Ed Brill

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1. 1  Vitor Pereira http://www.vitor-pereira.com | 10/19/2007 11:35:56 AM

   Isn't there a communications regulator that consumers can complain to?

1. 2  Keith Brooks http://lotus.tech.blogspot.com | 10/19/2007 11:49:16 AM

   While I do not experience it from a Domino/notes level, although it might explain some oddities, I definitely do experience it when uploading or sharing files.

   Fiber to the house would be nice.

   @1, the FCC?

1. 3  Jim Casale  | 10/19/2007 12:21:23 PM

   @1 The FCC but it doesn't appear they want to get invloved or do anything about it from what I can tell.

   @2 Just got business class FIOS. It is awesome :-)

1. 4  Mike Lazar  | 10/19/2007 12:30:02 PM

   I don't know if complaining to a regulating body would really do much. It's Comcast's network, and they have a very, very, opaque user agreement that you cannot avoid. They basically can do what they want to regulate the flow of traffic over their shared network. The only way to complain is to vote with your wallet. For me, it's not an option. Comcast is the only high speed provider in my area. Satellite is horrid, and I'm not sold on the fixed wireless platform. Once AT&T gets some repeaters or fiber running to the area, I'll be switching. Until then, I will live with it. However, I personally haven't had the issues with Comcast that others have. I just hate that they charge $60 for the same speed as DSL providers charge $30 or so.

1. 5  Craig Wiseman http://www.wiseman.la/cpw | 10/19/2007 12:31:21 PM

   Looks like if we wait a year or so the FCC might wake up a little.

   Laisez Faire <> Free Market

1. 6  George Paglia  | 10/19/2007 12:38:46 PM

   Ed, thanks much. We are having this same issue with all our sales guys using Comcast. I can tell you that using VPN appears to solve the problem. We have had no dropped replications or emails.

   Now, if someone could find a way to stop Notes clients from dropping our connections to our servers while idled (on the network or on the internet) .......

   Thanks,

   George

1. 7  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 10/19/2007 12:40:00 PM

   I wonder if Comcast subscribers could just escalate the fight. Start counter-attacking the RESETs some how. Do a DDoS on Comcast's own service.

   Oh, and I wonder how much of their bandwidth consumption problems aren't P2P, but are instead botnets.

1. 8  Bill Brown  | 10/19/2007 12:41:15 PM

   Ed wrote "so how do you log an issue?"

   The three word answer is "Class action lawsuit."

1. 9  Mika Heinonen http://www.siipi.com/mika | 10/19/2007 1:03:54 PM

   Just a few days ago I had again a problem with a ComCast user. He was trying to download a file from a Domino server, but his connection was interrupted each time before the file could be downloaded. It was a 70MB rar file. I had to install FireZilla FTP server, which supports continuing from the last interruption, and he had no problems after that downloading it. I suggest that all ComCast users use also FireZilla FTP server, it's free and you can bypass ComCasts illegal limits with it :) Would be of course nice if Notes 9 would also support continuing of interrupted downloads/uploads, but it can be done manually via FTP also.

1. 10  Gerco Wolfswinkel http://www.domino-weblog.nl | 10/19/2007 1:25:57 PM

   If you want Comcast's attention, just pay a local Comcast office a visit - and bring some appropriate tooling, like this old lady did :-)

   { Link }

1. 11  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/19/2007 2:04:01 PM

   @7 to escalate the fight, I could publish the names and e-mail addresses of the contacts I've been given within Comcast who are either responsible or at least connected to this issue. I would never advocate a flame war, but reasoned, rational e-mails from multiple customers would, I assume, get some attention.

   Let's give them the weekend to respond to the e-mails I've already sent (from my ibm.com address as "official" correspondence regarding our mutual customers).

1. 12  John Head http://www.johndavidhead.com | 10/19/2007 2:28:41 PM

   Have to love this site ... www.ComcastMustDie.com

1. 13  Vitor Pereira http://www.vitor-pereira.com | 10/19/2007 3:02:33 PM

   @4 Mike - I'm sure the opaque user agreement you mentioned does not allow them to lie to their customers.

