Re: How to game the system (was Re: What does 95th %tile mean?)

[Sean Donelan <sean () donelan com>]

On Thu, 19 April 2001, Greg A. Woods wrote:
> This is the Internet -- it's not a circuit-based telephone connection
> network, and it's not ATM (though either may be used to transport IP, of
> course).  It's certainly not equivalent to a power distribution grid
> where excess demand starts to look like a short circuit and causes real
> damage.  The traffic on the Internet is little bunches of packets that
> can interleave between each other.  Real-world traffic flows on IP
> networks are incredibly variable and resilient, partly due to the heroic
> efforts of higher level protocols such as TCP.

True, there is some buffering in the Internet.  And it does make it
much more resilant to short term peaks.  But as any DDOS attack shows,
if you use near peak capacity for even a short term, other traffic is
rudely shoved aside.  Further, traffic does not return to its original
levels for a considerable period of time after each peak capacity
event.  If you set up conditions just right, not only will you not
receive "peak" payment from from the customer gaming the system, you
receive lower payments from all your "average" customers too.