I'd venture to say that anyone touring the facility of an industry they're not familiar with, but intrigued by, would be fascinating to them (e.g. SpaceX mission control as previously mentioned). Likewise, touring facilities of your same industry could be boring.

I'm sure many of us have sunk HOURS into episodes of How It's Made which is really nothing more than a virtual factory tour; but I'm sure the workers there would feel the same way about touring other factories as we do about touring NOCs/DCs.

For businessy types who trade in data centers/NOC, but don't interact frequently, I'm sure tours can be both fascinating and informative.

-Matt

On Thu, Jan 7, 2021 at 5:57 PM Ben Cannon <ben@6by7.net> wrote:

I’m lucky enough to give hundreds of people their literal first look at “the internet” - and I can tell you, in many cases, it blows their minds.

Honestly watching people’s eyes light up when they see all this, or hold a bare glass optical fiber in their hand, has got to be one of the very best parts of this whole gig.

Lest we grow too accustomed to the technology that profoundly changed my life around age 8 or so.

Ms. Lady Benjamin PD Cannon, ASCE
6x7 Networks & 6x7 Telecom, LLC
CEO
ben@6by7.net
"The only fully end-to-end encrypted global telecommunications company in the world.”

FCC License KJ6FJJ

Sent from my iPhone via RFC1149.

On Jan 7, 2021, at 10:34 AM, Christopher Morrow <morrowc.lists@gmail.com> wrote:

NOC tours seem like a very 1990's thing, that and 'datacenter tours'.

"Oh you like seeing people at computers and you can't get enough of
that at your home workplace?"
"Oh, you also like cages? me too!! sometimes we put 'racks' in them...
or heavens to gertrude! 'computers'!!"

almost all of this seems like ... really not worth the time for
external people to bother with.
which is maybe why: "Sure, you wanna visit? pay me" (Oh, now you dont'
want to visit? ok, cool!)

On Thu, Jan 7, 2021 at 1:09 PM Sean Donelan <sean@donelan.com> wrote:

Department of Commerce OIG review of FirstNet request to tour AT&T GNOC

https://www.oversight.gov/sites/default/files/oig-reports/DOC/OIG-21-016-I.pdf
Continued FirstNet Authority Management Attention is Needed to Address
Control Environment Weaknesses

[...]
FirstNet Authority disagreed that the request for a GNOC tour “constituted
a request for ‘additional contract services outside the scope of the
contract.’” In its response, FirstNet Authority stated, “GNOC tours are
not governed or limited by the [NPSBN] contract as these kinds of tours
are commonplace for AT&T to provide to outside parties.” However, we
found that the contractor only offers a multi-media presentation regarding
the GNOC at its Corporate Briefing Center. FirstNet Authority requested a
visit and tour of the GNOC, which is neither included in the contract nor
offered widely to the public. We reaffirm that the tour was not in the
contract and could be viewed as exerting indirect pressure for the
contractor to perform unreimbursed services outside the contract.
[...]