   They are not just messing with the communications, they're also lying to their customers.

   There are laws that prevent them to "do what they want to regulate the flow of traffic".

   @3 Jim - I thought it was their job (FCC) to get involved when they get a complain. I guess they have to be pushed too.

   Anyway, I'm sure they will come to sense, I mean they're not stupid enough to have IBM recommending their clients to avoid Comcast.

1. 14  Erik Brooks  | 10/19/2007 3:05:54 PM

   Earlier this year I was noticing bandwidth problems with my Comcast cable modem at home caused by packet loss. I'm supposed to have 3.0mb down / 512k up, and was getting about 5%-10% packet loss.

   So I called support, and magically my aggregate bandwidth went up, back to the ~3.0 / 512 I was supposed to have. But I still had the same percentage of packet loss. I was simply sending more packets.

   Things got worse (20%-40% packet loss). I called support. A tech came out and couldn't find anything. He replaced the modem for the heck of it.

   That didn't help. So I called support again. They upped my bandwidth again, and voila - I was close to 3.0/512 again.

   But that level of packet loss obviously causes other major problems, so I called support again.

   Finally a tech came out that had a clue, replaced some lines, and my packet loss was gone...

   ...but they forgot to bring my bandwidth back down, so now I've got 12mb down and 1.5 mb up. Sweet.

   Gotta love Comcast.

1. 15  Vitor Pereira http://www.vitor-pereira.com | 10/19/2007 3:12:26 PM

   After reading Erik's post I have to take back some of what I said. They really are that stupid.

1. 16  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 10/19/2007 3:28:28 PM

   This has been posted as "Breaking News" on NowPublic: { Link }

1. 17  Dwight Wilbanks http://www.dwightwilbanks.org | 10/19/2007 3:31:44 PM

   I don't have any first-hand information, but, I read a post a while back on this topic from someone that is involved in city government. They stated the cable providers were required to provide a certain level of service per their agreement with the city, and that by filtering comcast was in breach of the agreement. People that are experiencing this might start there.

1. 18  Mike Robinson http://www.invcs.com | 10/19/2007 7:15:12 PM

   Some quick thinking product marketing manager at Verizon FIOS or some other high-speed provider could capitalize on this by offering "equal access for all packets" on their network...If I had comcast, I would switch to FIOS asap (if it were in my area)

1. 19  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 10/19/2007 9:26:53 PM

   @18 - Would that be the same Verizon FIOS that blocks Port 80 so you cannot run a web server?

1. 20  Jim Casale  | 10/20/2007 4:55:46 AM

   @13 Vitor Yes they are supposed to get involved but that doesn't mean they will. There are lots of things government is supposed to do and they don't.

   @19 Chris Fios blocks port 80 on consumer service, not their business class with static IP. They do block it on business class with dynamic IP. I am not a fan of Verizon (I think my picture is posted in the central office because of my complaints) but I have to say I think they got this right. I have business class with static and I have not seen any port blocking. Now if they will only open up their network to competitors like Covad. That would be awesome.

1. 21  spenser http://edgedirector.com/ | 10/20/2007 2:27:59 PM

   There are two questions that come to mind.

   First, is not the sending of promiscuous RST packets breaking a standard? In that case, the relevant standards body might have something to say.

   Second, is interfering with the communications channel not tantamount to a denial of service? And in this case, is there not American legislation covering this area? Illegal access to a computing device?

1. 22  Peter LaComb  | 10/20/2007 7:37:14 PM

   I'd be tempted to follow Nathan's (likely joking) suggestion of a DOS attack on Comcast if I were still a Comcast customer.

   While I agree that Comcast has a readily-available use-policy that allows them to do as they wish with their network, their customers are being taken in a bait-and-switch when comcast says "fast, unlimited internet". Comcast can and should find better ways to manage their bandwidth needs.

