No company has been working harder to illustrate streaming performance on different ISP’s networks than Netflix, and they’ve collected years worth of data on which companies are actually living up to their “high speed” claims.
This month’s speed report from the video service is chock full of all kinds of inside baseball info on what the relationship is like between companies like Netflix and ISP’s like Verizon. Following a controversial deal in which Netflix agreed to pay Verizon for more stable streaming service, we’ve actually seen speeds on Verizon’s networks dip, with their FiOS service now slotting in behind two DSL carriers. What exactly is Netflix getting here for their “Fastlane” money?
Starting out as a test platform, Netflix started broadcasting “congestion” warnings, alerting customers that Verizon’s network was having difficulty streaming high quality video. This prompted a cease and desist from Verizon, and Netflix countered with this letter.
To ensure that these customers get the level of service they pay you for, it is your responsibility to make sure your network, including your interconnection points, have sufficient capacity to accommodate the data requests made by those customers. To try to shift the blame to us for performance issues arising from interconnection congestion is like blaming drivers on a bridge for traffic jams when you’re the one who decided to leave three lanes closed during rush hour.
It’s unclear if Netflix was also taking a comedic stab at some of the political scandals facing New Jersey Governor Chris Chistie with that last line…
Another company Netflix also paid for better service, Comcast is also down a spot in this month’s report. If ISP’s can’t honor their “Fastlane” agreements before the FCC’s Net Neutrality destroying rules go into effect, how are we to believe they will live up to those agreements following the activation of these new rules.
Companies like Google are also getting into the reporting and comparison game with their new speed reporting website, giving customers more real world data on how broadband providers stack up. Handy tools as consumers often only get word of what the fastest possible burst speed under the most ideal conditions might be from an ISP’s marketing team. “UP TO 50 megs!“, but little word on what a sustained data rate might be.
As for now, Netflix will be ending their “Congestion Warnings” pilot program on June 16, but they reserve the threat of rolling it out again if relations with ISP’s don’t improve. Netflix knows they’ve touched on a hot button issue here. All too often when a web service doesn’t work well, the service is blamed. If Netflix appears broken, customers might be more willing to use an ISP’s video on demand service instead. Shifting customer blame to the pipeline carrying the service is a tactical PR move which should redirect customer ire. At a time where cable companies and broadband providers are ranking all-time low consumer favor-ability scores, this is negative PR they don’t need…