Level 3 Issues Ultimatum
Restores connectivity to Cogent until Nov 9
(old news - 07:15PM Friday Oct 07 2005)
After restoring connectivity to Cogent this afternoon, Level 3 has now issued a press release explaining their side of the story. "Despite more than 75 days of advance written notice of the termination of our agreement, Cogent apparently failed to notify its customers or make any business plans to prepare for disconnection," notes Sureel Choksi, executive vice president of Level 3 Communications. The restored peering arrangement won't last if Cogent isn't willing to negotiate, however. "Level 3 has, effective immediately, re-established a free connection to Cogent. In order to allow Internet users to make alternative arrangements, we will maintain this connection until 6:00 a.m. ET, November 9, 2005. The effectiveness of this arrangement of course depends on Cogent's willingness to maintain their side of the traffic exchange."
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TKJunkMail
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| Re: That's right said by CapinPete  :Good move by Level 3. There will be no one to blame when the connections go down on 11/09 but Cogent and their sorry asses. That puts the ball back in Cogent's court and calls them out as liars in their press release.
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| | Kip patterson
Premium
join:2000-10-23
Columbus, OH | That was a well-crafted press release. It certainly will defuse criticism of Level3, as it should in my opinion. | |
| | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| But it was Level(3) that turned this back up because THEIR customers were complaining to them.
Do you think that having so many large dialup ISP's and RoadRunner as their customers that they weren't catching any flack from this? They did this to appease their own customers. There is no reason to think otherwise. Level(3)'s customers were complaining to Level(3), and Level(3) stopped it.
If Cogent lets it drop on Nov. 9, then Level(3) can have a better excuse to give their customers. But I doubt it will stop them from complaining. | |
| | | bmn
? ? ?
Premium,ExMod 2003-06
join:2001-03-15
hiatus
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :If Cogent lets it drop on Nov. 9, then Level(3) can have a better excuse to give their customers. I think with it out that Level(3) gave Cogent over 75 days notice, they already have a good excuse... Cogent dropping the ball on Nov. 9th would just be a repeat of what happened the other day.
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| | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right Level(3) can't use the 75 day notice, if it does indeed exist, as an excuse. Because they didn't notify their customers at all before they turned it off. Not 75 days before, not 30 days before, not 1 week before, not 24 hours before. Not even 1 hour before.
The Nov. 9th date is in an official press release. | |
| | | | | jnxrox
join:2005-10-07
Las Vegas, NV
| Take a step back Level3's general customer profile is not a small/med, single-homed business. They cater to large multi-homed carriers and businesses. Cogent's customer base is much more vunerable here. It's the single-homed level3 customer to the Cogent single-homed customer that is impacted and as low cost vendor to the masses, that fits the cogent profile more. Level3 isn't going to connect to transit to satisfy such a small % of customers just to get to Cogent's single-homed customers. Cogent has more skin in the game and you saw that desperation in their initial responses.
Disconnecting peering happens. Cogent was notified and did not make arrangements for their customers. Level3 disconnected and that was their plan. If you check the reality on the connectivity affected, it's smaller than Cogent would lead you to believe. Most companies are multi-homed and in fine shape for re-routing around these issues. | |
| | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: Take a step back Well, since Level(3) turned this back on because of customer complaints, obviously there was a lot of need for their customers to get to Cogent.
If it was as "small" an impact as you say, Level(3) wouldn't have been bothered by a "few" customer complaints.
Also, sometimes multihomed customers don't want to use their backup connection, because they may be paying more per megabit for it. Say you're paying Level(3) for a 155 mbps connection, and it's $50/mbit. And you have another connection to Provider X, who charges you $150/mbit, but ONLY if you use them. So that peer is running at 0, you're paying them nothing until you use it. Then suddenly 20% of your 155 mbps goes to your backup connection. All of a sudden you're looking at paying an extra $4600 a month that you didn't have to pay, because now one of your providers doesn't have any routes to Cogent.
Many multihomed customers are setup like that. They have a main link, and a backup. Sure, it was their choice to get such a link. But it is people like this that can pressure Level(3) to do what they had to do. I worked for a year for a small hosting company that had a Level(3) connection and a connection to another ISP that worked like this. | |
| | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: Take a step back said by smcallah :Well, since Level(3) turned this back on because of customer complaints, obviously there was a lot of need for their customers to get to Cogent. If it was as "small" an impact as you say, Level(3) wouldn't have been bothered by a "few" customer complaints. It wasn't turned back on because of customer complaints. It was turned on to help Cogent which was the more desperate party here. Notice the lack of information from Level3 as opposed to the screaming and press releases coming out of Cogent. It will be the same in Nov., Level3 will not pay to reach a small % of single homed cogent customers.
