Pioneer Internet Has a Monopoly & is Rationing Internet Access

Okay, it appears that Pioneer is passing to sprintlink.net which is then preceding to bounce between SEVEN sprintlink.net ips (I'm wondering if this is being passed on their wireless cellular network from tower to tower)...this results in the latency going from 38 ms to 99 ms (I can live with that). But then sprintlink passes to att.net and the latency jumps as high as 152 ms (right now - we haven't got to prime time yet!!!) while I rattle around SEVEN att.net ips. Then I finally get passed to the Blizzard server.

Okay - so it appears att is the common problem so far and I'm going to report back when the witching hour comes upon us. But for now I'll leave you with what I've found:

Let's start with this dude who lives between San Antonio and Austin. he states he has Primetime latency issues. His ISP is GVTC Communications. Here is his tracert (only as far as where it goes to hell):

1 13 ms 11 ms 12 ms 10.11.0.1

2 14 ms 11 ms 17 ms 208-117-3-209.block5.gvtc.com [208.117.3.209]

3 12 ms 12 ms 12 ms 208-117-3-198.block5.gvtc.com [208.117.3.198]

4 11 ms 10 ms 12 ms 208-117-2-5.block5.gvtc.com [208.117.2.5]

5 14 ms 15 ms 12 ms 208-117-2-18.block5.gvtc.com [208.117.2.18]

6 324 ms 333 ms 339 ms 12.116.42.213

7 391 ms 406 ms 383 ms tbr2.hs1tx.ip.att.net [12.123.134.46]


This next guy is on Pioneer - he posts he is getting primetime latency issues:

51 ms 50 ms 50 ms 65-255-64-1.dyn.hsi.pldi.net [65.255.64.1]

2 192 ms 243 ms 355 ms docgw-portchan10.pldi.net [64.250.192.1]

3 88 ms 86 ms 86 ms so-10-3.hsa1.Dallas1.Level3.net [209.246.148.185]

4 81 ms 94 ms 88 ms vlan52.csw2.Dallas1.Level3.net [4.68.122.62]

5 203 ms 318 ms 234 ms ae-23-79.car3.Dallas1.Level3.net [4.68.19.69]

6 79 ms 81 ms 81 ms level3-gw.dlstx.ip.att.net [192.205.34.137]

And finally - from a post entitled "ATT.net is screwing me over again"

7 ms 5 ms 18 ms 10.33.192.1
2 7 ms 6 ms 8 ms gig2-1.gvcyoh1-ybr2.columbus.rr.com [24.95.84.209]
3 7 ms 8 ms 7 ms srp8-1.clmboh1-rtr2.columbus.rr.com [65.25.129.62]
4 15 ms 16 ms 15 ms network-065-025-137-245.columbus.rr.com [65.25.137.245]
5 23 ms 20 ms 21 ms te-3-1.car1.Cincinnati1.Level3.net [4.78.216.9]
6 25 ms 30 ms 19 ms ae-5-5.ebr2.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.69.132.206]
7 22 ms 22 ms 22 ms ae-24-52.car4.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.68.101.40]
8 36 ms 34 ms 37 ms ggr2-p3110.cgcil.ip.att.net [192.205.33.185]
9 331 ms 332 ms 331 ms tbr2.cgcil.ip.att.net [12.123.6.26]


That one there looks like what I start seeing after prime-time hits...we'll see how it goes this evening.

[edit on 4-28-2008 by Valhall]

reply to post by Valhall


Kinda' sorta'......do they have SLAs that spell out any performance guarantees for local advertising? And again, one has to consider the leverage the satellite provider, and the program producers, have to demand a specific level of accessibility for it's programming?

Now you might actually have a conspiracy.

reply to post by Valhall


Keep in mind Valhall.....Internet based tracerts are on a distinct channel or frequency. Independent of frequencies carrying IPTV. That's how ISPs deliver different services on the same wire....running them on different frequencies.

