Sony just said they’re slowing their download speeds to preserve internet capacity for everyone. Is the internet a finite resource? Why can’t everyone just use the internet at once?
In: Technology
Internet providers oversubscribe. Suppose you have 1000 customers each with 100 megabit internet connections in some city/suburb/whatever. Logically that’s 100 gigabit of capcity and you should be able to provide that, but since users normally don’t max out their connections all the time you can easily get away with only having 1/10 that speed on the other end and only need 10 gigabits into the building where all those customers are connected from. Internet providers do this all the time. This is a huge cost savings and for decades it’s worked.
But things are different today than they were yesterday. Now those 1000 customers are at home ALL THE TIME, both parents and kids. The parents are trying to work and run video conferencing which is sensitive to internet hiccups. The kids are trying to watch Youtube and Netflix at 11 am. That’s actually very atypical. Now that 10 gigabit connection to the neighbourhood doesn’t cut it any more and everybody is suffering a little bit. And video conferencing suffering from internet problems turns into video and audio stutters pretty quickly which ruins the whole thing.
Upgrading is difficult when the ISP employees are also trying to protect themselves from COVID-19, getting the needed parts is difficult because manufacturing and trade is slowed, and of course it’s spending money that wasn’t planned and there could be trouble getting the cash needed.
So Youtube and Netflix are saying that users won’t (by default) get the highest video quality available. That probably takes a good 20% off the bandwidth they’re using, relieving some of the pressure on that 10 gigabit connection. And that is definitely appreciated by the ISPs if not by the users. Sounds like Sony is doing much the same thing.
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