fiqqq
Mr. Chainsaw
Premium
join:2003-01-23
Wilmette, IL
clubs:  | hmmm
wasnt the internet invented in order to provide a communications network resistant to a centralized disruption?
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placidness.com: my site. |
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Alphy
join:2001-12-31
Troy, MI | Exactly. Sounds like these CEO's are spinning this in order to boost revenue by fear-mongering. I mean yes, the internet is prone to major failure, but what major infrastructure isn't? |
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Tsume
join:2004-02-23
Johnson City, TN
 ·Embarq
 ·ViaTalk
 ·Comcast
| reply to fiqqq
Who was that... Level 3 and cogent or something? Screwed over lots of RR and other ISP customers. Level 3 made it so lots of websites were inaccessible from those ISPs with certain peering agreements.
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"True warriors do not follow paths, they make them. It is not just their desire, it is their nature." (Battletech) |
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Zeb
Premium
join:2000-07-10
Lewisville, TX | If we are talking about the same thing.. it's because these ISPs didn't pay their Level3 bills. |
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en102
Canadian, eh?
join:2001-01-26
Valencia, CA
·RoadRunner Cable
·DSL EXTREME
| reply to Alphy
While the Internet can handle outages through re-routing of traffic, I suspect that this is more of a case that some businesses would suffer from their SLA's. I.e. email, browsing may be slowed, however, items such as IPTV or other bandwidth hogs could be disabled, especially if going outside the country. |
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owenhome
keeper of the magic blue smoke
Premium
join:2002-07-13
Bentonville, AR
| reply to Tsume
Level 3 Communications, Inc.
The poster child of centralized-decentralization. With one stroke, one company affected thousands of other companies and individuals, exactly what the web was supposed to prevent in the first place.
We were not prepared for that, just as we are not prepared for any major outage.
Any major disruption of a handful of companies could bring this country to a grinding halt and us to our knees. That, in and of itself, is a major, MAJOR problem. You can well bet that any info-terrorist, or hostile foreign power would have L3, MCI, Sprint, AT&T, etc. in their sites and any major disruption to the web could be brought on just by crippling a few such companies. Such companies are extremely important to our well-being in many, many ways. Finance, big-business, small-business, even our utilities such as water, gas, and power depend on them.
We don't like to think so, but we built this system, a system which our country and the entire world depends on incessantly. And because this system depends on a handful of companies driven by the almighty dollar, by its very nature, it is doomed to disruption, corruption, monopolization, and ultimately, failure.
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Never argue with a fool, people might not know the difference. |
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owenhome
keeper of the magic blue smoke
Premium
join:2002-07-13
Bentonville, AR
| reply to Zeb
There was no bill. It was a peering agreement. The ISP's and L3 agreed to carry traffic for each other, for free. Kind of a "you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" sort of thing.
L3 carried more traffic for the ISP's than the ISP's for L3. L3 decided this arrangement was no longer fair and wanted financial compensation. Unfortunately, there was a contract binding them to the free arrangement.
L3 wanted money, but the ISP's cited the contract and L3's free obligation causing a stalemate. That's were it started.
L3 said "Give me money!"
The ISP's said "Um, no, the contract says you will provide this service at no charge because we carry your traffic too!"
L3 said "Fine, I will just unplug you, contract or no contract, and you won't get plugged back in until you come up with some cash!"
And that's that. Finally, L3 agreed to resume peering services with the ISP's until an agreement for compensation could be reached.
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Never argue with a fool, people might not know the difference. |
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yabos
join:2003-02-16
Ingersoll, ON | reply to fiqqq
That's how it's supposed to work but in reality it's very centralized to minimize costs and maximize profits for the carriers. One outage of a major carrier could affect a huge portion of the internet. |
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Tsume
join:2004-02-23
Johnson City, TN
·Embarq
·ViaTalk
·Comcast
| reply to Zeb
I think you misunderstand, it was a dispute between Level 3 and the other backbone provider (I'll call them cogent because I am not sure if that's their name.)
RR and other ISPs had peering agreements with Level 3 I believe.
Cogent had a peering agreement with Level 3.
Traffic was disproportional, Level 3 demanded cogent to pay.
Cogent kind-of ignored that...
Level 3 in turn told their routers to tell ISP's customers that there were no routes to cogent's customers (instead of the correct route which would be to specify an alternate route to the cogent customers).
RR and other ISP's customers could not access anything on the cogent backbone because Level 3 blocked them. This blocked many many legit websites, and was no fault of said websites webmasters nor the ISPs.
If any of this is wrong feel free to correct me, that's just what I understand of the issue.
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"True warriors do not follow paths, they make them. It is not just their desire, it is their nature." (Battletech) |
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Jigsaw
Stardust We Are
Premium
join:2000-10-21
Cleveland, OH
·Cox HSI
| reply to fiqqq
said by fiqqq  :wasnt the internet invented in order to provide a communications network resistant to a centralized disruption? Don't worry when ATT takes over the internet it will suck so bad you won't want to go on it anyway.
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»www.auralmoon.com/html/ Stimulating ears for 6 years |
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Jafo232
You Can't Spell Democrat Without Rat.
Premium
join:2002-10-17
Boonville, NY
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to en102
There is a simple way to take the Internet offline:
Take the powergrid down.
You don't even have to know how to use a computer to do that.
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Write Your News, Find Your News At PingPost.com |
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Jigsaw
Stardust We Are
Premium
join:2000-10-21
Cleveland, OH
·Cox HSI
1 edit | said by Jafo232 :There is a simple way to take the Internet offline: Take the powergrid down. You don't even have to know how to use a computer to do that. That happened here we were down for about a day and a half!I think it was one of the biggest blackouts in US history.
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»www.auralmoon.com/html/ Stimulating ears for 6 years |
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newyorkslick
join:2001-12-19
Rosedale, NY | True, but I was still able to use my aol account to dial into Virginia. Even though most of the sites hosted in the affected area were down, the rest were working without a hitch.
Too bad my battery died after 2 hours. :-( |
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