Originally posted by MrPenny
reply to post by Valhall

 

Keep in mind Valhall.....Internet based tracerts are on a distinct channel or frequency. Independent of frequencies carrying IPTV. That's how ISPs deliver different services on the same wire....running them on different frequencies.

Don't talk to me that way. I have gone back to school but it's not for this stuff - do you want to talk about mitochondria? j/k

Please explain what you mean relative to tracert and IPTV. Am I not getting the full picture when I do a tracert? Is there something else I need to check?

reply to post by Valhall


The third one on your list appears to have roadrunner. That would explain why he/she gets high latency during peak hours (especially if he's in an urban area). TWC is notorious for not providing enough bandwidth in urban areas.

*Edit:

Have you tried posting on DSLreports.com about it? Often times the company will have a representative post on the forums so you can give them hell about how bad the service is, and you can share your pain with others who are suffering.

**Nevermind, doesn't look like DSLreports has a section for peakinternet or actionnet (not sure which one you use).

[edit on 28-4-2008 by Sublime620]

reply to post by OSSkyWatcher

(in canada bell owns all telephone lines, and rogers all cable lines, monopolies all the way)

Only in Ontario and Quebec, out west its Telus and Shaw and prairie provinces are govt owned plant. Most of Bell Canada has been sold off to income trust Bell Aliant and Bell Canada itself is going to be American owned once the deal is 100% complete. Yeah they do have banwidth limits. Bell is 30 - 40 GB but only for new activations, existing customers at the time of the change do not apply to this cap. Bell used to have monopoly over most of Canada and is now regulated by a govt agency, the CRTC which in my opinion is the biggest joke i have ever seen. The CRTC only allows companies to have a licence if they are of "special interest" or they are in the CRTS's pocket. For example the city where i live (population 200000) only has 2 radio stations (one of them owned by Rogers media) 6 new potential stations all recently applied for a license, the major competitors to rogers station were instantly turned down and the remainder that were considered to be in competition to the rogers station were turned down under the assumptiont hat they would cripple the stations business. Only 1 station got approved and it is a COUNTRY music station. This area i can assure you is NOT a pro country area. We have one rock station for a population of 200000. The CRTC decides however, the final ruling on who gets the license.

Originally posted by Sublime620


Have you tried posting on DSLreports.com about it? Often times the company will have a representative post on the forums so you can give them hell about how bad the service is, and you can share your pain with others who are suffering.

[edit on 28-4-2008 by Sublime620]

No, I haven't, but I had already found these reports of the same problem here:

www.dslreports.com...
www.dslreports.com...

www.dslreports.com...

This one is a gamer in my community voicing the same suspicions and he gets a response from a Pioneer employee:

www.dslreports.com...

reply to post by Valhall


You could always file a complaint with the BBB.

When I worked for a certain ISP (I won't name) they always took those reports seriously. They were strict about everything, and they never gave in to customers; but if a BBB report was filed they would give the bank away.

That might be the first step to getting the problem resolved.

i have the rogers thing in my hands will post a picture

"What you can do with 95 GB:"

and they have a list, which i dunno, weird, like basically they are to me anyways, trying to make the user think 95 gigs is huge, and you could never use them

will take some pics and post them brb

ok they are turning out horrible with my webcam but here are 2 of the pamphlet/letter i got

as of april 3rd 2008 (effective) the bandwidth limits for rogers are in place

the first one is rogers and them "Keeing track of your usage"



WHAT ROGERS WILL DO:
INFORM you with online notifications when you're approaching the 75% limit of your designated usage allowance, and again when you've reached 100%
CREDIT you any additional usage charged for the first 3 months to help you determine if you have the right service level for your needs
PROVIDE you with 24/7 customer care and support, plus answers to your questions

that's what the pic says

and the other




says

What can you do with 95GB:

You could send and receive 9,961,472 e-mails in a month.

OR

Your daughter could surf the Web and view 2,490,368 web pages in a month.

OR

Your husband could play games online for 3,240 hours per month.

