- Test - lists.nanog.org

Dern response to Metcalfe critique of Dern 'net collapse?' piece (fwd)
by J.D. Falk 31 Aug '96

31 Aug '96

Both NANOG and the Internet Press Guild talking about some of the same things...what fun! BTW, the IPG is at 'http://www.netpress.org/ipg/'. We'll be forming a public list for discussion of coverage of the net in major media, sorta like alt.internet.media-coverage used to be. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 29 Aug 1996 00:47:04 -0400 From: Daniel P Dern <ddern(a)world.std.com> Reply-To: ipg-l(a)netpress.org To: ipg-l(a)netpress.org Subject: (Belated fwd) Dern response to Metcalfe critique of Dern 'net collapse?' piece Resent-Date: Thu, 29 Aug 1996 00:49:41 -0400 Resent-From: ipg-l(a)netpress.org ---------<dern>------------ DERN ON THE INTERNET: Internet Predicts Overloading of Bob Metcalfe (.GIF at 11) (as told to Daniel P. Dern <ddern(a)world.std.com, www.dern.com>) -------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (c) 1996 Daniel P. Dern [ Copyleft (cl) - Permission granted to redistribute free ONLY to free-for-access online forums, sites and such (including mailing lists), and only so long as my byline, copyright and this disclaimer are included. Anyone else interested, contact me. -dpd ] -------------------------------------------------------------------- {What has gone before: <read this in Italics if you got 'em> I had a front-page article in the July 1 issue of InfoWorld, on the every-popular topic "is the Internet collapsing." Bob Metcalfe responded to it, with, "Internet Intelligentsia Stands on Credos, Not Facts", in the same issue (p.75, opposite my final 'graphs). Here is my response to Metcalfe's response; Bob, this constitutes the other shoe finally dropping :-) </Italics if you had 'em> -dpd} AUGUST 1996 (shortly after lunch) -- If you've been following the cybernatterings of cyberluminary Bob Metcalfe during the past half-year or so (or past two years in Internet dog years), in his InfoWorld "From The Ether" column, or elsewhere in various speeches, articles, interviews, and online postings, you're probably well aware that Dr. Metcalfe is concerned about the Internet. In fact, he's convinced that the Internet is overloaded to the point where it will soon collapse. Why he doesn't suggest the Internet take two aspirins, go to bed, and Internet-phone him in the morning I don't know -- perhaps he's not that kind of doctor. But he's definitely concerned. It is therefore highly ironic that, according to the Internet, a similar fate may lie in store for Metcalfe. In an exclusive interview I just had with the Internet, the Internet opined that Bob Metcalfe is overloading, and, predicts the Internet, he will soon be unable to handle the load. Dr. Robert Metcalfe, a suave, well- -- if perhaps too-casually- -- dressed techno bon vivant, and awardwinner, is best known for being the creator of Ethernet, and also for being one of the founders of 3Com, and recently variously publisher, editor-in-chief, and columnist at InfoWorld magazine. He's been kvetching about the Internet long before other industry pundits, even John Dvorak or Jerry Pournelle. The Internet is, of course, a global network of networks, linked by the IP networking protocols which enable applications on different types of networks and computers to "schmooze" (intercommunicate), and has become best known as the home of the WorldWideWeb (which has in turn spawned all those "intranets," "extranets," "intrawebs," and "IP corrals"), which, as well all know, is the reason we all "need" Netscape Navigator and/or Microsoft Internet Explorer. (Conspiracy theorists attribute much of the claimed value of the Web to PR campaigns by memory chip makers.) "It's the Firesign Theatre's 'Fudd's Law' all over again -- 'If you push anything hard enough, it will fall over,'" the Internet quipped self- referentially, while simultaneously blowing routing loops from its elegantly carved high-bandwidth meerschaum pipe and signing receipt chits for new top-level domains. "I know Bob's worried about me -- well, I'm worried about Bob," the Internet stated statelessly. "He's pushing himself too hard -- and, unlike me, he only has one provider and wasn't engineered to scale the same way." The Internet put down the pile of paperwork on a nearby routing table, which was wobbling as if it might collapse at any moment. A green plastic fish which had escaped from another essay wriggled briefly nearby. The Internet is flattered by the Metcalfe's ongoing interest in its health, but fears that this may be a case of the bioanarchistic pot calling the cyber-kettle black. "He's taking on too great a load," explained the Internet, dressed in a open-protocol suit and a <BLINK>ing bow tie for the occasion, at its open suite in the Hotel D'Arpa recently for an exclusive interview. "He's writing articles and editorials, he's speaking at conferences, he's being interviewed, he's getting awards, he's giving parties... Bob Metcalfe was never designed to handle this great a load, nor to handle many of these types of functions. Heck, it makes me tired just to think about it. It's inevitable that he'll prove unable to handle the load, sooner or later." According to a recent three-year $100 million study