[nycbug-talk] Cogent and Sprint - a signal of things getting Oldschool?

[Isaac Levy]

On Oct 31, 2008, at 10:07 PM, Alex Pilosov wrote:

> On Fri, 31 Oct 2008, Isaac Levy wrote:
>
>>>> My DSL (Speakeasy) gets quite slow for small periods of time since
>>>> yesterday.  OpenBSD 4.4 release today is coming down *slowly*.  My
>>>> home-office telecommute work day is sucking rocks. My neighbor
>>>> (Comcast Cable), reported less than 20k bandwidth for long  
>>>> periods of
>>>> time last night.
>>> Correlation does not imply causation.
>>
>> Er, it does imply, but your sentiment is correct if I modify-
>> correlation does not confirm causation.
> Correlation does not imply causation.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation
>
> I'm right, you are wrong, wikipedia says so.

*chortle* I stand corrected.

>
>
>>>> Admittedly unscientifically, from my endpoint --> traceroute to  
>>>> known
>>>> points in NYC, now go through mzima where they used to always go
>>>> through some level3 pipes- so I *believe* I'm not crazy to say the
>>>> Sprint/ Cogent de-peering affected my piddly DSL, (as it reportedly
>>>> seems to affect a lot more people).
>>> Yes, gamerz coming out from woodwork and "OMG IM PINGIN 10"
>> lol
> I missed mzima in the above sentence. That's where lulz is.

?

>
>
>> After years of (happily) paying ISP's, I see little change or
>> explanation from ISP's for why speeds/quality/reliability remains the
>> same.
> Disagree. People think that Interwebs is now a mission-critical  
> service,
> and demand 100% availability. They are getting close to it now.  
> Whereas, 5
> years ago, it was quite different and people were not really expecting
> 100%.
>
>> I see old networking gear, and a massive multi-billion dollar  
>> business
>> maintaining a status quo which I'm not happy about.
> Point fingers, please.

Oh- let me clarify one thing in my tone and meaning:
I'm DEFINATELY not pointing fingers at you, Alex.  I'm pointing them  
at the backbone telcos.

>
>
>> Examples:
>> ISP's getting into the CDN business: AT&T, XO, Internap, etc...
> Nothing wrong with that, it's where the money is. Means new builds  
> for CDN
> etc.

Sure- but what about their network customers who are CDN's?

>
>
>> Network Providers focused on ringtones: Telewest, Sprint, AT&T
> That's where the money is.

Great- but did it make my network connectivity any faster, or heck-  
did it make my mobile phone any more reliable?

>
>
>> Network Providers marry Media (Content) Businesses: AT&T, Quest,  
>> Verizon
> VZ doesn't have own content (AFAIK). Neither does Qwest. You probably
> meant to say "Time Warner" or "Comcast" (who owns both content and  
> pipes).

Sure-

>
>
>> None of this free market has opened up the market for various content
>> businesses to use the internet, however my point here is that none  
>> of it
>> has made our providers re-invest significantly in their own networks
>> either.
> What data do you have that providers don't "re-invest significantly in
> their own networks", I'm dying to know.

DSL available to me in 2002: 768/6.0, around $100/mo
DSL available to me in 2008: 768/6.0, around $100/mo

Gear deployed/used by DSL company: nothing upgraded, (even squeezing  
DSL through old lead pairs in my parts of Brooklyn).
Even with the newer DSL speeds (1.0/15.0), requiring a new card for  
the circut at the DSLAM, they won't deploy the new card until I pay  
for the service- I can't just 'switch over' and start paying more...  
(the monthly cost is nearly double anyhow).
In the last year, the card at the DSLAM burned out and was replaced,  
with an identical unit- not the newer stuff.
This is a personal story from 1 guy, (me), but can you tell me things  
are any different big picture?

-vs-

Rough Server specs in 2002:
1u server, 2gRAM (4 max), 4xSATA 250gb each, Hardware Raid5 PCI, dual  
Gig nics, dual Xeon 1.5ghz range
about $3200

Rough Server specs in 2008:
1u server, 4gRAM (32 max), 4xSATA 1000gb each, Onboard Raid5, Dual Gig  
nics which do altQ, dual Xeon Quad-Core procs 3.0ghz range
about $3000

--
The point here is that from my vantage point, computing machinery  
available in the market is advancing- and internet connectivity is not  
keeping pace.