Mostly you'll still use the Level3 link to get to the many Cogent multi-homed customers, you'll just take a different path. But, yes in your scenario you would start using the unused link to get to the single-homed Cogent customers. Tell me why this is Level3's problem? They run their business, you run yours. With all the people up in arms there's one thing that seems to always be forgotten...this is not an unusual thing to happen, the Cogent response is what is the unusual piece. They did the same thing with others in the past and had to purchase routes to fill in their 'gaps'. You never hear about the other times carriers de-peer with each other because it's taken care of during the period of notice. Cogent uses the period to call the other carrier's bluff, and when connectivity is lost they smear. It's happened more than once.
This was more a PR war then anything and Cogent won the battle.
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| | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: Take a step back said by vferrari3 : It wasn't turned back on because of customer complaints. Sorry, but it was because of Level(3) customer complaints that this was turned back on.
Level(3) didn't care about helping Cogent, they cared about helping themselves. If they cared about helping Cogent, they would have extended this without turning it off.
But since Level(3) also had losing customers and losing revenue on its mind, they had to turn this back on. They were the only ones with the ability to turn it on.
It doesn't matter if it's Level(3)'s fault or not. The only reason they exist is for customers. If they lose those, what do they have? | |
| | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: Take a step back said by smcallah :Sorry, but it was because of Level(3) customer complaints that this was turned back on. Level(3) didn't care about helping Cogent, they cared about helping themselves. If they cared about helping Cogent, they would have extended this without turning it off. You don't get it. They have no obligation to extend without turning it off. Peering is for mutual benefit. When one party no longer perceives benefit they back out. The party that relies on that arrangement too much is the weaker of the two. Level3 turned it back on because clearly there were PR implications where the public was not understanding the issues and they gave Cogent a reprieve. They knew what they were doing, they've done it before and come november, they will still not have those Cogent routes unless cogent utilizes their transit providers. Level3 did a risk analysis and/or cost analysis. The arrangement doesn't work for them. There's nothing wrong with that. They believe that the cost to keep the peering up is too much and is not balanced by the revenue they take in from the smaller single homed customer that were affected. If those customers go away, it may even be that they perceive that as a good thing. Smaller customers in the wholesale carrier business are usually higher cost to operate and higher cost to provision. It's a business decision and if you don't like it, take your business elsewhere. Again, I applaud that decision and there's nothing wrong with that. Forcing Level3 to keep up links that are not beneficial to their business is what would be wrong.
How would you like it if you were forced to keep a business relationship going that you perceived as bad for your business? You'd want out if an arrangement with a supplier was no longer benefitting you.
_VF | |
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DSLTech
join:2000-12-30
San Jose, CA
| Re: Take a step back I know for sure Level 3's customers were complaining. Can you imagine what a handfull of unhappy ISPs complaining might do to convince Level 3 to make a change?
Who was complaining? Oh, perhaps ISPs like Earthlink, Speakeasy, Megapath, etc. who all have connections via Level 3 to the internet, as well as other forms of peering. Dont you think that their complaints weigh heavily on Level 3?
Earthlink could, for example, choose to use Wiltel instead of Level 3 as a primary internet access connection, so their displeasure is very, very important to Level 3.
Fortunately our ISP is dual-homed to the internet, Level 3 being only one of the 2 options. | |
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PGHammer
join:2003-06-09
Accokeek, MD
clubs:
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| Re: Take a step back Except for dial-up providers, and this would typicaly not apply to the larger such providers, *any* ISP, if at all possible, would multi-home (via, at worst, two second-tier bandwidth providers). I know of NO national dial-up ISPs (including Earthlink) that use single-peering. Apparently, for whatever reason, the expiration of Cogent's peering agreement with Level 3 would have seriously inconvenienced a major subset of customers (either Cogent's OR Level 3's) else the dispute would not be taking place. | |
| | | | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| I don't get it? My whole point was theoretical. Obviously it wasn't the true case. I was saying IF Level(3) cared about Cogent, they would have tried to work something out with them or extend the deadline without turning it off. They did not. So they spent 3 days getting customer complaints, which they DO care about. And so had to end up extending the deadline anyway.
But they obviously didn't care enough about their customers to let them know beforehand, so maybe my point is moot anyway.
And if the links aren't beneficial to Level(3)'s business, why did they turn them back up in the face of customer complaints?
It was customer complaints that brought this back up, whether you know that or not. What else would have brought it back up? Level(3) obviously wasn't willing to work with Cogent, for whatever reason, and dropped the connection.
