[116264] in North American Network Operators' Group
RE: XO - a Tier 1 or not?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Hiers, David)
Tue Jul 28 13:58:59 2009
From: "Hiers, David" <David_Hiers@adp.com>
To: NANOG list <nanog@nanog.org>
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 2009 12:56:52 -0500
In-Reply-To: <4DBD8CAE-C92A-4D0C-AF82-88F1AC0C0327@ianai.net>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
=20
If you limit your consideration to how things look at IP and AP/AR, then =
the Tier-N discussion is solvable.
If you care about actual physical facilities, all bets are off. Taking a=
tangent from the diversity concept:
http://www.atis.org/ndai/ATIS_NDAI_Final_Report_2006.pdf
<war-story>
I worked at a CLEC that purchased two SS7 links, one each from two Very B=
ig Carriers. Both wound up going through the same fiber bundle in one pa=
rticular market, on which both big guys leased bandwidth from A Minor Car=
rier. I've never seen a VP run as fast as when that backhoe hit us in Il=
linois; turns out they only *look* slow.
</war-story>
You never really know...
David Hiers
CCIE (R/S, V), CISSP
ADP Dealer Services
2525 SW 1st Ave.
Suite 300W
Portland, OR 97201
o: 503-205-4467
f: 503-402-3277=20
-----Original Message-----
From: Patrick W. Gilmore [mailto:patrick@ianai.net]=20
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 8:26 AM
To: NANOG list
Subject: Re: XO - a Tier 1 or not?
On Jul 28, 2009, at 11:18 AM, Pekka Savola wrote:
> On Tue, 28 Jul 2009, Charles Mills wrote:
>> Is XO Communications a Tier 1 ISP?
> ...
>> Any help here? Thanks as always.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tier_1_network
Having written a good portion of that page, in the interest of full discl=
osure, I would like to point out some of the comments made while I was ed=
iting (and re-editing) the page.
I do not _know_ XO has settlement agreements with Sprint & L3. Such cont=
racts are covered by NDA, so (supposedly) only certain people inside Spri=
nt, L3, and XO know whether XO is paying settlements.
That said, does it matter? Settlement-Based may actually have a slight b=
enefit over Settlement Free, as links which generate revenue may get upgr=
aded faster than links which do not.
Perhaps more importantly, does Transit Free matter? A network which has =
two diverse transit providers is orders of magnitude less likely to be af=
fected by bifurcation events than transit free networks.
Not to mention many non-transit free networks have better quality and ser=
vice, IMHO, than some transit free networks.
But hey, your money, your bits, so your decision. You want to buy =20
from XO because they are Transit Free, or not buy from them because they =
are not Tier One, so be it. What's that line about competitors and encou=
ragement... ? =3D)
--=20
TTFN,
patrick
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