Free Newsletter
VoIP and the FCC Comcast Ruling
It's OK to give VoIP traffic priority over other Internet traffic, says the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). But, how do you tell if it is VoIP traffic in the first place?
CircleID parses through the FCC order issued to Comcast, abet with some brightly colored commentary. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin says it would be OK for networks to prioritize VoIP traffic. But the FCC's own press release says network applications should be treated equally, rather than "discriminate" among applications.
A further mystery arises when it comes to figuring out what packets should get priority over others--assuming, of course, that you can do so. The FCC's press release quotes Professor David Reed of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as saying that deep packet inspection (DPI) is not "acceptable behavior." It does beg the question of what you need to do to figure out what's in a packet in the first place in order to give it priority.
For more:
- Read the CircleID piece parsing the FCC Comcast ruling
Related articles:
Comcast, Vonage reach traffic management understanding
FCC targets transparency for network management
More stories about VoIP Regulation; Acceptable Behavior Traffic Priority Comcast FCC DPI Federal Communications Commission
Comments
Posted by Charlie Stogner | August 4, 2008 - 7:21am
So, if VOIP is okay, what about IPTV?
Isn't part of the reason cable wants to limit usage to make it easier for them to have their VOD products compete with the growing number of free internet TV offerings?
We are leased access programmers using IPTV to deliver MPEG4 signals to cable headends where it is then converted to standard analog signals and becomes content on one of their channels.
One MSO, WEHCO, refuses to permit us to subscribe to their broadband service and instead suggests we use AT&T DSL. One Bright House site refuses to even accept IPTV signals at their headend, regardless of the service provider.
Posted by Chip C. | August 5, 2008 - 5:35pm
A real "catch-22"! Homework could help.
One of the FCC Commissioners last week (McDowell, I believe) indicated that Martin's attack on Comcast's "internet blocking" of P2P file sharing could really create some throughput issues. He essentially apologized to U.S. consumers [in advance] if outcome is negative using excuse that "no FCC commissioners are engineers"!
They certainly are consistent though!
SHARE
WITH:
Comments (2) | Post a comment