Re: Congestion control as a hot topic in IETF

On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 12:45 PM, Bob Braden <[email protected]> wrote:
> I hope that people of this E2E list are reading the current thread on the
> IETF list about choosing a
> new Transport Area director who is/is not an expert in congestion control.
> Some of you have
> been around long enough to recall the congestion collapse of the
> (NSF-sponsored) Internet, before
> Van J showed us how to not be stupid when he defined the basic TCP CC
> mechanism.  They/we
> invented the concept of "TCP Friendly" to try to head off a race to the
> bottom while providing
> an easy-to-understand criterion for acceptable CC.
>
> It seems like an interesting question for research to determine whether
> widespread adoption
> of some future transport protocol with an ill-advised or inadequate CC
> mechanism could still
> cause congestion collapse of  large areas of the Internet,or only local
> patches.  Or has
> that been researched and I missed it?
>
> Congestion control seems a bit like riding a unicycle -- even after you
> learn how to do it,
> you have to pay attention every moment or you are in danger of falling off.
>
> Bob Braden

Yup :-).  I was astounded at the "why is congestion control important"
question.  I'm holding back, not being an expert.  I hope he gets 30+
answers ... but so far it seems to have shut everyone up.

When I was for-profit I was told "nobody ever made money on the
control plane".  That could be the problem.

Scott