[1775] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Commercial traffic
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Sean Donelan)
Fri Dec 20 03:28:15 1991
Date: Fri, 20 Dec 1991 2:25:28 CST
From: SEAN@SDG.DRA.COM (Sean Donelan)
To: com-priv@psi.com
X-Vmsmail-To: SMTP%"com-priv@psi.com"
Here's my basic problem about the privatization/commercialization plan. It
appears that the government ends up paying twice for the same thing. The
government pays to set up a national research network for researchers. If
both networks agree before hand the traffic is only for research or education
the network provider doesn't collect additional money. But if one network
doesn't agree, then all traffic to/from that network is charged additional
fees (including traffic that would have had no additional charge if there
was a prior R&E agreement).
So you end up with something like this
Government
| pays for research
v
Researcher
| pays network surcharge
v
"Commercial" Vendor
| pays for combits + other incremental costs
|
| Government pays for R&E network (i.e. "base" attachment & edu costs)
| |
v v
Network
The argument would be that the network was "over built" and those combit
and other charges are for the use of the network beyond what was paid for
by the government. The problem is the levying of the charges isn't tied to
what resources are used, but rather if there is a prior R&E agreement about
the use of the resources. For the R&E approved networks the government
pays for the network. If one network is non-R&E the government bill for the
network hasn't changed, but there is now an additional network surcharge to the
researcher (and the funding source) that wouldn't exist if it were a government
approved network. Consumption of government sponsored resources appears the
same in both cases (which is what I guess the combits are supposed to measure),
but for researcher using a non-R&E network the combit+charges plan seems to
end up costing the government more.
The government appears to be increasing its total cost using this plan.
--
Sean Donelan, Data Research Associates, Inc, St. Louis, MO
Domain: sean@sdg.dra.com, Voice: (Work) +1 314-432-1100