(only 744 hours in 31 days though so...dunno how he'd manage that lol)

this is part of the letter they sent

"With households doing more online every day - from downloading music to streaming movies to joining online communities - it's important to have an Internet provider that evolves to meet your changing needs."

now is that a joke? because if they were evolving they'd lose the bandwidth limits so that people who do stream movies, and download wouldn't have to worry, 95 gigs is 20 dvd movies, you don't have to search too hard to find disc images that are straight dvd rips

the worst part is rogers says "OR Your family could download and watch 24 High Definition movies per month."

that's right, your family could, but a 14-18 year old HS kid with a dvd burner can do the same, then sell them to friends at school, they can also burn xbox360 games, they were burning ps2 games last time i was into ps2, lets not even go into how huge this kid would be selling adult movies at school they burn onto DVD, most popular kid in school i'd reckon

i mean they aren't really evolving with your internet needs at all, especially when they say "we realize the internet and what people do on the internet are changing, we are gonna change with you" no....you're not, your going to impose a bandwidth limit and free up the speeds you have been able to give since the day the internet over cable was invented but have been capping

BS by rogers and bell but they have monopolies so...in my years of dealing with bell i have talked to a few field tech guys, and you learn a lot about bell and their internet when you can have a bit of tech banter with them then you ask "so why can't i be put on the remote server to get my speeds up?" they say "you can just ask" sure enough you ask and there you are, getting the speeds you payed for, see bell used to say "Speeds of" then have a listed speed on their webpage or any pamphlets or anything else of theirs with internet service, when you called their tech people to ask why you weren't getting those speeds they would say "well it's speeds up to" and you could then refer them to www.bell.ca and direct them to the internet page where it clearly stated "Speeds of" and they'd have to change their tune then, but eventually they changed their webpage so now you can't really do much besides pay full price for 1/2 connection



[edit on 28-4-2008 by OSSkyWatcher]

reply to post by OSSkyWatcher


I AM a bell field tech guy and i can assure you that 90% of the customers dont actually attain the speeds they pay for. This is usually because of the capacitance on the lines which also happens with coaxial but also because of the equipment that is connected in the residence, its funny but Bell Express Vu recievers, when plugged into a phone line, ramp up the capacitance on the line and disrupt 80% of the data stream of the DSL. The same thing also happens when you plug in cordless phones without the filter. Most new DSL installs even though they are self installed, require a tech visit because there are too many factors involved that disrupt the service. It is a good service when properly installed but we usually have trouble in older neighborhoods with older lines. Most of the time the lines have to be re-conditioned in order to provide the correct speed. In some areas i have to go as far as to drop the customers speed profile and then recommend to them that they pay for a slower speed sinply because they area they live cannot support the higher speeds.

The cable companies do have these issues as well though. As far as the speed profiles are concerned, the biggest scam going is the tech support. Assume there is a line issue casing 60 - 70% capacitance on the line and you are getting 3 MB on your downstream instead of 7 MB, the tech support guy will drop you speed profile down to a 1.5 MB interleaved profile in order to make the service more stable. This is to be used as a temporary measure untill a field tech comes out. Instead these tech support guys will close the ticket as complete and not issue fieldwork to the ticket. So your internet service will stop being intermittant, but, you will be at a reduced speed. Most customers never know the difference but the problem is that if there is a line issue, chances are it will get worse. I get so mad when i see people who have been on 1 MB interleaved profiles for as long as a YEAR.

[edit on 08/4/28 by metaldemon2000]

they have done that to me 3 times, "your connection is only this, we are dropping you to this" one time i made them keep me on the 3 meg profile to prove a point lol

maybe i can get some truth on this now, but can you limit their speed profile to w/e you want, like 1.7 is one of the profiles if i remember correctly, but can you enter 2.2 megs like put that into a text box and hit "Enter", or it is like a drop down box with 1.5,1.7, 2.5, 3.0 as profile speeds to choose from? like multiple choice, or can you enter what you want based on what the tests come back saying the speeds are?

they have told me a lot of crap over the years, but i'd like to know what options they do have when they do limit your profile when you aren't getting a full signal and they want to make it stable if you know or can ask someone who would know and would they ever try to limit users who are downloading a lot compared to the other users in the area?

