On the other hand, maybe you could be the customer that establishes the distributed web server scenario I discussed earlier. If you have read through http://www.ix.digital.com you will not that not only are they running an exchange point but they are also running a web farm of sorts at the same location. Chances are good that this web-farm-at-the-XP concept will become the rule rather than the exception. Note that in Digital's model it would be possible to connect to larger ISP's without requiring traffic to flow through the XP itself.
At Digital's Palo Alto IX (URL as Michael said above), we view the exchange point as a place where peering relationships are implemented. Web farmers who are not ISPs (I'm not trying to start a debate on what-is-an-ISP) can only peer with ISPs at the GIGAswitch if the web farmer is able to find an ISP that wishes to provide connectivity in that manner. I would hope that they wouldn't. My personal feeling is that the provision of service should be implemented on a separate port of the ISP's router - this provides both the ISP and the web farmer with a measurable point of demarcation independent of the IX. If the web farmer paid for an Ethernet or whatever interface, they'd get an Ethernet or whatever interface, and the bandwidth available to the customer on that port would not vary with other traffic as it would if the web farmer were competing with the ISP's peers for an interface attached to the GIGAswitch. Should the web farmer purchase connectivity from other ISPs, their purchases can be implemented as cross-connects to ISP routers (assuming the address space can be advertised, the topology of the web farmer's network can handle it, etc., etc., etc.). ISPs might also wish to implement certain peering relationships with cross-connects rather than consume bandwidth on their interface to the GIGAswitch. To us, cross-connects are cross-connects, whether they connect ISPs to web farmers or ISPs to ISPs. Stephen - ----- Stephen Stuart stuart@pa.dec.com Network Systems Laboratory Digital Equipment Corporation