What's slowing your connection?

[illusionofjoy]

We've all had those moments when, for seemingly no reason, our internet connection seems to slow down. It seems that Google is going to try and explain these network lapses:

Google and a group of partners have released a set of tools designed to help broadband customers and researchers measure performance of Internet connections.

The set of tools, at MeasurementLab.net, includes a network diagnostic tool, a network path diagnostic tool and a tool to measure whether the user's broadband provider is slowing BitTorrent peer-to-peer (P-to-P) traffic. Coming soon to the M-Lab applications is a tool to determine whether a broadband provider is giving some traffic a lower priority than other traffic, and a tool to determine whether a provider is degrading certain users or applications.

"Transparency is our goal," said Vint Cerf, chief Internet evangelist at Google and a co-developer of TCP/IP. "Our intent is to make more [information] visible for all who are interested in the way the network is functioning at all layers."

The tools will not only allow broadband customers to test their Internet connections, but also allow security and other researchers to work on ways to improve the Internet, Cerf said. Current Internet performance tools "are geeky to the extreme," he said during a Washington, D.C., forum on the M-Lab tools.

Comments

[agentorrange.livejournal.com]

One of the many reasons I supported Hilary Clinton in the Primaries was her stance supporting Net Neutrality. Google, man, I just kind of keep waiting for them to stop doing cool shit like this and get down to the business of cold heartedly ripping us off.