Re: Traffic Engineering

[Josh Beck <jbeck () connectnet com>]

> It's my analysis that the problem is that small (T-1 and below)
> customers should be buying their connectivity from (and there should
> _be_, for them to buy it from) a local exchange-type provider.  IE: buy
> a T-3 up hill to, oh, say, the top 6 or 10 backbones, and then sell
> transit to local ISPs and IAPs in your geographic area.
>
> This doesn't seem to be technically difficult, and it seems like it
> ought to be pretty easy to sell... sure, you're one hop further from
> the backbone... but you're now two hops away from _10_.
>
> Are there any major potholes in this theory that I'm missing?

        A big problem here is that ISPs differentiate themselves based on
who they buy bandwidth from. An ISP that has a T1 to CRL, say, benefits
greatly when a larger competitor gets a T1 to CRL as well, but the larger
competitor doesn't benefit if they already have multiple T1s and T3s to
the larger backbones themselves. A better idea is a miniature NAP for the
ISPs in each large metropolitan area for exchanging local traffic.

Josh Beck - CONNECTnet Network Operations Center - jbeck () connectnet com
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CONNECTnet INS, Inc.      Phone: (619)450-0254       Fax: (619)450-3216
6370 Lusk Blvd., Suite F-208                        San Diego, CA 92121
-----------------------------------------------------------------------