[9003] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Bad message address
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Karl Denninger)
Tue Dec 14 17:23:16 1993
From: karl@mcs.com (Karl Denninger)
To: sdw@meaddata.com (Stephen Williams)
Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 16:18:00 -0600 (CST)
Cc: karl@mcs.com, com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: <9312141412.AA03207@jungle.meaddata.com> from "Stephen Williams" at Dec 14, 93 09:12:31 am
> > > The members will route other <member's> generated traffic. The definition
> > > of such a member is a customer of the member, or the member itself. Back-door
> > > arrangements are not part of that.
>
> Are they specifically not part of that? If traffic is routed 'without
> discrimination', what precludes other arrangements? Is it implied
> that billing agents are prohibited? (In some arrangements, it
> wouldn't amount to much more than that.)
Nope. It doesn't preclude it, but it is also doesn't mandate it.
> I would really like to see a clear consensus. If I can't afford a T1,
> it's unlikely that I'm going to want to pay $10,000. I want small
> providers to be viable so they can grow into large ones.
You first have to find national providers who are willing to permit these
small kinds of arrangements. Months ago I was told a cold "NO" from Alternet
on exactly this request. This despite the fact that their contract has
NOTHING to say on a prohibition regarding resale.
PSI's basic position was about the same.
Both of these are about you competing with the folks selling you the pipe.
Sprint and ANS are the only two who I have found with a reasonable policy
on this.
> > Let me add to that from a copy of the actual agreement right here. The
> > agreement does specify <direct> customers in saying that the traffic shall
> > be routed without discrimination (or settlement). It says that you <can>
> > allow indirect connectivity, but not that you <must>. That puts the onus
> > on the network provider to decide.
> >
> > In point of fact that's an ugly clause. If you can prove that some number
> > of members colluded in going one way or the other, you might very well have
> > an anti-trust action unrelated to the CIX itself but still significantly
> > damning.
>
> IMHO, it's not in the spirit of internet, whatever that means, to not
> route. It's also potentially very damaging. From what little I know
> about telephony from the beginning of the century, I believe that many
> of the competing providers were forced out of business by the larger
> providers in each market siding with the gov. I believe this happened
> because they didn't voluntarily 'route' calls.
That's a function of the no settlement policy of the CIX. With that in
place, either you have the providers ponying up to the bar or the funding
model falls apart and dies.
--
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