[109715] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Telecom Collapse?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Michael Thomas)
Thu Dec 4 14:18:58 2008
Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:18:42 -0800
From: Michael Thomas <mike@mtcc.com>
To: Joe Abley <jabley@hopcount.ca>
In-Reply-To: <0DD2FBFA-E270-40B2-8454-913DD93672CB@hopcount.ca>
Cc: nanog@nanog.org
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
Joe Abley wrote:
> This is straying far from network operations, but I think 911 generally
> engenders an unnecessary degree of hysteria. As I suggested before, the
> marketing of this fear from certain quarters has apparently been quiet
> effective.
>
> The probability of any single individual needing to call 911 is already
> minute. The probably that all available cell and VoIP services also
> won't work precisely at the moment that a 911 call needs to be made is
> even smaller.
We haven't really had a major catastrophe where we've been totally
dependent on IP yet, AFIAK. Maybe all of the qos, call gapping and
the rest of the stuff the TDM networks do to deal with disasters
will be left in the dustbin of Moore's Law, but maybe they won't. One
thing is certain: we'll definitely find out one day, and it's not
likely to be from a position of having taken the precautions,
congratulating ourselves IMO.
Mike
