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Oversubscription is an ISP trick to make more money. People do pay for a certain bandwidth. They should be able to get it. Same thing with overbooking on airp

Oversubscription is an ISP trick to make more money. People do pay for a certain bandwidth. They should be able to get it. Same thing with overbooking on airplanes. You paid for a seat you should be able to use it. Your argument wouldn't work there either.

Hikikomori 2y ago
Its a cornerstone of building cost efficient networks. People pay for a certain sized pipe, what they pay also covers the rest of the ISPs networks and costs. With no oversubscription the ISP would need maybe 20-30x more infrastructure, do you think it would have an impact on what you pay? Not sure why I have to say this, but, networks are not airplanes.
- rockskon 2y ago
  Utter nonsense. Network tech hasvimproved by orders of magnitude over the past decade to let ISPs transmit more data than ever for cheaper than ever. Oversubscription is not the cost-restrictive mandate it once was.
  - Hikikomori 2y ago
    And last mile access didn't improve? Not oversubscribing is a cost multiplier at every level. 1 million 1 Gbit customers in a city is going to need 1000 100Gbit connections out of that city and the same for transit, and that will have no impact on pricing? And everything is on average used at 1% of capacity.
    - michaelt 2y ago
      If my ISP can only afford to supply me with 1TB of transfer at 1Gbit, that's fine. They can put it in the adverts, the contracts, and the pricing. For customers who want 10TB of transfer, they can offer a higher cost option. And if they choose to gamble, advertising and entering into contracts promising "unlimited data", which they think will be more profitable across their entire customer base? Then they've got to do supply what they promised in the adverts. They chose to gamble that way, and if they lose money gambling that's their business.
      - Hikikomori 2y ago
        You have that on mobile subscriptions usually, heavy users pay more and low usage users are not subsidizing them. I take you are fine with paying 10x or even more for your no oversubscription Internet connection then? Oversubscription is not gambling. The way it works after your last mile connection is that ISPs look at link usage in their network, city level distribution, city to city, transit, peering, etc, once it reaches 60-80% utilization at peak you start looking at adding more capacity. Bad ISPs (most US ISPs) will let this go too far though.
        michaelt 2y ago
        > Oversubscription is not gambling. Sure it is. If I promise 30 people they can have a burger at my barbecue, but I only buy 20 burgers, I'm gambling that 20 people or fewer will show up. It might be a reasonable gamble, based on past barbecues - but the guests left hungry will still be hungry, and I'll have broken my promise to them.
        Hikikomori 2y ago
        It might be if traffic had sudden jumps of like 30%, but it doesn't and there is headroom available. Traffic increases slowly over time and you have plenty of time to upgrade your network.
        kalenx 2y ago
        That's not the same thing. A more adequate comparison would be to say that you promised 30 people they can have a burger, but can only produce 5 burgers per minute. If everyone show up at exactly the same time, you won't be able to satisfy them all (they'll have to wait). But overall you can consider that the probability of such thing happening is small enough to take the "gamble".
- adriancr 2y ago
  I have a 10gbps fiber LAN. It was cheap to set up and have it running. I do not buy your argument. People buy a certain level of service, they should be able to enjoy it as in the rest of the world.