I'm actually surprised this thread only hypothetically mentions Comcast and doesn't provide other timely and explicit accusations of wrongful bandwidth throttling... I've been reading about this very issue in a number of places for the past several months.

See, for example:

AT&T Accused of Blocking 'Net Traffic

FCC Chief Says Comcast Blocked Traffic Even During Slow Times

There are tons of stories on these guys....and others.

reply to post by OSSkyWatcher


Yes it is a drop down box where you can select different speeds. It is however based in line tests. I use a Colt 250+ for field tests but bell has systems build into their DMS systems that allow them to remotely test any line from virtually any console connected to their network. When a tech support guy is talking to you he will test the line and drop your speed down to whatever speed will make your line stable. DSL tests are based on a few factors:

- Line capacitance
- Background noise
- attenuation
- strength of upstream and downstream

At least I personally make sure all those variables are within acceptable ranges when i am troubleshooting.

When your profile is on interleave however it sends the data packets at a weird sort of rate that makes stuff liek downloading large files and playing online games difficult.

Their site used to contain the list of speed profiles aavailable but i cant seem to find it now. It ranges, however from the lowest speed to the highest and can be raised or dropped in incriments of 500k. I dont know which area you are in but where i am bell only offers 7 MB max. Some areas as much as 16 MB but even still they are offering lower speed than their competitors. One third party provider out here has equipment in our frames and is using a newer version of the DSL technology than bell is and is also running fiber from our frames to apartment buildings that bell is not allowed to even use.

You can always check your speeds at www.speedtest.net if you are unsure about your speed profile.

I was dc'd over 30 times in a 25-man raid last night and eventually asked to leave.

My son came over and did some traceroutes which I have screen capped. He also did some speedtest with the IPTV receiver completely turned off and it turned on. I lost on average 600 kbps with it on....up to a full meg on one test...and it was sporatic. Not only did it slow the ramp up, but it bounced. When the IPTV was off it went quickly to 3 Mbps and stuck.

Here is the customer support submission I am about to send:
***********************************
Entry in box titled - 'DESCRIPTION OF PROBLEM'

As I see it there are multiple problems:

1. A year ago this time I had good DSL internet service. There were 4 computers in this house at that time and all 4 could perform P2P activities without degradation - while the TV was on.

2. There are only 2 computers in this house now and only one attempting P2P activities and there is severe degradation, disconnects, excessive latency and dropped data packets.

3. You're lying to your customers - including me, my husband, my son and on public forums to other Pioneer customers who are trying to figure out WHY they now have severe degradation of DSL quality for P2P activities during "prime time". Your business decision to try to squeeze more money by using phone lines for IPTV has caused data transmission issues for your DSL internet users, who - contrary to your press releases did NOT request you screw their lives up (i.e. your repeated mantra "WE LISTEN TO OUR CUSTOMERS!")

4. For some odd reason I thought you were a cooperative and I was a member, but in trying to diagnose where the throttling is taking place - since you refuse to acknowledge any problem and assist in fixing it for me - I requested from you yesterday via live technical support chat the name of the upstream provider for which DSL is routing and was told that I could not have their name. - That's odd and not very public, now isn't it?

5. I have now replaced virtually my entire hardware package in this house. We have a new modem, a new router - I'm hardwired to the router - no wireless. I have a new video card. I have a new network card. TAG YOU'RE IT.

We need you to come clean and start assisting with the problem you have created. If the IPTV is turned off completely I get 3 Mbps DL and about 650 kbps UL. If the TV is turned on I drop as low as 2 Mbps, but on average down to 2.4 Mbps in DL but no change in UL...hmmm, that makes sense seeing as the only time there would be upload on the IPTV would be if I changed channels. Your IPTV is cutting into my DSL - but I didn't see my DSL bill go down. Just 8 miles down the road they get 8 Mbps cable service day-in and day-out. You made a horrid decision for your customers, but you are touting yourself as "cutting edge".

