a fee per additional port opened...

Anyways, let me go and work at a whopping 68kbit/s of Internet speeds... Oh wait I cant. The VPN can't connect due to shaping... *sigh*

 

[saa044]

CW does. As soon as it's detected, you're shaped beyond anything resembling any form of useful Internet, or you have to request special permission to use it...

Frankly, why not just firewall everything, allow HTTP/HTTPs/Streaming/Gaming ports, and then open up anything else on a case by case basis as your customer request it... You can charge then a fee per additional port opened...

Anyways, let me go and work at a whopping 68kbit/s of Internet speeds... Oh wait I cant. The VPN can't connect due to shaping... *sigh*

Quoting CW here "we spoke in private I asked if I could sort things out for you and you mentioned it wasn't necessary." Now he did mention there he wanted to sort things out for you, being able not to work at 68kbit/s. Not picking a fight, just pointing out that you were offered help.

 

[Zenbaas]

which is why by accommodating streaming you can accommodate more people (and potentially more accounts) - but in terms of what it does to demand it is still a bigger challenge
and is why ideally people should stream what they are watching now and schedule what they want to watch at some point to download later
-- of course the content rights holders are a bit of a spanner in the works (lets not say that they are just spanners)

How would that work if you only do streaming for the most part...?

 

[savage]

Quoting CW here "we spoke in private I asked if I could sort things out for you and you mentioned it wasn't necessary." Now he did mention there he wanted to sort things out for you, being able not to work at 68kbit/s. Not picking a fight, just pointing out that you were offered help.

I don't want *another* account... They send me enough spam already (usage emails) that they can't stop due to a "bug." I don't want *more* spam, I didn't ask to be spammed, and neither did I give them permission to spam me either.

Every single time there's a problem, here have a new account.... I'm sorry but this is turning into OpenWeb 2.0...

 

[patrick123]

CW does. As soon as it's detected, you're shaped beyond anything resembling any form of useful Internet, or you have to request special permission to use it...

Frankly, why not just firewall everything, allow HTTP/HTTPs/Streaming/Gaming ports, and then open up anything else on a case by case basis as your customer request it... You can charge then a fee per additional port opened...

Anyways, let me go and work at a whopping 68kbit/s of Internet speeds... Oh wait I cant. The VPN can't connect due to shaping... *sigh*

We must be living in parallel universes, I have had absolutely no form of shaping/throttling take place!. I don't consider myself a "special user/client" in any aspect, In fact I think I'm quite demanding, but all my needs have been met.

A quick speed test with my two son's gaming as well as my daughter online.

 

[Paul Hjul]

How would that work if you only do streaming for the most part...?

a lot of content that a person wants to watch is known in advance - a particular series etc ...
as I said it would be great if the content providers were properly on board
from your entertainment system you can spool up what you will be wanting to watch and it collects at off peak (downloads) and live streams what is live or is to be watched that has not pulled. A proper implementation would involve you having watched an episode (streamed) and it asking if you'll be watching the series if yes download at X point and when a new episode is available that hasn't been watched it downloads

 

[patrick123]

In fact savage, please show us the run-of-the-mill traceroutes, out of interest sake.