They're more willing to work with them now, in the face of customer complaints, I hope anyway that it means they're more willing. It may simply mean that they are telling their customers that in 30 days you won't reach Cogent through them, and they'll end it at that with no negotiation. | |
| | | | | bmn
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Premium,ExMod 2003-06
join:2001-03-15
hiatus
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :Level(3) can't use the 75 day notice, if it does indeed exist, as an excuse. Actually they can. By giving Cogent at least 75 days notice, it gave Cogent the oppurtunity to prepare for the peering sessions to be ended.
Because they didn't notify their customers at all before they turned it off. Not 75 days before, not 30 days before, not 1 week before, not 24 hours before. Not even 1 hour before. They don't have to nor should they have to, otherwise Level3 would be required to notify customers of every tiny change. All they are required to do is tell Cogent. Once Cogent is notified, the ball is 100% in Cogent's court - they either fix their traffic profiles or they take measures to ensure routes to Level3.
As it stands, from the information available, Cogent totally dropped the ball here and this problem, considering they were given notice, appears to be their fault for the most part. They knew they would be cut off and failed to ensure they had alternate routes to Level3.
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| | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right said by bmn :They don't have to nor should they have to, otherwise Level3 would be required to notify customers of every tiny change. Tiny change? You think THIS was a tiny change?
Level(3) DOES notify its customers of major changes in the network. Most large providers I know do this, it's in their contracts with their customers. Especially ones with Service Level Agreements that require daily or monthly credits to be given when that SLA is not met.
I can't believe you consider this a tiny change that Level(3) made. | |
| | | | | | | bmn
? ? ?
Premium,ExMod 2003-06
join:2001-03-15
hiatus
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :said by bmn :They don't have to nor should they have to, otherwise Level3 would be required to notify customers of every tiny change. Tiny change? You think THIS was a tiny change? No, but you misunderstood, so I'll clarify...
Level(3) shouldn't need to be required to notify its customers of a peering change, otherwise then they would have to start to notifying their customers to tiny changes to the network. Is that more clear ?
Level(3) DOES notify its customers of major changes in the network. Most large providers I know do this, it's in their contracts with their customers. Especially ones with Service Level Agreements that require daily or monthly credits to be given when that SLA is not met.
I can't believe you consider this a tiny change that Level(3) made. Actually, you are right, this isn't a tiny change in the network, but I never considered it one. The point here is that it was Cogent's responsibility to make sure that it had routes to Level3 once Level3 notified them about the peering sessions being dropped. Level3 incorrectly assumed that Cogent would do ITS job and find alternate paths to their network via other transits providers.
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| | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right I still think you misunderstood.
Obviously Level(3) customers were pulling a lot of traffic from Cogent, or there wouldn't have been an issue here.
So this peering change would have been a change worthy of notifying their customers. They didn't notify their customers of it. And suddenly their customers' customers were complaining, and Level(3)'s customers could only say, "Not our fault." But that doesn't make customers understand the problem, even if it was explained to them, a non-technical customer isn't going to understand, neither are the ones that think they know what BGP is.
So Level(3) had RoadRunner and several large dialup ISP's fielding calls, giving credits, and losing customers during the almost 3 days that this was down.
I don't see how you think that notifying their customers of a major peering change would suddenly open them up to having to notify of every tiny change.
And what makes it ONLY Cogent's responsibility to make sure they could get Level(3) routes? Why wouldn't Level(3) have a resposibility to give their own customers routes to Cogent? And now obviously they have taken up that responsibility, by turning this back on because of customer complaints. | |
| | | | | | | | | bmn
? ? ?
Premium,ExMod 2003-06
join:2001-03-15
hiatus
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :I still think you misunderstood. Obviously Level(3) customers were pulling a lot of traffic from Cogent, or there wouldn't have been an issue here. No, the issue is that Cogent doesn't have enough users on its network to balance out the amount of traffic being sent to other networks. I recommend checking out when AOL dropped its SFI with Cogent and when C&W dropped its SFI with Cogent
said by smcallah :And what makes it ONLY Cogent's responsibility to make sure they could get Level(3) routes? Why wouldn't Level(3) have a resposibility to give their own customers routes to Cogent? And now obviously they have taken up that responsibility, by turning this back on because of customer complaints. Because, as an upstream Tier 1, Level3 receives the routes TO Congent's network FROM Cogent or via Cogent's transit providers. Without receiving those routes from Cogent, Level3 has no way of knowing how to get there... Level3 can't magically guess how to get to Congent without getting BGP information from Cogent. Level3 is not the one responsible to make sure that it can even see Cogent's networks since they don't have any control over Cogent's BGP information.
