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North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical RE: The large ISPs and Peering
There is the larger problem of anti-trust issues. Those large providers collectively represent more than 60% of the market. I believe that this is the real basis of the concern. Such an arrangement could be construed as being anti-competitive. Were IBM to make such an arrangement with IBM and AT&T then DOJ might become very active. The same holds true here. Companies holding such large market-share control cannot quite do things the way that they want because we (collectively) have made laws that have deemed such activities as public-policy effecting activities and subject to some regulation, by public bodies. I don't see where that has changed. Even in the spirit of telcom co-opetition, such activity can still be construed as collusion. I'm suprised that their lawyers let them do that. Also, the past 30-years of track-record clearly shows that such activity cannot be kept secret. > -----Original Message----- > From: Jeff Aitken [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2001 10:16 AM > To: Curtis Maurand > Cc: [email protected] > Subject: Re: The large ISPs and Peering > > > > On Thu, Jul 26, 2001 at 11:21:54AM -0400, Curtis Maurand wrote: > > A rose by any other name... The fact is, and history shows > us, that > > when cartels form, things get bad for the consumer. [...] > > However, The placement of the NAP's is disconcerting, because > > the process for choosing them was closed. > > This makes absolutely no sense. Are you saying that uninvolved > parties should be able to dictate where and how large "promising > local ISPs" should interconnect? Maybe we should have a vote on > NANOG! > > "How does this choice of interconnection point make you feel?" > > > > Does it make sense for all of > > my traffic going to maine.rr.com from lamere.net (both in > Maine and in > > the same communities) to exchange traffic at MAE east 650 > miles away? > > There's nothing preventing your provider from establishing additional > regional peering where appropriate; if they fail to provide the level > of service that you require you should vote with your wallet > and select > another provider. > > > > There won't be if the Tier-1's all form a "consotium." > > They will collude on network build out and stop competing [...] > > If the "consortium" is formmed it will wipe out all those > strides [...] > > A consortium will wipe out the glut and raise prices. > > The consortium will control supply at a lower level. > > Prices will increase. > > Yes, but the equalization will happen at the higher price. > > There's nobody to compete with, so why keep the price down? > > If you think that's not true, think again. > > Proof by repeated assertion, eh? > > I'm really confused here. How did we go from "certain large ISPs > are working together to reduce the cost of interconnection amongst > themselves" to "there will be no competition between these large > providers?" > > > --Jeff >
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