by two mailroom clerks and a service technician at the Cantseetheforestforthetrees Group located in Cambridge, Mass. near what was supposed to have been the site of a major urban mall and housing development that never materialized, "Metcalfe's appearances and activities have been growing at a monthly rate of 15%." By mid-2002, they predict, "Metcalfe will be speaking at every trade show in the United States, as well as at 29% of the Boy and Girl Scout troop meetings, numerous city zoning board committees, and several county fairs." (Copies of the full report, including color graphs and pie charts, are available for the small cheap paltry sum of $597, payable in $3.00 Ecash certificates made on a browser with margins set to 6.2 centimeters. Free copies are available from their web site.) Metcalfe's silicon-intelligent anarchistica, notably several leading Ethernet segments at major universities, deny the rumors. "Bob's NAPs keep him well-rested and productive," reported one at a technical east coast site. But others report dropped salt packets, open jars of clam dip, and a growing pile of sport coats and sweaters -- some of which, one WAN wag reported, aren't as seamless as they used to be. "Being a pundit requires a lot more speed and flexibility than it used to," notes Sc*tt Br*dn*r, an alleged academic at a university located a few miles upriver from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M*T) in Cambridge, Mass. "Bob's been able to cope, but he'll run out of bandwidth sooner or later, and fail to show up for a meeting somewhere, or drop his speech en route." D*v* Cl*rk, an alleged computer science academic purported to have been allegedly seen having a beer with an alleged journalist, says, "We have computer simulations of Metcalfe running on our academic computers which show how Metcalfe could run at a higher speed. Unfortunately, our program refuses to run simulations involving Metcalfe performing non-academic activities." Cl*rk hypothesized that his simulator was assuming an arbitrarily large supply of graduate students as one of the resources in its calculations. V*nt C*rf, alleged father of the Internet paternity suite and co-founder of C*rfN*t, adds, "At this point, given the expectations that have been created for Metcalfe, it's important that he drop something, if only to prove we're right and he's wrong." Defenders of Metcalfe claim the Internet is being unfair. "Bob, like all of us, is comprised of many individual organs, bones, cells and old parking tickets," points out an Ethernet segment in Umbilical, Hawaii which was subsequently arrested by the Grammar Police for improper use of 'comprise.' "To say he's completely overloading, versus that some muscle or organ may be overloading, is unfair." "Part of the problem," the Internet said in response to these counter- critiques, "is that Metcalfe was never designed to handle a load like this. He still needs security, management, proper billing, guaranteed service, and blue suede shoes. It's our own fault for continuing to use him." I attempted to reach Metcalfe for comment, but he was unavailable (hmmm!) -- off making a speach somewhere in New York... or was it Chicago... or Los Angeles... or whatever. (Kinda proves the point, don't it?) "I understand what it's like to be overloaded," the Internet concluded. "But I've got the same confidence in Bob that he's got in me. Frankly, I think we both want to collapse, and then be allowed to spend a few weeks chilling out somewhere quiet, downloading back a few drinks, and waiting for the press to find some other headline-grabbing scapegoat. "As for all those businesses supposedly relying on me -- heck, I never said I was good for that stuff," the Internet pinged. "I was supposed to just be the proof of concept. Making me into that info-super-duper- highway, that was somebody else's idea. Whoops -- here somes the three o'clock weather checkers and PointCast update -- back to work!" Shrugging out of its jacket and into a naugahyde jacket with a large "IP On Everything" JPEG on the back, the Internet sauntered off to the nearest meetpoint, singing, in a semi-public key, to a frightening familiar tune, "I know I connect all those LANs/and the LANs I connect to are grand/So when I say, IP, aye, IP, eye-pee-eye-eh/I'm lookin' fine, info-highway/info-highway, no way!..." * (Note to readers: Only stunt or simulated Metcalfes were used in testing and writing this article. Not real Metcalfes, or even his sweaters, were used. And had this been a real "Internet is out" alert, this would, of course, never have gotten to you.) # - Daniel P. Dern (ddern(a)world.std.com, www.dern.com) has been writing, speaking, consulting, and writing song parodies about the Internet for over a decade. Author of THE INTERNET GUIDE FOR NEW USERS and founding editor of Internet World magazine, he's ready for somebody to give him another Internet magazine to be in charge of. Or even another Internet column. And yes, he knows his Web site is vastly in need of updating, okay? Copyright (c) 1996 Daniel P. Dern /the end. really. ---------</dern>------------ ----------- Daniel Dern (ddern(a)world.std.com, http://www.dern.com) Internet analyst, author, columnist & speaker (617) 969-7947 FAX: (617) 969-7949

