Re: RE: [REPForum] REPforum get-together

On Mon, Mar 03, 2003 at 04:48:34PM -0800, Hrybyk, Michael reportedly typed:
> > Seems like a regional exchange w/in 500 miles of one of a 
> > firmly-established national-level exchange has an uphill 
> > battle to prove its value to carriers. And the established 
> > one with much larger surrounding population to justify its location.
> > 
> > Where new exchanges have been successful in the proximity of
> > an incumbent is usually that they offer compelling value
> > over the incumbent. There are plenty of examples of this at 
> > the national level (MAEs vs neutral locations, ATM vs GigE, 
> > public vs private peering). 
> > 
> > What are the compelling benefits regional exchanges can 
> > offer to bring the kinds of providers and subscribers you 
> > want to your exchange?
> 
> MAEs were overwhelmingly provider-centric, but notably required by R&E community due to NSFnet breakup to prevent balkanization.

The MAE's were not provider-centric, they were exclusively for providers.
They were also not required by the R&E communities, nor did the NSFnet
"break up."

The NSFnet proposed the NAPs as a way to move the Internet to a model 
that could be commercial funded, allowing funding for the NSFnet to be 
discontinued.  Three companies won bids to provide NAPs, one for each
location.  Sprint, Pacbell, and Ameritech, in Pensauken, San Francisco,
and Chicago respectively.  Although MFS did not win a bid for a NAP,
the already existing MAE-East was listed as "recommended" for commercial
providers to connect to.

In May of 1995, when the transition took place, the company I worked
for was connected to Pacbell NAP, MAE-West, and MAE-East, and it proved
adequate to retain global connectivity.

> Regional (or micro or transit) exchanges are user-centric, and derive value from the benefit to mid-to-large orgs in a particular metro-area or region. Could eventually scale to residential, but that's getting ahead of things.

I don't know what you mean by a transit exchange, user-centric, or deriving
value from benefit.

The benefit to an end-user is (the potential) for lower latency, loss,
and jitter to a very small subset of the Internet, which may be important
for an end-users application.  An ISP may wish to lower latency and
improve total capacity to local content or eyeballs.  This is the only
benefit of connecting to a local exchange, and it is not a benefit
that exists until an exchange reaches critical mass, which creates a 
lovely chicken and egg scenario.

As far as these transit exchanges are concerned, larger providers simply
refer to these as LEC's.   The typical customer wouldn't understand
this exchange point connection type of deal, unless, perhaps, you are
talking about a univerity connecting to Internet II.

Dave

ps.  Hi guys!

-- 
Dave Siegel
HOME   520-877-2593   dave at siegelie dot com
WORK   520-877-2628   dsiegel at gblx dot net
                      Vice President, IP Engineering, Global Crossing