Re: [nznog] Telecom's "peering" change of heart really isn't
[...] there are no common and widely accepted definitions of what peering and other related terms actually mean, where 'widely' encompasses the whole of industry.
We need to take off our techie hats and put on our lawyerie or accountant ones. How about this: Neutral Peering is peering at a Neutral Location. A Neutral Location is one where the entity providing the location does not provide connectivity to that location (or does so "at arms length" and competing equally with all other connectivity providers). A Neutral Location may be any physical size, provided that the location provider does not charge for traffic or bandwidth between participants within the location. In other words, Citylink metro qualifies as a location encompassing all of Wellington, because there is no charge within the "location". Telecom "peering" does not qualify beccause you can't backhaul your own cable and knock on their door saying "where do I plug in". Or if you could, you wouldn't get peering on an arms-length cost basis. -Martin
On Thu, 2007-03-29 at 12:51 +1200, Martin Kealey wrote:
[...] there are no common and widely accepted definitions of what peering and other related terms actually mean, where 'widely' encompasses the whole of industry.
We need to take off our techie hats and put on our lawyerie or accountant ones.
How about this:
Neutral Peering is peering at a Neutral Location.
A Neutral Location is one where the entity providing the location does not provide connectivity to that location (or does so "at arms length" and competing equally with all other connectivity providers).
That's a fairly thin argument given the distributed nature of some exchanges which is enabled by bandwidth.
A Neutral Location may be any physical size, provided that the location provider does not charge for traffic or bandwidth between participants within the location.
In other words, Citylink metro qualifies as a location encompassing all of Wellington, because there is no charge within the "location".
The Location is a building inside which the peering fabric resides. Anything more than that and we're talking about bandwidth. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise.
Telecom "peering" does not qualify because you can't backhaul your own cable and knock on their door saying "where do I plug in".
Where does it say that? It says "Marshall says providers would pay for circuits into Telecom's network" it doesn't say "Marshall says providers would pay for Telecom circuits into Telecom's network" --------- On Thu, 2007-03-29 at 11:14 +1000, Alastair Johnson wrote:
Okay, but if you're only interconnecting/exchanging at your local IX then suddenly this is not as useful as it sounded. Telecom's primary center of operations is indisputably Auckland. Does that mean that, e.g. Trademe, cannot reach TNZ across an IX?
Or do we come back to region-isation again?
The real issue is to get some consensus on how one defines regional/local. A sensible starting point is linking that decision to where the /32's within the networks that are peered are. Linking it to geography strictly is a great leap *backwards* towards LCA concepts in my view. Linking it to concentrations of competitive networks might be sensible. after all they tend to be where the people are. The thing to bear in mind that the bigger the metro is the more expensive it gets and the more it starts to look like national transit. "Yeah, my metro is 1000KM's long, and I'm going to charge you $160 per meg to connect with it" - sound familiar?
Are you going to pay for my long haul circuits to Palmy?
Is your primary centre of operations in Palmy? No? Why would you peer in Palmy, then?
Because you're regulating peering. If we must peer, then surely everyone needs to peer either everywhere (expensive), or at one IX (expensive for some).
Maybe, but this might be based on the presumption that there's only two paradigms. Peering, and International. That's clearly wrong. Just like the view that there's only National and International. That's equally wrong. The real deal is there's 3 zones. Local, National, and International. One day there might be regional as well. The point is that the price is vaguely linked to the cost of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question. Of course market forces will influence that based on the existence of competition. And competition is related to the relative ease of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question in the first place. What's really at stake here is the industry agreeing to accept that 3 high level grades of (more than 100 metres) transport (in terms of reach) is a valid concept. Maybe more if we can be sensible and it doesn't confuse the market. We used to have 3 grades. Then 2 entities decided there were 2 grades in 2004. Then some got confused that there was only 1 grade. Others got confused between local and national (or couldn't/wouldn't tell the difference). But we mostly understood that were there still 3 grades. Local. National. International. After all, 3 is the magic number. Ho ho. So we're back at the point where one of those entities recognises that again. Let's hope that we can all be sensible. 3-4 years is a while to wait, but I've seen worse.
