===== Vadim Antonov previously wrote: ====
b) a 100-byte packet travelled from provider A to provider B. Should A pay to B or vice versa?
Believe this is not the key problem with big players not be willing to peer with small one. The key problem is WHERE they are exchanging traffic. As long as both shares half of the load to haul traffic across the continent/ocean, that is okay. But if the small provider has only one local exchange, the big provider ends up hauling traffic both ways, and the small one gets competetive edge in his local market because he does not pay any wide area transmission cost. The cost would have been paid if he bought a pipe from the big provider instead of free peering. That is just a rough picture. If the small provider, however small he is, buys a pipe across continent/ocean and peer with big provider at multiple locations, there is really no reason not to peer with him except some CPU/router-process concerns. Jun