Comcast to cooperate in FCC Web traffic probe

While it has acknowledged using bandwidth management technology, company again says it does not block file-sharing services.

The story "Comcast to cooperate in FCC Web traffic probe" published January 9, 2008 at 9:22 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

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[WJeansonne]

You've got to be kidding.

Net neutraility isn't even a law, so why must Comcast follow it? Get real. The bandwith thieves (or IP thieves more precisely) that screw it up for the rest of us are the ones that should be brought before a tribunal and flogged, chained to stocks, pummeled with rotten fruit and vegetables or publicly humiliated.

wjeansonne replies with the same thing all the time

you're getting tiresome with your soapbox rant about everyone using p2p as thieves.<br /><br />I play online games constantly and that is how patches and updates are distributed and yes they can be upwards of 400 to 1 gig in size. So enough with your ill informed rants. And when comcast causes the swarm to slow to a crawl that ticks off a lot of people.<br /><br />With your analogy, you mind as well say if you go to an all you can eat buffet and someone has eaten the remainder of the shrimp, you feel its justified to walk up to that person and call him a thief.

[paulej]

Service was purchased

Putting aside the argument over net neutrality, customers are paying for bandwidth. There is absolutely no reason for service providers the size of Comcast to block traffic or otherwise try to "manage" the bandwidth as it has been stated here. Managing bandwidth ought to mean "monitoring the network usage and making enough bandwidth to meet customer needs." If customers want to use P2P software, download videos from YouTube, etc., that is their right, as they are paying for this service. To sell a service and then intervene to not allow the service to operate as it was advertised and sold is entirely dishonest and I would classify that as theft from the consumer.<br /><br />I really know nothing about Comcast's network practices and how they "manage" their networks, but any business should deliver goods purchased. Anything short of that breaks the law. It is well-known that network load might increase at times and one is not able to take advantage of all of the promised bandwidth always. However, network operators should monitor networks and identify when any network segment is "oversubscribed" and make necessary upgrades in order to meet service agreements.

[inachu]

Do not get comcast if you are a game player

I've had too many disconnects/lag.<br />My area has never been representative of any comcast TV commercial.<br /><br />LAG LAG LAG LAG.... Doesn't matter if it is streaming video or gaming or voip.

[Gayle Edwards]

Why I think Comcasts claims, and the FCCs-investigation, are bogus...

&gt;&gt; "Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin said on Tuesday that the agency will investigate claims by consumer groups that cable operator Comcast has blocked file-sharing services such as BitTorrent".<br /><br />&gt;&gt; "Comcast does not, has not, and will not block any Web sites or online applications, including peer-to-peer services," David Cohen, a Comcast executive vice president, said in a statement on Wednesday.<br /><br /><br />"Blocked"... is clearly the semantics, word-game, which is being played-up, here.<br /><br />Independent monitoring proved, that "Comcast" WAS, in actuality, injecting, fraudulent, "spoofed reset packets" (into the communications-streams of its users)... to intentionally -BREAK- such "peer-to-peer" connections (regardless of the actual contents of the file-transfers). However, Comcast still, fraudulently, refers to this as, merely, "...managing their network". Any objective analysis, however, would have to consider this sort of activity to, very clearly, be an act of arbitrarily "...blocking" of Internet-usage (and of specific-applications)... regardless of what Comcast chooses to call their unreasonable actions. <br /><br />In short... Comcast is LYING. Nor, is this the first time that Comcast has been caught flat-out lying in this matter.<br /><br />Unfortunately (for consumers and Internet-users), the "FCC" has already said, they have no problem with such, so-called, "...management". Furthermore, the (current) FCC-Administration has also made it abundantly-clear that they, oppose "Net-Neutrality" (in any concrete form). And, that they [the FCC] feel that big-business interests should, pretty-much, be allowed to do virtually anything that they desire. So, this "probe" is, rather sadly-obviously, little more than a public-relations sham... which, I suspect will, in the end, actually end-up green-lighting, exactly this type of activity, by ISPs.<br /><br />Most people, are not fooled by these childish word-games, and MOST people DO seem to oppose what the FCC has been allowing certain, large, corporate-interests to do... but, that has not deterred the current "FCC" from bending-over, backwards, to appease these special-interests (no matter what the cost to consumers).<br /><br />So, Id say, Comcasts action -IS- yet another demonstration of the clear need for "Net-Neutrality" legislation. And that, any FCC-duplicity in this scam, also demonstrates the need for serious-changes at the FCC.