Virgin Media CEO Says Net Neutrality is “A Load of Bollocks”
Written by enigmax on April 13, 2008The new CEO of Virgin Media is putting his cards on the table early, branding net neutrality “a load of bollocks” and claiming he’s already doing deals to deliver some people’s content faster than others. If you aren’t prepared to cough up the extra cash, he says he’ll put you in the Internet “bus lane”.
Net neutrality really is the hot topic at the moment. Ignited by the Comcast fiasco, the concept of net neutrality has certainly been brought into the mainstream. Most ISPs are never quite forthcoming about their throttling, capping and otherwise interfering behavior, but that crowd certainly doesn’t include the CEO of Virgin Media, the UK’s second largest ISP.
In an interview with the Royal Television Society’s Television magazine, far from covering up their intentions, Virgin Media’s new incoming CEO Neil Berkett - who joined the Virgin Media Board just a few days ago - has launched an attack on the ideas and principles behind net neutrality.
“This net neutrality thing is a load of bollocks,” he said, adding that Virgin is already in the process of doing deals to speed up the traffic of certain media providers.
With around 3.5 million customers in the UK, and already traffic shaping due to lack of capacity, it’s a sobering thought that at the behest of “content providers” with deep pockets, Virgin is prepared to speed up their traffic, which would presumably have a negative impact on those at the bottom of the ISP’s priority list, namely bandwidth hungry file-sharers.
Berkett then turned on the BBC and their iPlayer service, telling them - and other public broadcasters like them - that if they don’t pay a premium to gain faster access to Virgin Media’s customers, their service would be put into “bus lanes”.
It just shows that some ISPs are happy to throttle just about anyone in the name of profit, it’s just that most aren’t as open about it as Mr Berkett.
via DigitalSpy
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These virgins need to get laid.
Virgin maybe well gay with the policies, but as long as you don’t use BitTorrent to download (which I don’t) then you are fine. I get 2.5MB/s currrently from them, which i might add is going up to 5MB/s at the end of this year. All that needs to happen for you to remain a happy Virign customer, is too use a bit more sense and a little more effort so as to avoid being throttled.
I seem to remember Virgin squeeling like a pig when Sky tried to get them to pay more for their services/programmes and now look at them.
Two faced greedy g1ts.
Scandalous remarks.
His comments are EVIDENCE for the need for net neutrality.
To prevent people putting PROFIT/GREED before quality.
I paid for my internet connection. That is meant to fund my traffic for the various sites I visit, not the content providers. Its a case of having your cake and eating it.
Virgins actions should be made illegal.
[quote comment="343255"]Who’s talking load of bollocks here?!?
Threatening the BBC into paying money to deliver what the customers pay you (and not the BBC!) for to get?!?
What about customers who want the BBC stuff leaving our Virgin virgin if he can’t behave?!?
[/quote]
Actually, I think you are cos I don’t understand a word of that.
iv been with virgin media for nearly a year … there a joke! … i canceled my direct debit months ago by phone and letter as they cant be trusted with bank details … and so iv been phoneing up and paying with my card over the phone, then they kept my card details without my permission and used them the following month, also 3 days before i usually get my bill and without giving me any kind of notice before hand …. i got a £30 bank fine which as it was virgins fault its my opinion they should pay it, after a hour on the phone argueeing with twats they said they would refund it if i sent my bank statment off, so i did, and a month later and iv had no reply, not to my letter or the countless emails iv sent.
There happy to take your money and steal extra for services you dont have but you wont get much in return
Virgin media = CRAP
[quote comment="343307"]Unforutnately, virgin is the only isp prepared to offer 50meg connections (soon). So im staying with them. I’ve had no downtime, live a long from my exchange yet get 19.7meg on a 20 meg contract and seem to get bittorrent speeds of 2.3mb/s. Virgin are great, and I doubt this “bus lane” thing will have much impact then :-)
As long as they don’t give in to the BPI I’m happy - although the net neutrality thing did shock me. Next we’ll have someone “owning” the internet.[/quote]
Obviously the net neutrality thing did _not_ shock you. At least not hard enough to make you renounce the fast connection. You don’t seem to be satisfied with the “bus lane” either. And you seem to be prepared to pay for the 50meg connection. And that’s the way it works. You accept shit in exchange for more of whatever you think you want. You push for “this net neutrality thing is a load of bollocks” as hard as the other guy is pushing it.