  - abduhl 2y ago
    And does your cheap and easy to set up 10gbps fiber LAN cross under the interstate 10 feet deep?
    - adriancr 2y ago
      The same fiber I have for 10gbps can be used for 400gbps... just by changing sfp modules. Same logic for interstate. You lay fiber once and scale equipment as needed. If you already have the fiber there then just use better modules.
      - abduhl 2y ago
        It appears that your ignorance on the topics of infrastructure and the advancement of technology over the past five decades makes having a useful conversation impossible. Not every cable in the ground was installed with today's state of the art technology. Enjoy your apparently unthrottleable internet connection.
        adriancr 2y ago
        throttling should be an exception, not the norm. If ISPs sell you a bandwidth per month they should deliver it. You're the one that's short changed if you accept the throttling.
      - BenjiWiebe 2y ago
        It's oversubscription all the way up, and it works. What doesn't work is when a greedy/lazy ISP tries to increase the oversubscription ratio too far.
  - Hikikomori 2y ago
- Neonlicht 2y ago
  The water company makes sure that everyone can flush their toilet during Superbowl half-time.
dataflow 2y ago
Overbooking and oversubscription are inherently very different. Flying is a one-time service with a specific and fixed point at which the service is provided. Its peak usage is the expected usage. Internet access is a continuous service promise where it's nonsensical to expect the provider to predict exactly when every customer would want to use it. The peak usage is not the expected usage. These are not comparable situations.
- adriancr 2y ago
  They are comparable for expectations. You pay for a certain level of service, you expect it delivered.
  - dataflow 2y ago
    First: No, they're not. That is an unreasonable expectation divorced from the reality. What exactly do you think would happen if everyone in town switched off and on their AC-powered devices at the same time? What do you think would happen if everyone in town moves to the same street and starts using their cell phone to stream 4K videos at the same time? Do you seriously think it's reasonable to expect every system to deliver at its peak with arbitrary demand and load on it? Second: If you're going to play the "I paid for this" game: this stuff is generally in the contract anyway. It is the level of service you paid for. The overbooking possibility? You paid for it, it was in your contract. Throttled service? That was in your contract too. You're getting what you paid for.
    - adriancr 2y ago
      > What exactly do you think would happen if everyone in town switched off and on their AC-powered devices at the same time? Large systems have their own rules. If everybody watches the superbowl at the same time I'd expect the power grid not to fail. If everybody gets home at around the same time from work and start powering on devices I'd expect power grid not to fail. If it suddently gets cold and people turn on heating around same time, I'd expect it not to fail. Those seem valid expectations and are met. Therefor when I say if everyone starts streaming netflix it should work, then this is also valid expectation and should be fine. > It is the level of service you paid for. The overbooking possibility? You paid for it, it was in your contract. I get what I pay for when I want. I have 1gbps, I can run full speed as much as I want and sometimes it's nice to do that. I am also in europe. I don't get throttled service and what you say is not in my contract. What do you say to that?

