James Delahunty
23 Aug 2008 22:12
Verizon CTO Richard Lynch spoke about prioritizing Internet data packets at the Progress & Freedom Foundation's annual Aspen conference on tech policy. He was making his points public on behalf of the company following the FCC's recent order made to Comcast to turn over details on its "unreasonable network management practices" within 30 days.
Lynch said that Verizon's view is that network management is, and has always been, a requirement, even in the analog age. He explained that he believes time-sensitive packets should be prioritized over less-sensitive packets. For his example, he said VoIP data packets should be prioritized over P2P data packets.
Either way, he said that Verizon is always committed to delivering any data requested by customers. The question comes down to what packets would need to be delayed, but Lynch argues the 22ms delay would not be noticeable to most customers anyway. For Verizon, due to its fiber-to-the-home commitment, it doesn't suffer as much from congestion issues that badly affect other cable operators.
Lynch does not agree that all cable operators should have to guarantee delivering all packets without delay, and rejects the proposal that the companies should just keep investing money. He noted that Verizon invests $17 billion annually in its network infrastructure already, and aiming to develop a network that can deliver all data packets without delay at peak times is implausible considering traffic rises by 50% each year.
He continued that customers would be much more upset by the charges Verizon would have to impose on the end-user to keep developing that network. Lynch argued that the best way to avoid customer suspicion is transparency: full disclosure of network management practices.