[ NNSquad ] Re: [IP] Re: a wise word from a long time network person -- Merccurynews report on Stanford hearing

[Edward Almasy <ealmasy@scout.wisc.edu>]

On Apr 22, 2008, at 4:30 PM, Brett Glass wrote:
> At 05:42 PM 4/21/2008, Tony Lauck wrote:
> > While many aspects of network performance have become engineering
> > issues, there are still others that are more properly research  
> > issues.
> > Because of the complexity of this area, in my opinion the FCC would  
> > be
> > ill advised to promulgate regulations that affect congestion  
> > management.
> > On the other hand, I would have no problem with the FTC enforcing
> > transparent customer agreements.
>
> On this, we agree.

Enforcing transparent customer agreements would certainly be a step in  
the right direction, but that's not all the FTC et al need to do.   
Unless there's true competition in the market, knowing an ISP is doing  
something I don't like makes no difference, since my only alternative  
may be going without Internet service -- a situation faced by far too  
many people in the US today.

I don't understand why we should accept the premise that an ISP can't  
survive unless they oversell their bandwidth, or the (seemingly  
implicit) premise that a free and open marketplace for Internet  
service is unattainable.  As with many other problems we currently  
face, the real stumbling blocks lie in the realms of economics and  
politics, not research or engineering.  If you separated out the  
installation and maintenance of the last mile and treated it as a  
matter of societal infrastructure, rather than a ball to be batted  
around between the cable and phone companies, the situation would  
abruptly become a lot more manageable.

I'm not saying that research and engineering don't play a crucial role  
-- we obviously wouldn't be conversing in this medium at all if it  
weren't for the work of many very smart people in those arenas -- but  
we're not going to solve anything by debating the legitimacy of P2P or  
the nature of RST packets.  It seems to me the primary focus here  
should be on providing the tools needed to enable others (including  
some of us operating in a different capacity) to engage in accurately  
informed debate and subsequently make informed decisions.  In this  
context, the rest of it is, pragmatically speaking, just hot air.

Ed