Interesting People mailing list archives
a comment on Summary for Congress of proposed NN Act Proposal
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2006 13:16:47 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: Joe Touch <touch () ISI EDU> Date: June 21, 2006 12:04:04 PM EDT To: dave () farber netSubject: Re: [IP] more on Summary for Congress of proposed NN Act Proposal
David Farber wrote:
Begin forwarded message: From: Gerry Faulhaber <gerry-faulhaber () mchsi com> Date: June 21, 2006 10:07:41 AM EDT To: dave () farber net Cc: faulhaber () wharton upenn edu Subject: Re: [IP] Summary for Congress of proposed NN Act Proposal [for IP] Amazingly, I find myself in agreement with Dana Blankenhorn. Thisbusiness of restricting the use of Internet to only service that followsIETF/RFC protocols really is fairy dust. Does anyone think that customers really care about "IETF/RFC Inside"?
Dave, There are plenty of customers who care about this; they made their fortunes talking about "RFC compliance", even to the point of saying "we implement all RFCs" (and when asked, claimed even to support RFC 1149 - Internet over Avian Carriers). Most of those customers are IT staff, though. The general public has been using pseudoInternet service for many years, AOL having being the most prominent example. AOL is a useful example - at one point, all access was through their portal, through which they could track usage and add advertisements in the frame. Prodigy had a similar system in the late 1980s. Whether the general public cares about this or not is a good question. I'm not at all clear that the Government needs to legislate a definition of the Internet or what constitutes Internet service, especially given it's fuzzy (at best) definition in the Internet community (does it include NAT'd service? is it limited to only IETF standards-track protocols? etc.). We even came up with our own definition for a meeting two years ago (appended), though it's not clear that the capabilities noted there wouldn't be 'extra fee'. We already have ISPs 'breaking' those rules for most home customers, e.g., by providing only NAT'd addresses or by issuing real IP addresses with short leases so they can spin addresses. One reason is to support _their_ model of differential pricing - commercial vs. home - where commercial means 'runs a server' and home means 'runs a client'. That breaks when home users need to run server-based applications, e.g., VoIP, web servers, etc. One reaction to such limited access to 'server' capabilities is the development of peer-to-peer nets, where hosts elsewhere in the net are used to help home hosts connect to each other like a client-server would. Other systems make use of predictability in the way some NATs assign ports to enable such handshakes. I personally foresee attempts to block network service to edge users as similarly encouraging those (and other) overlay and tunneling technologies*. Given that existing ability, I'm not entirely sure that any particular legislative restrictions are necessary, as users could tunnel to a service provider that would sell them whatever access service they choose. I would hope that a free market would then resolve the issue, as it should, without the need for the government - who cannot even decide what "organic" means, to define what is or is not the Internet. Joe * Disclaimer: my experience may be biased since I've been working on overlays for 9 years, but we use our own technology to support demos requiring 'real' Internet service in places we find NAT'd service for years - www.isi.edu/tethernet ------- Bill of Internet Access Rights http://www.isi.edu/touch/internet-rights Joe Touch USC/ISI June 21, 2006 (this is an update of a set of rules originally presented at "Preventing the Internet Meltdown", Los Angeles CA 2004; the original is also presented at the URL above) Internet is an association of communicating parties. This necessarily results in a number of rights which are required for consenting parties to communicate. Consenting parties should be able to communicate in an unrestricted fashion, insofar as they do not impinge on the corresponding rights of other parties. The following is a list of specific rights to that end: 1. REAL IP: Users have the right to obtain a real IP address, routable from anywhere on the Internet. 2. REAL DNS (& REVERSE-DNS): Users have the right to obtain a valid reverse DNS name for that IP address, and the forward lookup of that name should match the same address. 3. RECEIVE ANY: Users have the right to receive any valid IP packet, using any valid transport protocol on any valid port (if applicable), up to the limits of your local resources and network connection. 4. SEND ANY: Users have the right to send any valid IP packet to any valid real IP address, using any transport protocol, on any valid port (if applicable), provided it uses an inconsequential amount of resourcesof the network and potential receiver until mutual consent is established.
5. ENFORCEMENT: Users have the right to know the ISP responsible for traffic from any valid IP address, sufficient to register a complaint regarding violations of any of these rules. -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as lists-ip () insecure org To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
Current thread:
- a comment on Summary for Congress of proposed NN Act Proposal David Farber (Jun 21)