Cogent/Level 3 depeering

Thu Oct 6 11:00:36 UTC 2005

> Depeering never makes sense to me.  Customers of both companies are 
> expecting their vendor to connect them to the customers of the other 
> company.  These customers are each paying their respective vendor for 
> this service.  Why should one vendor pay the other for this traffic that 

> is mutually beneficial to them while the other pays nothing?  Why does 
> the amount of bandwidth or the direction it travels make any difference? 

>   The customers are PAYING for the bandwidth.  If each vendor pays their 

> own costs to a peering point then they should be passing that cost onto 
> their respective customers as part of the *customer's* bandwidth bill.

Perhaps someone wants to make this argument before a judge
in order to set a legal precedent for mandatory peering
with settlements?

--Michael Dillon