Re: a pricing model??

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

________________________________________
From: Karl Auerbach [karl () cavebear com]
Sent: Monday, June 16, 2008 3:51 PM
To: David Farber; "Gerry Faulhaber [gerry-faulhaber"@mchsi.com]
Cc: brett () lariat net
Subject: Re: [IP] a pricing model??

David Farber wrote:
> ________________________________________
> From: Gerry Faulhaber [gerry-faulhaber () mchsi com]
> Sent: Sunday, June 15, 2008 4:03 PM

> Whew!  Somebody finally got it right!  When all the costs are capacity costs
> (as in the Internet), then the economically most efficient pricing (in
> theory) is what Bohn calls "spot" pricing,

What seems to be missing from this discussion is the fact that not all
packets are equal.  Some, such as VoIP packets need to transit the net
with minimal delay and minimal variation in that delay that does occur
(VoIP can tolerate a degree of loss - human speech is very redundant and
   at the conversational level, we humans have a lot of error recovery
feedback mechanisms.)

I would expect to have the option to pay more for that kind of traffic.

I don't want providers, especially the good kind like Lariat, to operate
at a loss, else they'd disappear.

My feeling with all of this stuff is that any flat rate pricing for all
traffic at all times is going to lead to the net becoming tuned for
TCP-carried web pages larded with big graphics and You-Tube videos.
That will be bad for those interesting applications that require
low-latency/low-jitter paths for datagrams, such as VoIP or remote
operation of equipment (yes, I know that this latter thing may require
more than simple, unreliable datagrams.)

Shifting back to net neutrality - I tend to be in the camp that says
that different prices for different kinds of net packet carriage
services is OK, but that the choice must be given to the user and the
providers must not deal themselves an advantage over others.  (And in
that latter condition lies a mountain of wiggling issues.)

                --karl--








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