Comcast and Pando Networks Want to Create P2P Bill of Rights and Responsibilities

Comcast and Pando Networks have announced that they want to create a P2P Bill of Rights and Responsibilities. The announcement was greeted with skepticism by some net neutrality advocates.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Comcast Corporation and Pando Networks, Inc. announced today they will lead an industry-wide effort to create a "P2P Bill of Rights and Responsibilities" (BRR) for peer-to-peer (P2P) users and Internet Service Providers (ISPs). The two companies plan to collaborate and engage with industry experts, other ISPs and P2P companies, content providers and others to set a framework for the BRR that can serve as a best practice. The purpose would be to clarify what choices and controls consumers should have when using P2P applications as well as what processes and practices ISPs should use to manage P2P applications running on their networks. For example, P2P users should have the right to control their computers’ resources when using P2P applications.

In addition, Comcast and Pando plan to conduct a test of Pando Network Aware™ P2P technology on Comcast’s fiber-optic network. The purpose of the test will be to capture and analyze the data flow associated with downloading a file using Pando’s P2P application. These tests, along with tests Pando will conduct on a variety of other ISP networks, including cable, DSL, fiber and wireless, will measure things like performance, speed, distance and geography as well as the bandwidth consumption impact to the ISP. Comcast, Pando and the P4P Working Group plan to publish the results of these tests so other ISPs can benefit from understanding how P2P applications might be optimized for traveling over different types of networks in different environments and geographies.

Today’s announcement builds on Comcast’s March 27th announcement to collaborate with BitTorrent and the broader Internet and ISP community to more effectively address issues associated with rich media content and network capacity management. It also builds on Pando’s recent announcements of its P4P test results which demonstrated Pando’s ability to reduce network congestion and speed content delivery by routing P2P traffic more effectively across cable, DSL, and fiber broadband networks.

The Pando test will provide additional data to help Comcast migrate to a protocol-agnostic network management technique by the end of this year. The arrangement is yet another example of how these technical issues can be worked out through private business discussions and without the need for government intervention.