95th Percentile again (was RE: C&W Peering Problem?)

Thu Jun 7 22:54:24 UTC 2001

I believe Geoff glosses one or two interesting cases.

1) the (semi) regulated market where an external body defines an exchange
   rate which can differ in each of A,B's {dis}favour, and requires A and B
   to settle inbound,outbound according to that tarrif. In that case, A and B
   can be required or expected to exchange differences between net A->B
   and B->A traffic for traffic in some set of {calls,time,initiater-end}

   Of course, A and B might also be expected to pay tax or other impost on
   gross amounts!

2) A and B form a regulated {combination,confederation} and seek to acquire
   leverage off C for exchange, arriving at some interior settlement which
   is not peering, but the entity D, which is some relationship of A and B
   has peering power against C, E, F ...

What I'm trying to intrude is that this is not the 1980s and we are not in
some Milton Friedman nightmare of completely unregulated exchanges between
entitities. We might differ about the desirability of unregulated exchange
between competing parties, but even in the international arena, albiet in
a very ineffectual sense, other bodies dictate what happens.

Like, forcing MCI to divest of some activity in forming Concert with BT
(which fell apart) or like preventing the RBOC from being in the long distance
game (which fell apart) or like going to the FCC to winge about international
phone settlement rates (which is falling apart)

The falling apart part is about political apathy as much as a realpolitik
view of what will work. That these things fall apart doesn't mean inside
the fine-grained 5 year window they can't work, or that better regulation
might not shore them up for another interesting 5 year window. A lot of things
happen in a 5 year window.

Off to one side of this is another dimension. USA people may not have seen
a story in the Australian press pointing out that the sale of C&W Optus to
Singapore raises the prospect of the Australian national security agencies 
satellite communications channels being owned and operated by a non-resident
entity. Of course its a beat-up, and from a not disinterested source, but it
makes for interesting considerations in how entities might be constrained to
offer communication services, and by implication settlements.

cheers
	-George

PS this is a personal mail and doesn't reflect APNIC policy views.

--
George Michaelson       |  APNIC
Email: ggm at apnic.net    |  PO Box 2131 Milton QLD 4064
Phone: +61 7 3367 0490  |  Australia
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