It’s just a matter of time

Can Your ISP Stop File Swapping?

Seems that Cisco is pushing some new technology to cable operators, including something that will help them identify different types of applications that users are running and how much bandwidth they are taking up. Now as a cable customer, I have to admit there are times when our connection speed just disappears and I suspect it’s because someone is using P2P and tying up all the local bandwidth. That’s not good. On the other hand, it’s going to be very easy for ISP’s to simply start blocking heavy P2P users, if not all of them. They avoid all the legal liability that may be involved in copyright infringement, and their non-P2P users get a consistently fast connection.

On the third hand, most non-techie users would have almost no reason to pay for more than dialup without the P2P right now. I assume they are hoping that legit audio-video availability will sell broadband, but that’s far from proven. (Heck most ISP’s pushed broadband based on the ability to download music, which was only available through P2P at the time..)

On the fourth hand, will content providers even move to the internet if broadband use starts to decline?

Look for a serious market shake-out over the next few years. Things are going to change in the broadband, content delivery, and in P2P over the next few years and what we have now will be old news. Something has to change, what we have now isn’t working, what the RIAA and MPAA want won’t work. What else is there?

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.