Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

[Magnus <magnus AT trilug.org>]

Michael Tharp wrote:
> This is absolutely key. Zero-cost peering would allow bittorrent and
> other peer-to-peer solutions to thrive as a content delivery mechanism
> since there's no whining from upstream providers who have to foot the
> bill for their overbooked bandwidth. The hard part will be connecting to
> a backbone, where all the servers live, which won't be cheap;
> residential connections are extremely asymmetric since normal people
> don't have a lot of use for upload.
> 
> This topic has come up several times in the past few months on TriLUG
> and now INW, so I'm beginning to believe it might just be crazy enough
> to work. It's a bit of a pipe dream (pun intended), but hey, somebody
> has to try it or we'll never know!


I'm suggesting that the cooperative *NOT* provide internet connection
itself.  This is just a last mile network.  And provide a level playing
field for ISP's to compete for the business of cooperative members.
Maybe you use a VPN client or something similar to exit the last mile
network.

The point is to level the playing field, which is something we don't
have today.  If the cooperative focuses on the best last mile
connectivity, and let the ISP's focus on the internet connectivity and
being competitive with one another. everyone wins.  No?