Otherwise you're significantly reducing the benefit of it before you even start.
What happens if my POPs are islands and not connected to my backbone[s]? (think internap PNAPs) I'm only going to originate local prefixes anyway.
What if I don't want to haul Content Provider C's traffic from Palmy to my subscribers in Auckland because it's 50+Mbps?
Third option: regional based peering. My POP in PMR peers at the PNIX and only originates local prefixes.
And if providers wish to announce more than that, that's at their discretion.
These all sound like significant business and technical issues that would need to be addressed by regulation.
Unless your idea of regulation is to just focus on the big boys. Maybe that's fair, maybe that's not....
Good point. People! Try to think about living with the consequences after the war. That'll balance what you do today. Jamie
On Thu, March 29, 2007 14:51, jamie baddeley wrote:
On Thu, 2007-03-29 at 11:14 +1000, Alastair Johnson wrote:
Okay, but if you're only interconnecting/exchanging at your local IX then suddenly this is not as useful as it sounded. Telecom's primary center of operations is indisputably Auckland. Does that mean that, e.g. Trademe, cannot reach TNZ across an IX? Or do we come back to region-isation again?
The real issue is to get some consensus on how one defines regional/local. A sensible starting point is linking that decision to where the /32's within the networks that are peered are.
i'm not sure that i agree that tracking $large_number /32s is sensible (and i'm pretty sure you aren't talking about ipv6)
Linking it to geography strictly is a great leap *backwards* towards LCA concepts in my view.
this statement contradicts what you said about tracking /32s - a /32 is tied to a location, either statically or dynamically. i agree that LCA is a step in the wrong direction
Linking it to concentrations of competitive networks might be sensible. after all they tend to be where the people are.
The thing to bear in mind that the bigger the metro is the more expensive it gets and the more it starts to look like national transit.
metro != national no city/metro within new zealand is that large...not even the auckland sprawl. london, new york, etc. have much larger populations and much larger areas...but they still are just cities.
"Yeah, my metro is 1000KM's long, and I'm going to charge you $160 per meg to connect with it" - sound familiar?
regardless of how big a network is (or tries to be), is largely irrelevant. is that network worth $money to you? if it can be had via another path for $less_money then why bother?
Are you going to pay for my long haul circuits to Palmy?
Is your primary centre of operations in Palmy? No? Why would you peer in Palmy, then? Because you're regulating peering. If we must peer, then surely everyone needs to peer either everywhere (expensive), or at one IX (expensive for some).
Maybe, but this might be based on the presumption that there's only two paradigms. Peering, and International. That's clearly wrong. Just like the view that there's only National and International. That's equally wrong. The real deal is there's 3 zones. Local, National, and International. One day there might be regional as well.
what is local? this sounds a little like LCA again... france telecom defines "local peering" as: A local peering refers to interconnections contracted on a specific country with internet route from this country only. depending upon whom you ask, you will likely get different definitions for "local" and "regional"..."national" and "international" are probably the only terms that will yield a consistent definition
The point is that the price is vaguely linked to the cost of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question. Of course market forces will influence that based on the existence of competition. And competition is related to the relative ease of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question in the first place.
very very vaguely related. i haven't seen much 'cost + margin' pricing since coming to this country...
What's really at stake here is the industry agreeing to accept that 3 high level grades of (more than 100 metres) transport (in terms of reach) is a valid concept. Maybe more if we can be sensible and it doesn't confuse the market.
are you talking about "transport" (a layer 2 service) or "transit" (a layer 3 service)? how much does it really cost to haul one byte of data between any two points within new zealand? cost + margin if your network doesn't reach one (or both) of those end points, then you have two choices, pay someone else to reach them for you, or build your network to reach them.