1 0

Re: Agenda for next NANOG
by schnell＠gsd.sprint.com 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

OK, you can color me a NAP apologist. As a NAP operator I don't have the resources at my disposal to conduct the suggested tests. (A couple of DEC Alpha or other capable workstations attached to the NAP media would be a nice asset.) However, as a L2 network operator I would be VERY interested in learning of my customers' perception of the service provided. Steve At 12:51 8.30.96, Vince Fuller wrote: > > Are there other topics you'd like to hear about? > > How about > > Analysis of Actual End to End Performance accross the NAPs/MAEs > > To be given by each operator? > > (as opposed to "everything is wonderful because we dropped no packets > across ten feet of level-2 wire") > >An excellent topic, to be sure, but how do you propose that this be measured? > >About the only thing NAP operators can directly gather and report upon is the >"ten feet of level-2 wire". > >And before anyone color me a NAP apologist (I'm certainly not, as some >interconnect operators can probably attest), this is a serious question, >not an excuse for any poor performance that _may_ have been observed at >interconnects. > > --Vince ******************************************************************************** Phone: 1.816.854.2113 Fax: 1.816.854.2201 Pager: 1.888.366.7890, PIN 398.6644 Alpha Page via Internet: 3986644(a)pagenet.net ********************************************************************************

2 1

Recent FARNET meeting notes on-line
by sob＠academ.com 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

The proceedings from the Cheyenne Mountain FARNET meeting are available at http://www.farnet.org/cheyenne. They include update on the information about @HOME that Milo presented at NANOG in February. That URL is here: http://www.farnet.org/cheyenne/medin -- Stan | Academ Consulting Services |internet: sob(a)academ.com Olan | For more info on academ, see this |uucp: {mcsun|amdahl}!academ!sob Barber | URL- http://www.academ.com/academ |Opinions expressed are only mine.

1 0

RE: Agenda for next NANOG
by Jim Browning 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

>From: Susan R. Harris[SMTP:srh@merit.edu] >Sent: Friday, August 30, 1996 7:09 AM > >Greetings - Here's what we've lined up so far for the Oct. 24-25 NANOG >agenda: > > - vBNS Update > - Future router requirements > - Multihoming pros and cons > - Economics of Internet resource allocation I believe there would be significant interest in a debate on the relative merits of Peering and Transit oriented connectivity strategies. The vast majority of operators rely at least partially on transit arrangements with 'upstream' providers, with many hoping to eventually transition (npi) to a robust set of peering relationships. There are many technical and business issues surrounding this topic, which is evolving rapidly over time as the NAP environment changes. A deep exploration of the issues involving presenters from a variety of perspectives would benefit everyone, regardless of their chosen Approach. -- Jim Browning

1 0

Re: Agenda for next NANOG
by Havard.Eidnes＠runit.sintef.no 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

Hi, it's possible that I'm off base here, but... > How about > > Analysis of Actual End to End Performance accross the NAPs/MAEs > > To be given by each operator? > > An excellent topic, to be sure, but how do you propose that > this be measured? > > About the only thing NAP operators can directly gather and > report upon is the "ten feet of level-2 wire". Somehow I think Randy meant "connected network service operator" rather than "NAP operator" when he said "operator". Isn't the problem in some cases more with overloaded access circuits *into* the NAP rather than the NAP interconnect medium itself? How to measure? Well, I must admit that I do not have much of a suggestion there. Pinging your own NAP router usually will not reveal much regarding the quality of service delivered over the access circuit, as the NAP router can fool around with where it places it's self-originating packets in the output queue on the access circuit. - Havard

1 0

Re: Agenda for next NANOG
by sob＠academ.com 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

>From various discussions at the FARNET meeting, I am sure there are more folks participating in what Merit is doing in this area. Perhaps they can share more about that at NANOG. -- Stan | Academ Consulting Services |internet: sob(a)academ.com Olan | For more info on academ, see this |uucp: {mcsun|amdahl}!academ!sob Barber | URL- http://www.academ.com/academ |Opinions expressed are only mine.

