[I really wasn't going to get involved in this mire, but this is too easy. Standard disclaimers abound.]
Sure, but only the assymetry that results from BBN customers ASKING for more than they OFFER.
Or is it the asymmetry that results from Exodus customers OFFERING more than they ASK FOR? ...so now you are looking to dictate what business prodcuts/models someone uses?
other. Just because long distance phone calling introduced the purely artificial concept that the initiator of the transaction pays for it does not mean we should analyze IP traffic in the same way. "Artificiality" applies in the telephone model, where the circuit is set up and you can't/won't/don't know about the payload [which end talks more? is there a lot of silence? does the quality suck?]. Packet switching shows a lot about the payload [packet sizes, packet frequency, and retransmissions] from both sides.
In the past we have considered the initiator of IP transactions to be irrelevant and had no-charge peering for networks that basically send a similar number of bytes to what they receive.
So what do we do when that is no longer the case? The requests handled by pointy-clicky-"dub dub dub"; great wodges of traffic being burned on lossy protocols. The traffic doesn't spontaneously decide to slam down pipes to non-path-discovery Windoze dialups. The humans behind the dialups asked for something (albeit, they had no forwarnings about adverts, pictures, applets, etc etc.).
Back to life, Joe -- Joe Provo, Network Architect 508.229.8400 x3006 Commercial Internet Services Group Fax 508.229.2375 UltraNet Communications, Inc., an RCN Company <jprovo@ultra.net>