And the reason that Level3 took up the responsibility of getting routes to Cogent is because Cogent did not.
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| | | | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right said by bmn : Level3 is not the one responsible to make sure that it can even see Cogent's networks since they don't have any control over Cogent's BGP information. Obviously Level(3) has TOTAL CONTROL over the BGP routes it sees from Cogent on its network.
They can peer with Cogent, if they drop this peer, they lose the routes. They can also peer with a transit provider of Cogent, if Cogent has such a transit provider, and receive those routes. But Level(3) can also CHOOSE to drop those BGP routes.
Why do you think Level(3) has no control over Cogent's BGP routes on its network? | |
| | | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :said by bmn : Level3 is not the one responsible to make sure that it can even see Cogent's networks since they don't have any control over Cogent's BGP information. Obviously Level(3) has TOTAL CONTROL over the BGP routes it sees from Cogent on its network. They can peer with Cogent, if they drop this peer, they lose the routes. They can also peer with a transit provider of Cogent, if Cogent has such a transit provider, and receive those routes. But Level(3) can also CHOOSE to drop those BGP routes. Why do you think Level(3) has no control over Cogent's BGP routes on its network? Because the BGP tables were showing that they weren't even getting them. On the other side, Cogent fills in gaps in it's routing table from it's transit providers. It never asked them to send them Level3's routes. They did nothing. I'm impressing upon you that this is not a unique situation and what made it unique was Cogent. On Nov. 9 it will go down again and unless Cogent realizes it's position the same thing will happen.
_VF | |
| | | | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right Just because the BGP tables showed that Level(3) wasn't receiving them, doesn't mean that Level(3) wasn't.
I can receive plenty of BGP routes from a neighbor, but filter all of them. And they won't show up in my BGP tables.
Does that mean I wasn't receiving them? | |
| | | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :Just because the BGP tables showed that Level(3) wasn't receiving them, doesn't mean that Level(3) wasn't. I can receive plenty of BGP routes from a neighbor, but filter all of them. And they won't show up in my BGP tables. Does that mean I wasn't receiving them? They aren't filtering peers. I know this for a fact. I think you're mis-understanding. I'm not being ridiculous. I understand the customer complaints. Why I try to combat is all the speculation and mis-information that is getting tossed around. Like RR, I'm not ready to discount the reports that they were affected but as a former network designer type person, I have no idea how a network of that size with that customer base was affected. I could be missing something but it doesn't make sense unless they were single-homed to Level3 or Cogent which I find really hard to believe.
It's one thing for people to get upset and complain but it's another to try to speculate as to why this was done and why that was done. Case in point, I've heard over and over that this was done because Level3 wants to hold Cogent hostage and force them to pay them for the traffic. Not true. Most likely Level3 will lose traffic and revenue based on this decision but they did the analysis and decided it was the right thing for their business in the long run.
_VF | |
| | | | | | | | | | Kip patterson
Premium
join:2000-10-23
Columbus, OH
| Re: That's right My belief/guess is that Cogent has both paid transit connections and unpaid peering. In that situation most folks would try to put as much traffic as possible over the unpaid peers. So, Cogent did not annoounce all their IP's over the paid connections. When the peer went down, so did Cogent's connectivity to the world. It then appears that they announced the routes over Verio, for a while at least. That connection went down in 12 hours or so, followed by the rreconnection by L3.
RR (and others) can have all the redundancy they want, but if Cogent isn't announcing their routes RR will not be able to reach them. | |
| | | | | | | | | | bmn
? ? ?
Premium,ExMod 2003-06
join:2001-03-15
hiatus
| said by smcallah :Obviously Level(3) has TOTAL CONTROL over the BGP routes it sees from Cogent on its network. Incorrect. Level(3) does NOT have total contol over the BGP sessions from Cogent. If Cogent doesn't send them, Level(3) won't get them. If one of Congent's upstream providers filters them from reaching Level(3), Level(3) will not receive them. Its much more complex than that.
They can peer with Cogent, if they drop this peer, they lose the routes. Correct.
They can also peer with a transit provider of Cogent, if Cogent has such a transit provider, and receive those routes. But Level(3) can also CHOOSE to drop those BGP routes. Correct, however, there's no indication that Level(3) filtered Cogent's routes at the peering routers, but its possible.
Why do you think Level(3) has no control over Cogent's BGP routes on its network? They do have SOME control, but that control ONLY exists if Cogent is sending its routes to Level(3). Period.
