Dear British Broadcasting Corporation,

I would like to understand the profile of bandwidth speed as measured on the iPlayer Diagnostics page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/diagnostics. For the avoidance of doubt, I am interested in the information referred to by Anthony Rose in his blog post: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2.... Specifically I am interested in the following information referenced in Anthony Rose's blog post of 20th April 2009:

i) "allowing us to analyse the bandwidth available from different ISPs by time of day, etc"

ii) "the next three tests measure the Flash RTMP streaming speed from each of three major content distribution networks (Akamai, Level3, Limelight), giving us excellent visibility into overall network throughput"

Please provide the following information relating to diagnostic tests performed between 1st January 2010 and 31st July 2010:

1) Total number of diagnostic tests recorded

2) Number of diagnostic tests per UK ISP

3) Average result (e.g. measured bandwidth) for each of the four tests

4) Average result (e.g. measured bandwidth) for each of the four tests broken down by UK ISP

5) Average result (e.g. measured bandwidth) for each of the four tests by hour of the day

6) Average result (e.g. measured bandwidth) for each of the four tests by hour of the day broken down by UK ISP

7) Key as to which of the three streaming tests correspond to which of the three major distribution networks

Yours faithfully,

Mr J Alexander

Dear British Broadcasting Corporation,

I would like to follow up on my previous FOI request sent on 18th August 2010 - reference number RFI20101123.

In your response to the previous request you stated: "The BBC is currently engaged in discussions as part of Ofcom's consultation on traffic management and consumer transparency and will publish the information following the conclusion of these discussions."

In addition the document "BBC response to Ofcom’s discussion document on traffic management and ‘net neutrality’" (http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binarie...) published in response to the Ofcom discussion document states:

"The BBC’s diagnostics capability allows us to closely monitor how ISPs manage BBC content on their networks and to individual. Specifically we are able to collect information about: time spent buffering (where the video is frozen while sufficient data is loaded to enable playback to continue); stream bit-rate where adaptive bitrate is in use; and connection rates where the iPlayer diagnostics have been used (www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/diagnostics). This information allows us to see where traffic management technology may be in use by ISPs. The BBC has concerns about the increasing potential incentives for discriminatory behaviour by network operators, which risks undermining the internet’s character, and ultimately resulting in consumer harm and citizen detriment. Traffic management also has the potential to become a substitute for investment to increase network capacity to accommodate increased demand."

and also:

"The BBC would welcome an opportunity to work with industry and network operators to develop accessible information tools to allow consumers to better understand the nature of their broadband service. The BBC has data which could be shared with industry and Ofcom in order to improve consumer understanding of their individual connections, and to offer comparable aggregated data with other networks."

The Ofcom consultation ended on 9th September 2010. I believe that it is now in the public-interest that the BBC should disclose the diagnostic data mentioned above to enable licence-fee payers to better understand the nature of their broadband service. As such I would like to repeat my previous request for information to cover the period from 1st January 2010 to 31st July 2011.

Alternatively if the BBC has imminent plans to publish this data, please provide details of the planned publication date and the format in which this data shall be made available.

Yours faithfully,

Mr J Alexander