6. You have a pathetic data transmission route - 18 hops and 2 trips to Virginia through Sprint's erratic network. Why am I going to Reston, VA twice? And have you done a single thing about the poor QoS from Sprint? 240 ms!

Feel free to verify that through the trace route I provide here - and to make sure you understand this traceroute was done with my computer hardwired to the MODEM - bypassed the router even!:

removed link to trace route pic

and analysis

removed link to trace route analysis (IP info and all)

I was dc'd over 30 times in 2 hours during P2P activity last night. I eventually had to quit. You have cost me money in various ways as I have tried to ensure the problem does not exist within my own system, and you still refuse to acknowledge you are providing poor service - instead you are opting to lie to your customers.

So what appears to be the solution from my end seeing as you hold the monopoly in this area?

Well, you could attempt to get your upstream problems worked out - that would be "real cutting edge". You can give me or my husband a call - contact numbers are included - and you could get honest for a change. You can attempt to see if you can get it to where we can watch TV and also conduct P2P activity at the same time - like it was a year ago. OR - we can switch to Direct TV and drop the services we have to get from you to an absolute minimum until a better option becomes available and we drop you completely.

And I will lodge official complaints to the FCC and BBB, because you're being underhanded at this point. That's putting it mildly. It is not okay to decrease quality of service, charge the same amount of money, claim you still provide the same product, and then lie to your customers when they try to call you on that claim. I think that probably breaks multiple business rules.

I'm assuming if you have any desire to act as a customer-driven entity, either myself or my husband will be hearing from you soon. This has gone on way too long (we'll be at a year of continuously degrading DSL quality about mid-year). Something's got to give immediately.

[edit on 4-29-2008 by Valhall]

Val, I know exactly what you are going through as we here in my neck of the wood were held hostage by mediacom/bellsouth monopoly for years.

The pushing of Digital TV by cable became a problem as they had not lines to support their digital services and had to borrow them from the telephone lines or something like that.

I am not expert on the way this works, but this companies wants to sell something that they can not support and then force the viewers to pay the prices.

I was told that many of this cable companies when they became digital they didn't want to spend money rewiring and are using the same old cables for the service and is a compatibility issue and still giving consumers higher prices for services that are not delivered.

Or that is what I understood.

But here we had a big lobby fighting back the monopoly and they won, we are to have more cable and satellite companies services soon to compete.


[edit on 29-4-2008 by marg6043]

Originally posted by marg6043
Val, I know exactly what you are going through as we here in my neck of the wood were held hostage by mediacom/bellsouth monopoly for years.
But here we had a big lobby fighting back the monopoly and they won, we are to have more cable and satellite companies services soon to compete.
[edit on 29-4-2008 by marg6043]

Hi marge, I too know the absolute frustration Val and many others have with the fraudulent and yes felonious activities that circumvent the ideals of what we were all told by Presisdent Bush in 2004 about a 1st rate internet that would be second to none by 2007.

Line coding changes have made mine even worse than it was.

I think it is great you guys beat them in court and have written about victories like yours and the famous law suits won by ranchers at ruby ridge in addition to my own rants about this. You can hear Senator Ted Stevens in my website and get a good example as to why we have such a problem in this regard. Perhaps it might convince Mr. Penney a conspiracy is true especially when I have linked his biggest contributors to the speech and they are (wouldn't you know it) The Telecoms industry.

ultramedia.freehostia.com...

Warm Regards

- Con

Originally posted by loam
See, for example:

AT&T Accused of Blocking 'Net Traffic

FCC Chief Says Comcast Blocked Traffic Even During Slow Times

There are tons of stories on these guys....and others.

Exactly! That and many more, I wrote my web rant linked in the above post back when they were arguing back and forth about whether or not they needed to have laws in place for just such a problem.

We have all known what kind of corporate construct runs this country anymore and it is GREED plane and simple. Not the kind Gorden Gecko talks about in the movie with Michael Douglas giving his riveting speech about the virtues of same but the kind that does the least it can giving the worst it can give for the higest price it can legaly get away with.