[quote comment="343350"][quote comment="343339"]If you’re in the UK check out this website for a list of all the decent ISPs.
Virgin Media are 2nd to last with a pathetic 3.3/10!
http://www.dslzoneuk.net/isp_ratings.php
I can personally say good things about zen.co.uk - clear monthly caps and no traffic shaping whatsoever.[/quote]
I think you’ll find it is 6.75/10, not 3.3, no one uses the adsl version any more.
Look, unlimited 20meg broadband, 50meg soon. The only cable isp in the uk. You can go wrong with virgin, and they do NOT shape traffic, unless you download over 3gb between 7pm-9pm, then you are resitricted to 5meg for 10 hours[/quote]
The limits are between 4 and 9PM, I don’t know where you got 7 and 9. Also, they don’t cut your line at 50%, I’m on 4mbit and when throttled technically I should be on 2. This is not the case, as I can barely load a web-page at all, let alone at 2mbit. Don’t trust everything you read on the Virgin site.
[quote comment="343203"]Those Assholes Talk like They Are Giving Us The Connection For Free.
I wish he gets Gang Raped.
PS : Just Asking , Is There Any ISP Which Give Proper ‘ Unlimited Connection ” ?
Unlimited In The Sense :
Dictionary:
unlimited
(ŭn-lĭm’ĭ-tĭd) pronunciation
adj.
1. Having no restrictions or controls: an unlimited travel ticket.
2. Having or seeming to have no boundaries; infinite: an unlimited horizon.
3. Without qualification or exception; absolute: unlimited self-confidence.
unlimitedly un·lim’it·ed·ly adv.
unlimitedness un·lim’it·ed·ness n.[/quote]
Verizon FiOS in the US. 20 MBit Fiber. I used 5 Terabytes in a month and not even a phone call!
at least he’s honest, gotta give him credit for that, opposed to the sneaky bastards at comcast. well he’s still a bastard but not so sneaky.
Just a thought but, we may want to question the validity of this story. In the past month TF has posted stories saying virgin is going to disconnect us, give us free usenet, has told the BPI to shove off and now that they think net neutrality is b***ocks and are going to throttle the BBCs iPlayer service.
I think someone is taking tiny stories about government greenpapers on a 3 strikes policy and ISPs being ‘concerend’ about iPlayer and making them into a sensationalised story with an easily critisized corporate giant as the bad guy. and who better? A big cable company, just like that evil torrent throttling Comcast.
Virgin isn’t Comcast just because they are both big cable companies doesn’t mean they operate in the same way!
Show me the original statement from the CEO and i’ll eat my words. But I’m guessing this whole story is manufactured to make people hate Virgin.
[quote comment="343545"][quote comment="343350"][quote comment="343339"]If you’re in the UK check out this website for a list of all the decent ISPs.
Virgin Media are 2nd to last with a pathetic 3.3/10!
http://www.dslzoneuk.net/isp_ratings.php
I can personally say good things about zen.co.uk - clear monthly caps and no traffic shaping whatsoever.[/quote]
I think you’ll find it is 6.75/10, not 3.3, no one uses the adsl version any more.
Look, unlimited 20meg broadband, 50meg soon. The only cable isp in the uk. You can go wrong with virgin, and they do NOT shape traffic, unless you download over 3gb between 7pm-9pm, then you are resitricted to 5meg for 10 hours[/quote]
The limits are between 4 and 9PM, I don’t know where you got 7 and 9. Also, they don’t cut your line at 50%, I’m on 4mbit and when throttled technically I should be on 2. This is not the case, as I can barely load a web-page at all, let alone at 2mbit. Don’t trust everything you read on the Virgin site.[/quote]
Although it oughtta be right by 9PM, I’ve been still being shaped well after 10:30PM…
what a dick.