   Comcast cannot claim that this is their way of combating piracy - I'm not advocating piracy, but this is akin to Wal-Mart stocking, but refusing to let people buy, CD/DVD-R media because they will likely illegally duplicate something.

1. 23  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/21/2007 7:47:03 AM

   The EFF has picked up Kevin's report... { Link }

1. 24  Sean  | 10/21/2007 8:45:37 PM

   The FCC does have a policy statement, which you can find here.

   { Link }

   If Congress doesn't act we may see Net Neutrality action at the state level, most likely in the form of consumer protection legislation. The phone companies have been lobbying heavily for Net Neutrality legislation at all levels of Government, however they are spinning their own model to protect their networks against competition.

   Taxing the internet may also be a hot topic again in Congress since the Internet Access Tax Moratorium is set to expire on November 1st and the Taxman sure would like a piece of America's 213 million Internet users.

   If you can switch providers and send an email to their customer service dept as to why you left it will send a message loud and clear to Comcast.

1. 25  Barry McGovern  | 10/22/2007 6:14:08 AM

   I'm confused as to why IBM is being so quite on this? Other then Ed and Kevin's blogs, I can't find any reference to IBM on this issue. The news articles do not mention anything on problems with Lotus Notes. There are no interviews or references to IBM.

   I do not think the FCC is going to do much with Comcast if they only are shown to be limiting BitTorrent uploads. But if they hear it's affecting corporate email / Lotus Notes - well that is an entirely different discussion.

1. 26  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/22/2007 6:59:13 AM

   @25 I contacted two different senior managers at Comcast late last week -- one before the AP story broke and one afterwards. I guess I am hoping a little diplomacy will work versus taking the issue broadly to the media and market.

   Having said that, some of the blog postings worry me greatly. A comment on this blogger's site { Link } includes a form reply received by someone contacting Comcast tech support. Comcast's reply calls it a "web rumor", which is amazingly naive considering that the Associated Press story confirms the packet resets and other reports quite clearly show the behavior.

1. 27  JP Liggett  | 10/22/2007 7:27:03 AM

   "Comcast's reply calls it a "web rumor", which is amazingly naive "

   or the reply could be called a bald faced lie. I bet they turn off the resets without admitting to anything, in order to minimize the liability. If they were to admit it, it would cost comcast plenty.

1. 28  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 10/22/2007 8:45:39 AM

   Comcast hasn't been consistent in their handling of this issue. In some places they deny any traffic shaping, in others they admit that they throttle some users. The reports of people having their service terminated for "excessive use" -- but no definition of what that means -- are also fairly common.

   From the comments on Susan Crawford's blog: "Additionally, Comcast does not “throttle” bandwidth (limit throughput on

   the network)."

   And the evidence to the contrary: { Link } { Link } { Link }

   That last article is particularly interesting for the last few paragraphs:

   "On another issue, Banse defended Comcast's use of management technology, reported Friday by the Associated Press, to reduce the impact users of file-sharing networks, such as BitTorrent, eDonkey and Gnutella, have on overall traffic on the cable company's pipe. While these users make up a small percentage of Comcast's subscriber base, they account for a large majority of the traffic, Banse said.

   "There is the hyperbole and the reality of what we call excessive use," Banse said. While 99.9% of Comcast customers get access to the Internet without interference, the 0.1% that fit into the category of excessive use have to be managed."

   So on the one hand they openly admit it, on the other they deny it, and the customer is caught in the middle. If they were just open and honest about what they were doing people could decide whether it was acceptable or not. Being shady about it only makes people mad and introduces collateral damage with no way to recover from it without smearing their image even further.

1. 29  Kevin Mort  | 10/22/2007 9:44:56 AM

   Just posted on the update thread, but I'll cross post it here...Broadbandreports.com picked up the Lotus Notes impact today.

   { Link }

1. 30  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/22/2007 6:46:24 PM

   For those still reading this thread, it appears that the issues related to Notes/Domino over Comcast have been resolved. See the update posted today.

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