We used to have 3 grades. Then 2 entities decided there were 2 grades in 2004. Then some got confused that there was only 1 grade. Others got confused between local and national (or couldn't/wouldn't tell the difference). But we mostly understood that were there still 3 grades. Local. National. International.
"local"? "national"? "international"? sounds like "3 grades" of phone charging... if you want to purchase 100mbps of ip transit in billings, montana it is probably going to cost you a bit more per-megabit than 100mbps in tampa, florida...but there is no differentiation in pricing made between a destination in kansas or a destination in south africa. chances are that even if the destination is on different provider in billings, montana, it will be hauled to chicago and back (~4100km round-trip) (longer than invercargill to auckland and back - roughly 3000km)
After all, 3 is the magic number. Ho ho. So we're back at the point where one of those entities recognises that again. Let's hope that we can all be sensible. 3-4 years is a while to wait, but I've seen worse.
i prefer the number 'i' - it seems much more magical than '3'...but that is just me
Otherwise you're significantly reducing the benefit of it before you even start.
define "benefit"? to whom? for which destinations? from which sources? for what costs?
What happens if my POPs are islands and not connected to my backbone[s]? (think internap PNAPs) I'm only going to originate local prefixes anyway.
each pnap was treated as a separate network: each had a unique ASN (sometimes several), and they tried to purchase transit from the same providers are each pnap, but it varied a bit. if you were an internap customer in more than one location with no internal backbone, you had to play tricks (as-override or similar) or announce inconsistent tables like internap did... the last time i was an internap customer, the transit was "cheap" and the quality was variable. ymmv fyi - internap has a backbone now, and i think most (maybe all) of the pnaps are tied together (or will be).
What if I don't want to haul Content Provider C's traffic from Palmy to my subscribers in Auckland because it's 50+Mbps? Third option: regional based peering. My POP in PMR peers at the PNIX and only originates local prefixes.
see above re "local" my rambling two-cents (pick a currency) /joshua -- A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools. - Douglas Adams -
On Thu, 2007-04-05 at 11:13 +1200, joshua sahala wrote:
On Thu, March 29, 2007 14:51, jamie baddeley wrote:
On Thu, 2007-03-29 at 11:14 +1000, Alastair Johnson wrote:
Okay, but if you're only interconnecting/exchanging at your local IX then suddenly this is not as useful as it sounded. Telecom's primary center of operations is indisputably Auckland. Does that mean that, e.g. Trademe, cannot reach TNZ across an IX? Or do we come back to region-isation again?
The real issue is to get some consensus on how one defines regional/local. A sensible starting point is linking that decision to where the /32's within the networks that are peered are.
i'm not sure that i agree that tracking $large_number /32s is sensible (and i'm pretty sure you aren't talking about ipv6)
Not necessarily talking about tracking /32's - more talking about an approach which recognises where the punters are rather than something that reflects architecture and therefore where the netblocks aggregate to. For example one ISP has a number of punters in Palmerston North which hub off a Chch RAN. If you're not cogniscient of where the punters are local peering could mean PN punters are announced in Chch instead of PN. Which makes a mockery of the idea.
Linking it to geography strictly is a great leap *backwards* towards LCA concepts in my view.
this statement contradicts what you said about tracking /32s - a /32 is tied to a location, either statically or dynamically.
i agree that LCA is a step in the wrong direction
Linking it to concentrations of competitive networks might be sensible. after all they tend to be where the people are.
The thing to bear in mind that the bigger the metro is the more expensive it gets and the more it starts to look like national transit.
metro != national
Yes. My tongue was in my cheek then.
no city/metro within new zealand is that large...not even the auckland sprawl. london, new york, etc. have much larger populations and much larger areas...but they still are just cities.
