--- "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick@ianai.net> wrote:
It is strange that people have to be reminded no network has the "right" to use any other network's resources without permission. Most people realize this in one direction. For instance, the "tier ones" love to point out Cogent has no "right" to peer with Level 3. Absolutely correct.
What some people seem to forget is that Level 3 has no right to force Cogent to buy transit to get to Level 3.
This is where you lost me: if there is no obligation for an SFI between them, then each player absolutely can force the other to buy transit to reach them. The way it plays out is this: whichever player's customers are more upset about the inability to reach the other will force that player to blink and either buy transit or make some other arrangement. The term "peering" is useful to describe SFI, because there is an implied equivalence between the players: i.e. it would hurt them both equally to partition. As was said by someone earlier, if it is more valuable to one party than the other, the business relationship is skewed, and ripe for a conversion to a settlement-based interconnection.
P.S. Does anyone else get that Baby Bell feeling whenever someone talks about being a "Tier One"?
heh. I'm certain we're about to see the Nth iteration of the "who's a Tier One Provider" discussion, and I'll repeat: there are two contexts for "tier one" - marketing and routing. In marketing, everyone with a big, national network is a tier-one. In routing, definitions differ, and whatever definition is used, it's a smaller set than the marketing bunch... David Barak Need Geek Rock? Try The Franchise: http://www.listentothefranchise.com ______________________________________________________ Yahoo! for Good Donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. http://store.yahoo.com/redcross-donate3/