1 0

Re: Agenda for next NANOG
by Vince Fuller 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

> Are there other topics you'd like to hear about? How about Analysis of Actual End to End Performance accross the NAPs/MAEs To be given by each operator? (as opposed to "everything is wonderful because we dropped no packets across ten feet of level-2 wire") An excellent topic, to be sure, but how do you propose that this be measured? About the only thing NAP operators can directly gather and report upon is the "ten feet of level-2 wire". And before anyone color me a NAP apologist (I'm certainly not, as some interconnect operators can probably attest), this is a serious question, not an excuse for any poor performance that _may_ have been observed at interconnects. --Vince

2 1

Re: MFS WorldCom/WilTel/LDDS
by Vadim Antonov 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

Perry E. Metzger <perry(a)piermont.com> wrote: >Raw bandwidth is inherently cheap. Undersea lines are even fairly >cheap, except nasty government price fixing keeps them >expensive. Switching equipment is expensive right now but Moore's Law >takes care of that over the years. Excuse me, but bandwidth demand doubles in about half year, while Moore's law is that semiconductor capacity doubles every 2 years. There's no indication that this will change any time soon. Nice brick wall :) --vadim

4 4

renamed: Usage based billing
by Peter Ford 30 Aug '96

30 Aug '96

The other thing that everyone has their business plan built on is an average utilization of X. If the average utilization grows to 2*X or 3*X then the business plan usually does not work. Usage base measuring is a no-brainer, most providers measure their customers' loops today. Much of the discussion so far has mistaken usage based measuring/pricing with the style of accounting the telcos use for phone calls which certainly is not the only usage accounting model available. Usage based accounting can also be used to lower the barrier some customers might have in terms of connecting to the Internet. If their usage is low, they pay LESS. If they can get really cheap high speed local loop, they might pay A LOT LESS. How many people want to surf the web vs how many people want to host a big web site on their ISDN lines. The model I like is where they both are always "connected" but one group pays less (per month) than the other. It seems intuitive to me and I suspect it is intuitive to most consumers of Internet which probably makes it easier to sell. If I have a fixed number of dollars would I rather buy a really high speed pipe and pay for what I use or buy a really narrow pipe (that is provisioned on top of a really high speed pipe of which most of it I can not use) and pay for what I use and what I don't use? Empirically, it is hard for me to buy into the "usage based accounting kills the market" argument as long as the telephone business continues to grow (not to mention a whole lot of other usage based pricing businesses). In the end, there needs to be a set of business models (probably more than one) that are good for both the customers and the providers. I believe usage based models will be there for the reasons cited above, and the fixed rate schemes will be employed where there are broad averages that can be exploited (the customer likes the flat predictable rate, the provider believes the average usage still allows him/her to make money). Cheers, peter

3 2

Re: MFS WorldCom/WilTel/LDDS
by salo＠msc.edu 29 Aug '96

29 Aug '96

> Date: Wed, 28 Aug 1996 20:12:51 -0700 > From: Vadim Antonov <avg(a)quake.net> > To: ed(a)texas.net, jerry(a)fc.net > Subject: Re: MFS WorldCom/WilTel/LDDS > Cc: nanog(a)merit.edu > [...] > To be more precise it would have had merit if Internet > metering was at least remotely technically feasible. > [...] The easiest point to measure traffic is undoubtedly on the link between the customer and its ISP. I believe that many ISPs are already measuring the total amount of traffic into and out of each customer. I even saw a complicated pricing formula from one ISP which added a surcharge cor customers which passed a lot of traffic over the last time period (some number of months, I seem to recall). So, at least at one point, we already have at least one example of an ISP which had a component of its pricing based on the amount of traffic transferred over a dedicated connection. A number of other usage-based charging schemes have been proposed which were based on tractable measurements, (e.g., settlements of all sorts of flavors, combits, ...). Measuring traffic accurately enough to use the results in charging is not hard. On the other hand, it is possible to invent measuring schemes which are impossible to implement, (e.g., a host-to-host traffic matrix gathered somewhere nearer the "core" [whatever that is] of the Net. On the other hand, I probably missed your point... -tjs

9 9