"Yeah, my metro is 1000KM's long, and I'm going to charge you $160 per meg to connect with it" - sound familiar?
regardless of how big a network is (or tries to be), is largely irrelevant. is that network worth $money to you? if it can be had via another path for $less_money then why bother?
The point of that comment is the lack of ability to distinguish between national and local/metro.
Are you going to pay for my long haul circuits to Palmy?
Is your primary centre of operations in Palmy? No? Why would you peer in Palmy, then? Because you're regulating peering. If we must peer, then surely everyone needs to peer either everywhere (expensive), or at one IX (expensive for some).
Maybe, but this might be based on the presumption that there's only two paradigms. Peering, and International. That's clearly wrong. Just like the view that there's only National and International. That's equally wrong. The real deal is there's 3 zones. Local, National, and International. One day there might be regional as well.
what is local? this sounds a little like LCA again...
france telecom defines "local peering" as:
A local peering refers to interconnections contracted on a specific country with internet route from this country only.
depending upon whom you ask, you will likely get different definitions for "local" and "regional"..."national" and "international" are probably the only terms that will yield a consistent definition
I'm asking NZNOG. France Telecom would say that in the context you describe which is international. Europe is bound to have quite a different perspective due to the landlocked nature of many of the countries. Unlike NZ.
The point is that the price is vaguely linked to the cost of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question. Of course market forces will influence that based on the existence of competition. And competition is related to the relative ease of providing the infrastructure to cover the area in question in the first place.
very very vaguely related. i haven't seen much 'cost + margin' pricing since coming to this country...
Correlating cost against market price assists you in the context of assessing price-gouging/monopoly behaviours.
What's really at stake here is the industry agreeing to accept that 3 high level grades of (more than 100 metres) transport (in terms of reach) is a valid concept. Maybe more if we can be sensible and it doesn't confuse the market.
are you talking about "transport" (a layer 2 service) or "transit" (a layer 3 service)?
Either. I am sure that parties will develop products that are characterised as one or the other.
how much does it really cost to haul one byte of data between any two points within new zealand? cost + margin
if your network doesn't reach one (or both) of those end points, then you have two choices, pay someone else to reach them for you, or build your network to reach them.
Sure.
We used to have 3 grades. Then 2 entities decided there were 2 grades in 2004. Then some got confused that there was only 1 grade. Others got confused between local and national (or couldn't/wouldn't tell the difference). But we mostly understood that were there still 3 grades. Local. National. International.
"local"? "national"? "international"?
sounds like "3 grades" of phone charging...
Well it's how it was here prior to 2004. And it seemed to work.
if you want to purchase 100mbps of ip transit in billings, montana it is probably going to cost you a bit more per-megabit than 100mbps in tampa, florida...but there is no differentiation in pricing made between a destination in kansas or a destination in south africa.
I suspect that's related to the retail side rather than the wholesale side.
chances are that even if the destination is on different provider in billings, montana, it will be hauled to chicago and back (~4100km round-trip) (longer than invercargill to auckland and back - roughly 3000km)
Personally I think it's more fruitful for us to work out what works for us rather than trying to compare to markets that have a significantly different dynamic and economic equation. The US is nationally significantly larger, and pays significantly less to reach the world.
What happens if my POPs are islands and not connected to my backbone[s]? (think internap PNAPs) I'm only going to originate local prefixes anyway.
each pnap was treated as a separate network: each had a unique ASN (sometimes several), and they tried to purchase transit from the same providers are each pnap, but it varied a bit. if you were an internap customer in more than one location with no internal backbone, you had to play tricks (as-override or similar) or announce inconsistent tables like internap did...
the last time i was an internap customer, the transit was "cheap" and the quality was variable. ymmv
fyi - internap has a backbone now, and i think most (maybe all) of the pnaps are tied together (or will be).
Sounds familiar. I'd suggest that that evolutionary path is one that is also tread here.
participants (3)
-
jamie baddeley -
joshua sahala -
Martin Kealey