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| | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| said by smcallah :I still think you misunderstood. So Level(3) had RoadRunner and several large dialup ISP's fielding calls, giving credits, and losing customers during the almost 3 days that this was down. I don't see how you think that notifying their customers of a major peering change would suddenly open them up to having to notify of every tiny change. And what makes it ONLY Cogent's responsibility to make sure they could get Level(3) routes? Why wouldn't Level(3) have a resposibility to give their own customers routes to Cogent? And now obviously they have taken up that responsibility, by turning this back on because of customer complaints. That's what the notice was for. Level3 is in the position of strength. They gave Cogent the notice to make arrangements to get to Level3 after the peering goes down. Level3 has the eyeballs and that's the position of strength. I know you don't like it, but this is the way it is and has been. Cogent is the one with the history of not being able to play nice and has been through this before. Most carriers respect the model and when peers de-peer them, they make the arrangements.
BTW, what does RR have to do with this. RR should be multi-homed and should not be caught up in this. If they were, shame on them. I think you're over estimating the number and type of customers that Level3 would be losing. Again, for their business model they may even expect to lose the lower end of the base in order to continue mining the higher end of their base. They have multiple 10Gb links to some customers, the single homed DS3 customer leaving is not affecting them.
_VF | |
| | | | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right said by vferrari3 :BTW, what does RR have to do with this. RR should be multi-homed and should not be caught up in this. If they were, shame on them. I think you're over estimating the number and type of customers that Level3 would be losing. Again, for their business model they may even expect to lose the lower end of the base in order to continue mining the higher end of their base. They have multiple 10Gb links to some customers, the single homed DS3 customer leaving is not affecting them. _VF Why are you even asking what does RR have to do with this? RR is a huge cable ISP. They use Level(3), they might be Level(3)'s largest customer. You don't think RR was complaining? And RR is multihomed, they appear to use Level(3) and ATDN in most markets. But the fact remains, that they complained to Level(3) as well. So THAT'S what they have to do with this.
You're definitely underestimating the customer complaints that would have been coming into Level(3). Especially since they were the reason that Level(3) had to turn this back up. Now that they've given their customers a 30 day notice, perhaps it won't be so bad for them on November 9th.
If Level(3) didn't stand to lose revenue or customers, they wouldn't have had to make a move. How do you even doubt this? Have you seen their financials? They're going to take a beating this month alone on service credits they had to give to keep customers from wanting to leave.
I for one wouldn't want to be fielding support calls for something I couldn't support. Which is what RR, some DSL, and some dialup ISP's hanging off of Level(3) had to do. So they passed that pain on to Level(3). At that point, Level(3) is responsible to its customers. Sure Cogent is responsible to its own customers on the other end. But Level(3) had the ability to immediately get their own customers fixed, and they did this, 2 1/2 days later, without a notice before the cut off.
If you can't see that from the Level(3) customer and the customers' customers standpoint, you need to drop out of this discussion, because you clearly do not get it. | |
| | | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA | Re: That's right My point is that RR should not be complaining to Level3. They should have had full visibility to all routes through multiple providers. So I'm trying to understand from RR's point of view, what was the outage?
_VF | |
| | | | | | | | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right You're ridiculous.
RR is a CUSTOMER OF LEVEL(3). Is that not clear to you?
They have EVERY RIGHT to complain to Level(3), no matter what your personal thoughts are on this. No matter if RR has multiple exit points or not.
RR is a business. They have SLA's that they are sure to complain about when Level(3) is having problems. Whether Level(3) does anything about it or not.
You really think RR should have done nothing towards Level(3)? | |
| | | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: That's right said by smcallah :You really think RR should have done nothing towards Level(3)? Depends on what the outage was. I still haven't figured out how RR was affected. If they were affected then they have a right to complain. Although if they were affected and I were a customer of RR I'd be upset that they were affected by such an issue.
_VF | |
| | | | | | | | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| said by smcallah :said by vferrari3 :If you can't see that from the Level(3) customer and the customers' customers standpoint, you need to drop out of this discussion, because you clearly do not get it. I sympathize with the customers. BUT...it's a policy decision. Do you know that some providers don't have access to every route on the internet because they filter inbound on allocation boundaries? Probably not. Because Cogent hasn't jumped up and down screaming about it. There are routinely 1-5% of the net inaccessible by certain ISPs due to filtering policies. Level3 shuts down peering, loses 1000 out of 150k routes and everyone flips out because Cogent stirs up a hornet's nest. Again, I sympathize with the customer, but I understand the bigger picture. The Internet is NOT a public utility and carriers are going to protect their resources and make decisions for their shareholders. This is not a recent phenomenon. _VF | |
| | | BosstonesOwn
join:2002-12-15
Everett, MA
clubs:
·Comcast
| said by smcallah :But it was Level(3) that turned this back up because THEIR customers were complaining to them. Do you think that having so many large dialup ISP's and RoadRunner as their customers that they weren't catching any flack from this? They did this to appease their own customers. There is no reason to think otherwise. Level(3)'s customers were complaining to Level(3), and Level(3) stopped it. If Cogent lets it drop on Nov. 9, then Level(3) can have a better excuse to give their customers. But I doubt it will stop them from complaining. Level 3 customers (yeah I use them) never had a problem reaching cogent or at least none of my servers. The had another peering agreement in place to take up the slack of the cogent drop. GCW ? I think it was. all be it it took a couple more hops to hit SJ but it still got there in under 200 ms. So I am happy.
