sean@donelan.com (Sean Donelan) writes:
"Favor"? What, precisely, connotes "favor" in this regard? Sending more, or receiving more? And: why?
Which side of the debate do you want to take?
Neither. The argument had better not be about last mile costs, since those are actually comparable when you count them per bit-mile rather than per customer. Nor is it about last mile margins, since if someone is charging $19.95/mo for a service that costs $25.00/mo to provision, then expecting companies who are less stupid than that to go ahead and do some bizarre kind of "profit sharing" anyway is just insulting. I don't see a "favor" being granted here, either by the side who transmits more, or by the side who receives more. Both sides had better be charging what it costs them to provide the service, plus some kind of margin to keep the shareholders in the game. Failing to do this, even if for competitive reasons, does not create liability against those who manage to do it right. After all, in an actual "media", the content providers collect money from the networks who distributed their wares, and those networks then sell the eyeballs to the highest bidder. Fortunately, the internet isn't a "media".