While that legality part is often lax to enforce what laws have already been broken being under the toxic influence of this same kind of immorailty and Greed.

This may sound cagey to some of you but the late Actor Michael Landon used to talk about our country becoming this eaten up by this sick disgusting phenomnena called Greed and the almighty dollar to the point where it wouldn't be so mighty anymore and we'd pray the day the real almighty would fix it. That day has come as we see the fall in the dollar when that is the last thing we need right now.

Little House on the Prairie got scoffed at by many for its message about values being so "oppressive" and old fashioned.

Now I scoff at anything and everything this Government promises and Corporate America "Guarantees"

Michael Landon's view about America was a policy that NEVER needs to change with the trends of the day. It was simple and accurately portrayed as an effective construct for Business and Government, and one we don't see that often anymore, the one that goes

Honesty really is

the BEST

Policy

- Con

reply to post by Conspiriology


Yes, I was lucky enough to get Satellite in my area and made the change, they tested my house wiring and told me that it was old and the receiving was poor and none in some of my rooms.

They did the rewiring and I am receiving the best HDTV now compare to cable.

Still they are working on the internet now as the Satellite is not a good choice right now ( the satellite company told me to hold on for now on the internet) but Verizon is now getting hold also on the wireless internet and they are still working on it as they need to increase their receiving towers.

My son have the wireless service with ATT for his Ipod and is working great for him.

AT least we are getting more choices in the area and more are to move in.

Well, I submitted my review of Pioneer on the dslreports.com. I posted in reply to mover2k7's post. He is in the same town as me.

He immediately responded. Note that the CEO of Pioneer is the former Majority Leader of the State Legislature and also note that Pioneer has grown to it's level by buying up local cable companies and telephone companies. In our case, they bought out the local cable company and declared they would convert all cable over in 2 years - the 2 years was up last year...now we suffer.

www.dslreports.com...

I'm thinking of looking into some anti-trust issues.

Also, I have now been told that Pioneer has customers in Northern Texas. (I have not confirmed this.) This changes the complexion of stuff. IF Pioneer is shipping IPTV to Texas to service areas down there, then we have an issue with that stream going through a switch that is not Pioneer's. (att???)

reply to post by Valhall


How do you know you are not having line issues? During spring there is always a spike in distribution line troubles due to weather, and the settling of the ground. The further north you are, the bigger the problem. This is also when we experience a higher number of internet troubles. Also, phone companies are spending less money on line repair in the past few year, they are ALL doing this. Because of the lack of preventitive maintenance we are seeing huge areas affected by this. You have deregulated telephone service to thank. Its a known fact that all phone companies that were once monopolies spent tons of money in their infrastructure and hired premium techs. These days barely any money is spent on infrastructure and most telecom companies hire techs for as low as 10 dollars an hour.

Is your provider the same company that owns the lines? If so hound them to get your lines checked by their field technicians and when a tech comes tell them you want your line conditioned better for dsl service. If your provider does not own the lines, switching to another dsl provider will not solve anything since the service will be carried over the same line as you are on now.

other tips

- you could be experiencing inside wiring issues, check jacks for green corrosion on the pins

- make sure there are filters on ALL non internet using devices such as phones and call display units and make sure the filters are connected at the right polarity

- security systems disrupt dsl, ask your security company to filter it,

- too many phones and too many fax machines increase line capacitance and disrupt service.

- ask your dsl provider to install a pots splitter

- modem and router is also important, you dont HAVE to use your providers modem. AS long as you know how to manipulate the firmware you can use any modem. i use a 2 WIRE 2701HG-E which i find to be quite good.

There are MANY variables that degrade dsl service, sometimes it takes me half a day to create the right conditions on a line to create the perfect environment for dsl. On my own line personally i had to re wire my inside telephone network, remove cable bridge taps on the buried distribution network outside, install my modem at my main panel and run cat 5e to all consoles running off of my modem, and i now use only 1 portable phone with 3 remotes that run off the same base. I now get the full 7 MB that my company supplies as opposed to the 3 MB i was receiving initially and this is something that had to physically be solved.