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| | | | smcallah
join:2004-08-05
Home
| Re: That's right Level(3) did not have any Cogent routes on their network since Wednesday, that was easy to see with their looking glass server. They had no alternate routes to Cogent, or this wouldn't have been a problem.
RoadRunner, one of Level(3)'s largest customers, certainly couldn't reach Cogent through Level(3), as evidenced by all the posts from RoadRunner customers here. | |
| | 
PunkGod
join:2003-02-02
1 edit | Maybe good for them but I have roadrunner and I noticed alot of websites I visit wouldn't come up and the ones I could were slow as hell.
I got back to looking at a few websites and noticed it seemed faster than earlier. I came here and noticed they reconnected. | |
| 
Rob
In Deo speramus, God Bless the USA
Premium
join:2001-08-25
Kendall, FL | Wasted Lawsuit on the brinks? Why do I have a feeling that Cogent will file a lawsuit against Level3 that will expand for a 1 year or more and will consume millions of dollars? | |
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See 8 replies to this post | |
Spicolli
join:2002-08-03
Saint Paul, MN | Re If I was another carrier who could swoop in on some of these customers I would offer a rebate equal to the fee for dropping cogent. I bet they would get a lot of new customers, and get them locked in to a new contract. | |
| | 
texas net
@playnet.com
 from:
rec9140
| Re: Re Level3 restored connectivity because their own customers were the ones complaining, and leaving. I'm one of them that called Level3 and told them I am cancelling my contract.
Level3 pulled the plug on Cogent, and Level3 knew it would affect my business, I pay Level3 and they did this with absolutely no warning to me, their customer that they were going to do this.
They warn me about every little maintenance item that can posibly affect me, but when they are about to cut off access for 15% of my customer for political reasons they don't warn me at all? Totally irresponsible and inexcuseable.
Nice try at covering their own backsides, but it wasn't cogent's users that spurred them to reconnect, Level3 on their own site brags of having 5 of the top 6 dial up ISP's using their network, it was Level3's customers that forced Level3 to reconnect directly. | |
| | | 
lua6
Premium
join:2002-08-15
New York, NY | Re: Re i could kiss you right now | |
| | | hottboiinnc
ME
join:2003-10-15
Cleveland, OH | also don't forget L3 is where a lot of VoIP providers go for their network, especially E-911 and numbers. | |
| | | jeffs471
join:2005-09-16
Camarillo, CA | I agree with level 3's actions. Cogent is to blame. | |
| 
sherman10570
join:2000-10-15
Pleasantville, NY
 ·Verizon FIOS
| Just as everyone here suspected... said by Level 3 :
»biz.yahoo.com/prnews/051007/laf0···ml?.v=17
[...]
Free peering, also referred to as settlement-free peering, is a contractual relationship under which two companies exchange Internet traffic without charging each other.
[...]
Cogent was sending far more traffic to the Level 3 network than Level 3 was sending to Cogent's network.
[...]
Simply put, this means that, without paying, Cogent was using far more of Level 3's network, far more of the time, than the reverse. Following our review, we decided that it was unfair for us to be subsidizing Cogent's business.
Can anything else be said? Fucking Cogent...
- Sherman | |
| |
See 20 replies to this post | |
itsover
@64.34.x.x
| Stop figuring out who to blame....... I could care less who's fault it is.
I just wish that they would work out their problems and ensure both level3 and cogent customers that come 11/9 the problems wont happen again.
I think its both equllay their faults and every one thats ragging on cogent should just look at it this way:
Cogent is a budget provider, they allow people that cant pay 50$/mbit to provide hosting, servers etc.
Level3 asked cogent to start sending them more bandwidth, why? because level3 makes $$ by the mbit its users use, so if cogent sends them more bandwidth by peering, their users are using more meaning they are making more money.
