Google wants to be your Internet

Sun Jan 21 00:33:26 UTC 2007

On Sun, Jan 21, 2007, Charlie Allom wrote:

> > This is a pure example of a problem from the operational front which can
> > be floated to research and the industry, with smarter solutions than port
> > blocking and QoS.
> 
> This is what I am interested/scared by.

Its not that hard a problem to get on top of. Caching, unfortunately, continues
to be viewed as anaethma by ISP network operators in the US. Strangely enough
the caching technologies aren't a problem with the content -delivery- people.

I've had a few ISPs out here in Australia indicate interest in a cache that
could do the normal stuff (http, rtsp, wma) and some of the p2p stuff (bittorrent
especially) with a smattering of QoS/shaping/control - but not cost upwards of
USD$100,000 a box. Lots of interest, no commitment.

It doesn't help (at least in Australia) where the wholesale model of ADSL isn't
content-replication-friendly: we have to buy ATM or ethernet pipes to upstreams
and then receive each session via L2TP. Fine from an aggregation point of view,
but missing the true usefuless of content replication and caching - right at
the point where your customers connect in.

(Disclaimer: I'm one of the Squid developers. I'm getting an increasing amount
of interest from CDN/content origination players but none from ISPs. I'd love
to know why ISPs don't view caching as a viable option in today's world and
what we could to do make it easier for y'all.)

Adrian