How does one make not playing nice with each other scale? (Wa

Sun Jan 14 00:59:43 UTC 2001

> I'll point out that someone banning a site for AUP violations should only be
> able to affect their own network, since policies are supposed to be
> organization-level.  (Thus, inflicting your policy decision on someone else
> is a very gray area, legally and ethically.)

unless there's a bgp routing leak, in violation of both policy and intent,
there is no way to inflict your policy decision on someone against their will.
this is because all traffic in an AS is paid for by at least one party (the
sender, or the recipient, or the agent of one or the other) who has a contract
with the owner of the capital plant making up that AS.

in AS6461's case, every customer agreement ever signed includes a binding
reference to the AS6461 AUG.  any traffic blocked by the AS's owner by way
of enforcing that AUG is perfectly within that AS owner's rights.

> ..., in this case, AboveNet is inflicting policy decisions on transit
> routes =without consent=.  (It's obvious this is without consent,
> otherwise this thread would never have come up.)

obvious to you perhaps, but incorrect nevertheless.  the complainer has since
had their contract read to them and has learned that they did in fact consent
to this type of policy-related blockage, by signing agreement to that contract.
-- 
Paul Vixie <pvixie at mmfn.com>
CTO and SVP, MFN (NASDAQ: MFNX)

AboveNet, PAIX, and MIBH are subsidiaries of Metromedia Fiber Network, Inc.