So next time you want to think cogent is a bad company, take a minute stop being selfish, and relise they let many people get affordable net access and dont have to pay the outrages prices of 50+a mbit on a 100meg commitement. | |
| | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: Stop figuring out who to blame....... said by itsover :
Level3 asked cogent to start sending them more bandwidth, why? because level3 makes $$ by the mbit its users use, so if cogent sends them more bandwidth by peering, their users are using more meaning they are making more money.
What makes you think level3 asked Cogent to send them more traffic. This makes no sense.
The eyeballs that level3 users have to suck down Cogent content is largely dialup and DSL. More likely priced per port utilization and not bandwidth utilization. It's the level3 customers, the earthlinks, AOLs, NetZero's of the world that charge the users per bandwidth. Although that is going away as well as providers move more to flat rates per subscriber.
Regardless, this is the way it works, level3 is settlement-free and has a mix of content and eyeballs on the network and Cogent is not. They have a lot of content. It works with others and peering and de-peering happens. It's not new. Cogent didn't react and decided to not do anything. They have a bit of time to make new arrangements this time. We'll see what they do.
Multi-homing to multiple providers is always a good policy for redundancy.
_VF | |
| | |
itsover
@rr.com
| Re: Stop figuring out who to blame....... Yeah your probably right about the per port setup, i did'nt think about that.
I can see why level3 would want to de-peer cogent anyways, they charge 10$ a mbit while level3 chages about 5x that, so level3 would lose customers, thats why i think cogent should make agreements for paid peering so if they want to de-peer them they will atleast have some transit...
I just hope in the next weeks Cogent has they work something out, and maybe keep peering open with level3. | |
| | | |
itsover
@rr.com
| Re: Stop figuring out who to blame....... Oh, and about the "What makes you think level3 asked Cogent to send them more traffic. This makes no sense"
It's in cogents press release here:
»www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2005/oct/1190945.htm
"In fact, Cogent is willing to offer Level
3 free Internet service across our network to help alleviate their financial
situation while also discussing appropriate traffic ratios. Cogent feels
allegations of inappropriate traffic ratios have been incorrectly articulated
by Level 3. In fact, it is Level 3 who requested that Cogent send more
traffic across their network since Level 3 charges by the bit, and increased
traffic flow helps them financially." | |
| | | | | jnxrox
join:2005-10-07
Las Vegas, NV
| Re: Stop figuring out who to blame....... Still makes no sense. Judging from the reaction of Cogent I would say it's not true. Along with a few other things they tried to say over the past couple of days. Remember this is the company that 'neglected' to mention they have known about this for 75 days and didn't do anything to prepare. Notice how quiet Level3 was. They did everything they were going to do. The responses showed who was in the position of strength and who was the desperate party.
Let's hope they get it worked out and we don't have a repeat in 30 days.  | |
| 
Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC | Numbers? Where are the numbers?
Cogent this, Cogent that...
Where are the actual Tbps NUMBERS? | |
| | jnxrox
join:2005-10-07
Las Vegas, NV
| Re: Numbers? said by Matt :Where are the actual Tbps NUMBERS? We'll probably never see them. Under NDA for both companies but it's safe to say that peering is for the 'mutual benefit of both parties'. Don't listen to all the crap about Level(3) wanting to get money from cogent. They don't care how cogent gets to them even if it's through another transit provider. If the relationship wasn't benefiting them then they had the right to terminate. Everything else is hand waving as far as I'm concerned. Too many people speculating about things they don't understand. | |
| | | 
DCIFRTHS
join:2000-02-18
Hartsdale, NY
| Re: Numbers? I'm trying to make sense of all this, and I don't understand something. First, a few statements on what I believe to be true:
1) All tier one providers have peering agreements with each other.
2) Peering agreements allow tier one providers to hand off traffic to another tier one to facilitate routing (speed and accessibility) on the internet. Assunming no other connectivity between the two computers.
3) If there were no peering agreements, either paid or free, access to bits stored on computer "A" could not be accessed by computer "B" if the two computers "hang" off of different tier one providers.
If all of the above statements are correct, then the part I don't understand is why Cogent couldn't route the bits that were to come from Level 3 through a different tier one connection (peer).
Additionally, are there any requirements that tier one providers have imposed on them to establish and maintain peering agreements? If not, isn't this a HUGE hole in the "internet"?
tier one providers to let their customers, whoever they may be, access bits that are stored on computer "x" even though the bots reside on computer "Y" and can only be accessed using | |
| | | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: Numbers? said by DCIFRTHS :I'm trying to make sense of all this, and I don't understand something. First, a few statements on what I believe to be true: 1) All tier one providers have peering agreements with each other. Tier 1/2/3 is a marketing term. Providers have peering arrangements when it's mutually beneficial to directly connect to each other. That is, if both are paying transit providers to reach eachother they say 'hey, we give eachother roughly the same amount of traffic. Let's cut out the middle man and connect to eachother. I'll pay for 2 links and you pay for 2 links.' It's been accepted that the so called Tier 1's do indeed peer with eachother and also do not pay anyone for a full routing table to reach the 'Internet'.
