🚀 go-pugleaf

sinkwitz@ifi.unizh.ch (Rainer Sinkwitz) writes:
: 
: In article <1992Jul28.220927.4845@chsun.chuug.ch>, poole@chsun.chuug.ch (Simon Poole) writes:
: > 
: > One tendency is very visible: in the US the peering of networks 
: > is actively encouraged and practiced, in Europe a lot of forces 
: > are pushing exactly the opposite way (no amount of CEC money 
: > will compensate what European industry will loose due to this).
: > 
: > * if anybody is interested, I can expand a bit more on why this
: >   is so essential to the "Internet".
: > -- 
: I am interested. Does this apply to whole Europe or only to Switzerland ?

As a tendency it applies to Europe as a whole and to some of the
countries more than others. On the other hand there are examples
in Europe where you can see a very  positive situation with a
number of service providers competing at all levels of service
(these also tend to have the lowest telecommunication prices).

Particulary annoying are the fights going on at the European
level: IXI-PS vs. eBone93, OpUnit vs. ? and so on (at least
partialy financed with tax payers money).

One of the key reasons for the explosive growth of the "Internet"
is not that of protocols (users don't care about protocols),
it's a difference in culture to other networks (for example
public X.25).

Charging: if you look at the charging schemes of all major IP
	  networks. You will see charges that are

		- based on bandwidth and quality of service

		- volume or connect time (for dialup connections)

	  What you wont see is charges based on the "destination"
	  of your packets.

	  One of the positive effects of this, that there is no
	  real notion of "distance" for an "Internet" user and
	  since there are no cost consequences, usage is not
	  as restricted as you would expect. As a "Gedanken-
	  experiment": apply PTT X.25 charges to your IP usage.
	  How many people reading this would still have the same
	  access as they have now?

Connectivity: if one thing has been the goal of the Internet up to now,
	  it's been that connectivity is what everybody aims for. 
	  Nothing is as unpopular as saying "you are not allowed
	  to connect to XY". Interconnection between the various
	  service providers has been provided by either:

		- government funded backbone networks (NSFnet)

		- cooperativly funded interconnection points and
	          networks (CIX, eBone)

	  CIX is a very good example of this: pratically all members
	  of CIX are direct (and very fierce) competitors of each other, 
	  none the less all of them freely exchange traffic.

Funny enough one of the consequences of both of these aspects, is 
that it works out to be a lot cheaper for everybody involved (and
that naturally leads to more growth).


-- 
CHUUG/EUnet Switzerland				Simon Poole
Zweierstrasse 35	Tel: +41 1 291 45 80
CH-8004 Zuerich		Fax: +41 1 291 46 42	poole@eunet.ch