[tyw]

sure, all of that is possible. but honestly how likely is it that some or all of those things are the case on the direct path from netflix/youtube through the ISP in question to so many people's homes? and yet the problem spot is mysteriously avoided when using a VPN (not any particular VPN, but pretty much any of them, judging by most of the people who have spoken out about this problem recently). the problem so effectively avoided by changing the route from the optimal(ish) path to one that is almost guaranteed to be worse from a network flow standpoint.

sorry, I don't buy any apologizing for comcast/verizon failing to deliver HD video from netflix/youtube yet somehow able to do it under the same network conditions (same time) just this time through an encrypted VPN. if it was an isolated report... maybe. this is far too widespread to be anything but intentional.

[kev009]

Well, under-provisioned backhaul, peering, and/or transit would cause exactly this. And the blame trail could be quite complex. I'm not apologizing, but commentary by almost anyone other than the network architects and peering coordinators of these organizations are pretty baseless speculations.

Disclaimer: I work for a major CDN. Netflix is trying to ween off of us and our competitors, which has contributed to lesser experience. Their model of co-locating gear for free doesn't make much sense to ISPs in the grand scheme of things.