I want this to change, and before that can happen, I feel it's  
important to explore *why* it's not changing.

>
>
> As far as free market for content - I don't think there's been a  
> better
> time. See all pr0n companies, none of them have any problems  
> delivering
> their content to end user.

There's more to the net than pr0n, but from the numbers, not much I  
guess.

>
>
>> I was thinking Sprint may have been going around rattling cages to  
>> cut
>> costs and make their next quarters numbers...  Not a conspiracy,  
>> but as
>> the market is down...
> Doubt anyone in Sprint corporate even *knows* about sprint internet
> transit. It is such a tiny portion of their revenue, I doubt they  
> finance
> people care.

Gotcha.

>
>
>> My point here, is that upgrading the networks seems to be happening  
>> in
>> big waves- instead of a more cumulative or calculated manner- and
>> therefore has pains.
> Explain what you mean by waves of upgrade, and how are they  
> different from
> cumulative or calculated.

Big waves of upgrade: Re-Wire all of NYC with FIOS and light it all at  
once (big expendature all at once)

Cumulative upgrades: An example: At an old job of mine, if a  
production server was taken offline, it was policy to drop more RAM  
into the box when it was out of the rack- regardless of need.  RAM was  
always cheaper/better/etc... and the cost of taking a production box  
offline was high.  This can be applied to *many* small aspects of a  
tech business, but the cost is the organization and management  
overhead of paying attention to detail.
I am willing to see this cost of managing small details, and strategic  
planning, may not scale easily.


>
>
>> When I worked on the web-hosting ISP, we had a life-span for each  
>> server
>> accounted for in advance, and rough estimates on what the tech (and
>> service offerings) would be a couple of years down the road.  It  
>> worked
>> out peachy- servers, storage, etc... all could cumulatively grow and
>> change as technology advanced.
> There's no lifespan of networking gear. It stays in service until it  
> is
> unable to handle traffic passing through it. There's nothing wrong  
> with
> that. If traffic is not increasing and there are no additional feature
> requirements, it'll stay.

Gotcha.

>
>
>>>> I would argue that to continue to compete and grow internationally,
>>>> American businesses desperately need increased bandwidth all  
>>>> around-
>>>> especially at the datacenter.  I argue that carriers need to be
>>>> supported in, as well as held accountable for, planning upgrade
>>>> cycles.
>>> We all held them accountable, with our wallets. It's called 'free
>>> market'.
>>
>> I'm no economist, but didn't the raw free market, and Freedman-style
>> economics, just wholly collapse?
> I wouldn't quite put it like that just yet. We won't have whole  
> picture
> until a year from now, at least.

Understood- we'll all see with time.

>
>
>> But if a company has a network application which drives their  
>> business,
>> and the network sucks/fails, it's out of their hands, right?  It  
>> becomes
>> a surprise cost, and everyone down the chain is affected by the big
>> carriers decision making?
> Wrong. It means you didn't build *your* network right, didn't  
> multihome
> properly. If the network is *so* critical to your business, you owe  
> it to
> plan for your carrier's failures - just like you plan for your own
> equipment to fail.

I get your point from a carrier perspective-

I'm saying that on a smaller-scale than before, the functioning  
internet is critical to businesses.

How does a small office of 5 people, deal with loosing the internet  
for a day?  Or a building full of small offices?

>
>
>> I would argue that the US Govt. was far too immature with where  
>> networks
>> were going to even legislate, back then- and perhaps now?
> Sorta. Reed Hundt's FCC was actually fairly sensible and visionary.

Interesting- he's another name around the Obama campaign.

I see what you mean- it's not all been bad from the Fed- but the  
common problem is trucks-and-tubes blunders, as these issues become  
more mainstream.

>
>> What, no comment on "Separation of Content and Infrastructure"?
> I don't think there's a problem with it. If content merges with a  
> network,
> nothing's wrong. It's when you get into the monopoly (or duopoly)
> situation, problems happen.

Yes- but aren't we talking in general about a monopoly here?

>
>
>>>> Who has internet backbone?
>>> I dunno. But I can has cheezburger.
>>
>> Oh- I guess that means you think content and infrastructure are the
>> same.
> No, I mean that this thread has not enough lulz. So here's a picture  
> of a
> firewall:
> http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/funny-pictures-furwall-prevents-unauthorized-access.jpg

*sigh*/*chortle*

Rocket-
.ike