RE: Time for a real Internet highway (?)

["David Schwartz" <davids () webmaster com>]

> I wonder what the author would have said if major medical facilities would
> have had casualties because of the Level3/Cogentco debacle. Say a surgeon
> speaking via VoIP to another doctor about some brain surgery and the
> patient flatlines. What about a daytrader about to click on a nice sized
> trade... Oops.

        I think that mission-critical Internet doesn't exist. I have no objection
to creating it, but I do have an objection to replacing the best-effort
Internet with a mission-critical one. There are legitimate reasons to want a
best-effort service at the lowest possible cost. Because there isn't a
mission-critical Internet yet, it is a serious mistake to put mission
critical services such as the ones you speak of on the Internet.

        DS