Cogent/Level 3 depeering
Patrick W. Gilmore
patrick at ianai.net
Thu Oct 6 17:59:01 UTC 2005
On Oct 6, 2005, at 2:47 AM, Richard A Steenbergen wrote:
> Inbound traffic doesn't cost them anything? That old adage only
> applies to
> end user transit purchasers who have doing extra outbound and thus
> have
> "free inbound" under the "higher of in or out" billing. For folks
> operating an actual network, the bits use the same resources as
> traffic in
> the opposite direction, and thus "cost" the same. The only reason
> Cogent
> gives out free or absurdly underpriced inbound transit is ratios.
You are mistaken.
If I sent 100 Gbps outbound and 20 inbound, I can sell 40-60 Gbps of
additional inbound for FAR, FAR less than 40-60 Gbps of additional
outbound.
Zero cost? Probably not. Trivial cost? Possibly, depends on network.
> I know folks who are willing to give away all manner of things,
> inbound
> and outbound, for free or low cost, because they have "excess
> capacity"
> that they're already paying for and nothing better to do with it. If
> you're desperate and you're willing to sacrifice long term
> marketing for
> short term cash it can be a cute technique, but to quote Vijay, "it
> does
> not scale". Besides, if anyone is depeering Cogent now because of
> their
> disruptive pricing in the market, they're a couple years late.
> Speculate
> all you like, but I suspect there is more to it than that.
It doesn't have to scale.
I'm perfectly willing to sell $100K worth of services for $1K worth
of cost, knowing I cannot sell $101K because "it does not scale".
And anyone who isn't is probably not doing good business.
But I do agree with you on the "couple years late" thing. Putting
Cogent out of business will _not_ make prices go up. (And I'm not
even sure this will put them out of biz.) In fact, Cogent is not the
"lowest cost provider" any more - at least not for bit pushers.
--
TTFN,
patrick
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