2) Peering agreements allow tier one providers to hand off traffic to another tier one to facilitate routing (speed and accessibility) on the internet. Assunming no other connectivity between the two computers. True. Traffic from one carriers customers to another carriers customers but not to transit the peer and reach a third carrier's customers.
3) If there were no peering agreements, either paid or free, access to bits stored on computer "A" could not be accessed by computer "B" if the two computers "hang" off of different tier one providers. Sure. You either pay to reach the other side or use a peering link. Free yes but there are still costs.
If all of the above statements are correct, then the part I don't understand is why Cogent couldn't route the bits that were to come from Level 3 through a different tier one connection (peer). Two things, first by definition, Cogent would not receive Level3 routes through another 'peer'. Second, to reach the routes no longer accessible they have to get them some other way. Without the peering arrangement they do that buy purchasing transit. They pay another provider like Sprint or Verio and receive level3 routes from their provider.
Additionally, are there any requirements that tier one providers have imposed on them to establish and maintain peering agreements? If not, isn't this a HUGE hole in the "internet"? The contract have terms and conditions and either party can terminate with notice. There's a common quote going around now that sums it up nicely.
"A true peer relationship is based on the supposition that either party can terminate the interconnection relationship and that the other party does not consider such an action a competitively hostile act. If one party has a high reliance on the interconnection arrangement and the other does not, then the most stable business outcome is that this reliance is expressed in terms of a service contract with the other party, and a provider/client relationship is established"
This is what has happened here. Cogent, based on their reaction, has shown that they rely on the peering more than Level3 yet they have been insisting that they are big enough to remain peers. It does not seem so now. Level3 opitimizes this as they have shown that they are not reliant on the peering and they do not consider it beneficial anymore. It's a business decision.
This has always created small holes in the Internet. There was never anything that said the Internet guarantees connectivity from EVERY host to EVERY OTHER host in the world.
-VF | |
| 
SweetDelight
lagomorph
Premium
join:2004-09-04
Earth | This fight This fight makes me feel sick.. Oh the Utter unhapiness with business's and end users. | |
| jagged
join:2003-07-01
Boynton Beach, FL
| Too much time for Cogent November 9? After having a 75 day advanced notice AND making an effort to work it out? Too much slack for a freeloading company.
I would have given Cogent 2 weeks from now to get their shit together or the cord gets pulled.
Obviously Cogent likes to use other companies networks a lot more than their own. Didn't the little spat with AOL happen because Cogent then too was sending a lot more traffic?
I think Level3 should have warned it's clients though, but to me they are still within their right to terminate Cogent. | |
| | | vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| Re: peering cost????? said by TxRoadDawg :Just has me curious how level 3 thinks its losing xyz of money from this peering exchange. now i COULD be wrong:o but level 3 keeps its network up and running 24/7 regardless of usage on it, thats a FIXED expense. It's not a fixed expense. There is capital (Routers and router ports) and network expense (circuits) needed to build the network and augment the network. Operational expense to run the network. The settlement free peering is based on a relationship of mutual benefit. If carrier A gives carrier B more traffic than in reverse, carrier B has to build out more capacity to handle the traffic and the costs become unbalanced. When all is equal, or close to equal then the costs balance out and that's when peering is at it's best and makes the most sense. When it's not balanced one party has the right to disconnect in order to save on costs since there is then an imbalance and one carrier is benefiting more from the arrangement. The traffic should normally continue to flow from other carriers where there is either a payment arrangement or over other peering links where the relationship is more beneficial.
_VF | |
| vferrari3
join:2005-10-07
Boston, MA
| A nice summary Everyone should read NANOG before thinking they know how the Internet works. This is a nice summation of previous Cogent issues and why Level3 hasn't done anything you wouldn't do in the same situation:
»www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nano···471.html
RAS knows what he's talking about and as I've been trying to point out, as a business decision Level3 is not expected an increase in revenue.
"Let me be perfectly clear here, under absolutely no line of logic will L3
see an increase in revenue from this, period. If you think they will, you
don't understand how the Internet works. What L3 will see from this is a
REDUCTION IN BILLABLE TRAFFIC AND BACKBONE UTILIZATION." - RAS
_VF | |
| psycho
join:2004-07-10
Overland Park, KS
1 edit | Just a Test! Testing!:D | |
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peering cost?????