Sounds like you in the UK are about to get shagged by a virgin.
[quote comment="343203"]Those Assholes Talk like They Are Giving Us The Connection For Free.
I wish he gets Gang Raped.
PS : Just Asking , Is There Any ISP Which Give Proper ‘ Unlimited Connection ” ?
Unlimited In The Sense :
Dictionary:
unlimited
(ŭn-lĭm’ĭ-tĭd) pronunciation
adj.
1. Having no restrictions or controls: an unlimited travel ticket.
2. Having or seeming to have no boundaries; infinite: an unlimited horizon.
3. Without qualification or exception; absolute: unlimited self-confidence.
unlimitedly un·lim’it·ed·ly adv.
unlimitedness un·lim’it·ed·ness n.[/quote]
You are like the 3rd person on torrent freak to wish rape upon someone. Hey - we all hate dicks like Burkett, but why so eager to rape? Wouldnt it be enough to just kill the guy?
Every ISP in the UK is demanding money from the BBC for bandwidth consumed by the bbc’s iplayer. It would seem the iplayer is more of a drain on resources than even bittorrent!. So surely the BBC needs to adapt its technology as much as the ISP’s need to upgrade their equipment.
Virgin is just a brandname bought by NTL. And Virgin promised you unlimited downloads not an unlimited connection. Read your ToS.
“I wish he gets Gang Raped”
I second that with
“You butt-hole will now have more bandwidth”
Here is his email address:
neil.berkett@virginmedia.com
[quote comment="343582"]Just a thought but, we may want to question the validity of this story.[/quote]
Every TorrentFreak news post is published with at least one source and usually multiple sources.
In respect of the post about Virgin Media disconnecting file-sharers from the internet, we referenced our source - The Telegraph. It turned out that The Telegraph were wrong, and they didn’t link to any sourceat all. However, we did a follow up article to explain the true situation. You can read that here:
http://torrentfreak.com/virgin-media-denies-doing-deal-to-disconnect-pirates-080403/
If you have a problem with this post, you will also see that as usual, we provided a link to our source, in this case, DigitalSpy.
So if you think the new CEO didn’t call net neutrality a load of bollocks, then I suggest you take it up with them. And if you find out he didn’t, i’ll happily print a correction :)
good to see the head of GB’s largest isp has a well formed, professional opinion.
virgin media = load of bollocks
if you think he DID say that, then you should maybe do more research than seeing it on another website and posting it. (how about finding the original source?) If you consider yourself a serious journalist then it’s up to you to do your own fact checking.
All you have done is spread a rumour that you read elsewhere, it’s like a paper putting something a friend of a friend overheard in a pub on the front page.
TF is becoming renowned for posting rumours as fact. It’s just a shame is all. It used to be a good P2P blog.
Mr Berkett forgets that Virgin isn’t the only ISP in the world (or even in UK) which means he’s not in control and never will be. The story of Comcast seemingly taught him nothing.
I foresee another bankruptcy filled in a few years. ;-)
[quote comment="343745"]Here is his email address:
neil.berkett@virginmedia.com[/quote]
And whatever you do people don’t go adding it to random sites online as that could cause an unecessary amount of unwanted mail to be sent Berk’s way.
“When asked about the iPlayer’s P2P system (which you can’t switch off, meaning that once you download shows, they’re available for other iPlayer users to download from you), Highfield says that the ISPs have sold “unlimited” broadband to their customers without expecting us to actually use the service without limits. They have a dishonest pitch for their technology, and Highfield essentially says,
[b]“Well, that’s their problem.”[/b]
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/10/30/bbc-execs-strawman-d.html
Your right, it is betweeen 4 and nine, my fault. The throttling depends on the package you have.
For everything to do with virgin’s capping, see: http://techdigest.tv/2008/03/virgin_media_sp.html
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