[997] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: some dumb questions from the gallery
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Martin Lee Schoffstall)
Mon Jul 15 14:39:21 1991
To: sob@tmc.edu (Stan Barber)
Cc: mcostel@kaman.com (Mark Costello), com-priv@psi.com, nren-discuss@psi.com
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 15 Jul 91 10:39:22 CDT."
Date: Mon, 15 Jul 91 11:58:12 -0400
From: "Martin Lee Schoffstall" <schoff@psi.com>
Sorry. Gigabit network research was funded by nsf/darpa through CNRI
before the NREN bill had a comittee vote in the current Congressional session.
That money and project was
divided between I believe 5or6 different groups. These include small numbers
of research pilot interconnections over long distances.
Additional funding of that CNRI lead project should be done, using
NREN funds - for research. Hopefully one of the research groups
will come up with an optimal NON-PROPRIETARY solution.
What is a matter of discussion and controversy is the funding of operational
internetworking for FY92-FY9?. What is of serious concern to many, is that
the majority of the funding going through providing universal access even
at 9.6-56kbps so that all the K-12, all the libraries, all of America
participates.
The alternative of sinking the money into access for 100
researchers at 10 institutions so that they can have OC-12 and higher
operationally, and even worse through proprietary solutions, has signficantly
less impact short through long term. That is why there is growing opposition
by many.
There are many questions right now even with the current "OC-1" really T3
NSFNet in terms of its operational reliability let alone its cost effectiveness.
Marty
PS: those 5 different groups ARE interested in gigabit networking, post the
research phase.
----------------------------------------------
The only problem I see with this arguement is that it does not necessarily
provide the infrastructure needed for gigabit networking research and deployme
nt.
The government (since the days of the ARPAnet) has provided this infrastruture
to promote not only network research but also network usage.
With the exception of ANS, none of the network providers I am aware of are
interested in providing gigabit networking because they believe there is no
market for it.
I am not saying that government funding is necessary for ANY networking. I
believe it is necessary for gigabit networking until there is a large
market for it and the technology to provide it is as cheap as that that
provides T1 today.
Right now the commercial providers are concentrating on T1 and below. There is
nothing wrong with that. In fact, if NREN was just to provide subsidies to
educational institutions for networking, providing the dollars directly to
the end-users for their selected provider would be a fine approach.
--
Stan internet: sob@bcm.tmc.edu Director, Networking
Olan uucp: rutgers!bcm!sob and Systems Support
Barber Opinions expressed are only mine. Baylor College of Medicine