Hikikomori 2y ago

Its a cornerstone of building cost efficient networks. People pay for a certain sized pipe, what they pay also covers the rest of the ISPs networks and costs. With no oversubscription the ISP would need maybe 20-30x more infrastructure, do you think it would have an impact on what you pay? Not sure why I have to say this, but, networks are not airplanes.

rockskon 2y ago
Utter nonsense. Network tech hasvimproved by orders of magnitude over the past decade to let ISPs transmit more data than ever for cheaper than ever. Oversubscription is not the cost-restrictive mandate it once was.
- Hikikomori 2y ago
  And last mile access didn't improve? Not oversubscribing is a cost multiplier at every level. 1 million 1 Gbit customers in a city is going to need 1000 100Gbit connections out of that city and the same for transit, and that will have no impact on pricing? And everything is on average used at 1% of capacity.
  - michaelt 2y ago
    If my ISP can only afford to supply me with 1TB of transfer at 1Gbit, that's fine. They can put it in the adverts, the contracts, and the pricing. For customers who want 10TB of transfer, they can offer a higher cost option. And if they choose to gamble, advertising and entering into contracts promising "unlimited data", which they think will be more profitable across their entire customer base? Then they've got to do supply what they promised in the adverts. They chose to gamble that way, and if they lose money gambling that's their business.
    - Hikikomori 2y ago
      You have that on mobile subscriptions usually, heavy users pay more and low usage users are not subsidizing them. I take you are fine with paying 10x or even more for your no oversubscription Internet connection then? Oversubscription is not gambling. The way it works after your last mile connection is that ISPs look at link usage in their network, city level distribution, city to city, transit, peering, etc, once it reaches 60-80% utilization at peak you start looking at adding more capacity. Bad ISPs (most US ISPs) will let this go too far though.
      - michaelt 2y ago
        > Oversubscription is not gambling. Sure it is. If I promise 30 people they can have a burger at my barbecue, but I only buy 20 burgers, I'm gambling that 20 people or fewer will show up. It might be a reasonable gamble, based on past barbecues - but the guests left hungry will still be hungry, and I'll have broken my promise to them.
        Hikikomori 2y ago
        It might be if traffic had sudden jumps of like 30%, but it doesn't and there is headroom available. Traffic increases slowly over time and you have plenty of time to upgrade your network.
        kalenx 2y ago
        That's not the same thing. A more adequate comparison would be to say that you promised 30 people they can have a burger, but can only produce 5 burgers per minute. If everyone show up at exactly the same time, you won't be able to satisfy them all (they'll have to wait). But overall you can consider that the probability of such thing happening is small enough to take the "gamble".
adriancr 2y ago
I have a 10gbps fiber LAN. It was cheap to set up and have it running. I do not buy your argument. People buy a certain level of service, they should be able to enjoy it as in the rest of the world.
- abduhl 2y ago
  And does your cheap and easy to set up 10gbps fiber LAN cross under the interstate 10 feet deep?
  - adriancr 2y ago
    The same fiber I have for 10gbps can be used for 400gbps... just by changing sfp modules. Same logic for interstate. You lay fiber once and scale equipment as needed. If you already have the fiber there then just use better modules.
    - abduhl 2y ago
      It appears that your ignorance on the topics of infrastructure and the advancement of technology over the past five decades makes having a useful conversation impossible. Not every cable in the ground was installed with today's state of the art technology. Enjoy your apparently unthrottleable internet connection.
      - adriancr 2y ago
        throttling should be an exception, not the norm. If ISPs sell you a bandwidth per month they should deliver it. You're the one that's short changed if you accept the throttling.
    - BenjiWiebe 2y ago
      It's oversubscription all the way up, and it works. What doesn't work is when a greedy/lazy ISP tries to increase the oversubscription ratio too far.
- Hikikomori 2y ago
Neonlicht 2y ago
The water company makes sure that everyone can flush their toilet during Superbowl half-time.

dataflow 2y ago

Overbooking and oversubscription are inherently very different. Flying is a one-time service with a specific and fixed point at which the service is provided. Its peak usage is the expected usage. Internet access is a continuous service promise where it's nonsensical to expect the provider to predict exactly when every customer would want to use it. The peak usage is not the expected usage. These are not comparable situations.

adriancr 2y ago
They are comparable for expectations. You pay for a certain level of service, you expect it delivered.
- dataflow 2y ago
  First: No, they're not. That is an unreasonable expectation divorced from the reality. What exactly do you think would happen if everyone in town switched off and on their AC-powered devices at the same time? What do you think would happen if everyone in town moves to the same street and starts using their cell phone to stream 4K videos at the same time? Do you seriously think it's reasonable to expect every system to deliver at its peak with arbitrary demand and load on it? Second: If you're going to play the "I paid for this" game: this stuff is generally in the contract anyway. It is the level of service you paid for. The overbooking possibility? You paid for it, it was in your contract. Throttled service? That was in your contract too. You're getting what you paid for.
  - adriancr 2y ago
    > What exactly do you think would happen if everyone in town switched off and on their AC-powered devices at the same time? Large systems have their own rules. If everybody watches the superbowl at the same time I'd expect the power grid not to fail. If everybody gets home at around the same time from work and start powering on devices I'd expect power grid not to fail. If it suddently gets cold and people turn on heating around same time, I'd expect it not to fail. Those seem valid expectations and are met. Therefor when I say if everyone starts streaming netflix it should work, then this is also valid expectation and should be fine. > It is the level of service you paid for. The overbooking possibility? You paid for it, it was in your contract. I get what I pay for when I want. I have 1gbps, I can run full speed as much as I want and sometimes it's nice to do that. I am also in europe. I don't get throttled service and what you say is not in my contract. What do you say to that?