Hi Don,
More comments inline below.
On 06/08/2012 03:36 PM, Don Fanning wrote:
No, I would
definitely not decline, I would be happy to
accept, as long as it is free for non-commercial
use.
So here is the flaw in your logic. These
educational and scientific organizations are not
in the business of maintaining physical circuits.
That is left to the Level3's, Vodafone's and
Cogent's of the world. Each of these
organizations lease circuits and dark fiber from
them. None of them have laid a single piece of
cable from one country to another (with perhaps
the exception being CERN). They are in the
business of Science! Not telecommunications. At
some point you are left with peering on a
commercial network broadcasting your routes.
Either I am unclear or you haven't got it. I would accept
free transit from anyone, but I wouldnt trust anyone else
than hams with 44/8 addresses, not even research and
education networks.
Free transit does not involve ham resources.
The fiber optic cable that you use to connect
your server to your storage area network is not
the same that goes into the ground or in the air
or under the ocean. Each of those applications
use different cable that is much more expensive.
Actually the fiber I am referring to can be used both
underground, with or without a duct (if you have no
termites eating them) and in the air (preferably above
power lines to protect them from people believing it is
copper inside). Submarine cables are a bit more expensive,
but over distances where you can avoid active amplifiers
(festoon solutions) less than ten times more. Transatantic
is about 30 times more, typically 1 USD/inch.
Your analogy of using staff/students to string
16km (9 miles) of fiber while interesting and
laudable doesn't apply. We're talking about
1000's of km of long haul DWDM fiber optics and
the equipment to boost the signal at regular
distances. Depending on where you are running it,
you have to have equipment to run it through km's
of conduit or across oceans where you have to deal
with dragnetters.
Yes, the next phase being discussed in Somalia is to
interconnect the metropolitan area links. Garowe -
Mogadishu is some 2500 km and few intermediate stops. The
idea is to include a free fiber pair for research and
education, and why not ham activities. The main challenge
is not funding but what trustworthy consortium can be
formed to own it. There is an economical tradeoff between
deploying more fiber and use cwdm/dwdm when there is not
enough fiber. cwdm is cheap.
If multi-million dollar corporations and cities
are having a hard time implementing it, what makes
you think a group of blowhards wearing plastic
antennas can do it better?
Well, it is often easier to do things that are guaranteed
not ever to become commercial than things that definitely
are commercial since everyone wants a piece of the pie.
The main roles of regulators include to collect tax from
the market and support public good aspects. The groups
fall in different categories.
While I completely understand your position and
agree with it in some aspect, the fact is that
44net itself is not a space regulated by the IARU
and other than whatever your country applies to
free speech, is not bound to keeping with
non-commercial/non-business rules. It is a
allotment of public network address space.
Nothing more. Nothing less.
I am certainly aware of that 44net is not regulated by
IARU, but by ICANN and that IANA and regional registries
may be watching us. I am under the impression, correct me
if I am wrong, that the rules applying to 44net are very
unclear since the allocation is unique and that it might
be better to show good conduct rather than ask or
misbehave.
Has anyone asked what rules apply and what was in that
case the answer?
/Bjorn