>How exactly does a larger address space ease deployment of an ISP?
Y'know, I almost answered this, and decided against it. After reading this whole note, I realized it wasn't conversation, it was argument, and I almost came underdressed.
>"Current thinking" of who? Sure we should conserve space, but that was
>not my argument.
Your argument was that:
> >The whole point of getting the bigger address space is to be better than
> >your competition (multi-homed, etc etc.)
And I'm telling you with fairly solid certainty that the point of address space of any kind has NOTHING to do with position on the totem pole or being "better than your competition." Based on your last note, we should wantonly acquire larger blocks and one-up GenericISP because doing so is an available weapon prescribed by the IANA.
>Ever seen a nasty catfight between small local ISPs?
Do you realize who you're talking to?
The problem is the users, not the ISPs. Any user worth two cents of online time can pick the liars out of the mix and go to the superior provider. We don't have many "low-end" AOL types, virtual domain wanna-be-in-business-on-the-Internet yahoos because the morons across town do a better job of downright LYING to them. Try and tell one of those clowns you're multi-homed, or have Cisco 7000s over 2501s, tell them you're connected to NAPs, not the larger provider on the other end of town, and tell them you've been doing IP for almost 10 years. They don't know the difference, and they don't care. They see the schmooze, and they hear the speel, and they see the price is lower. Y'know what? They buy it. Fine. I'm not in this business to keep other people from making money. I wish the opposite were true too.
I don't hold my competitors nearly as responsible for this as I used to. The fact is, the lusers can't even appreciate the argument. There are just too many customers and too many greedy ISPs with sights set on getting money from all of them.
Can you imagine what this world would look like if there were ANY other industry with as many clueless consumers as clueless vendors? I can just see the automobile market now, or the airline industry. Hell, a restaurant.
"Oh, can you tell me about your food, please? Filet mignon? Well, the place that sells food over there has some for a tiny fraction of your price. No, they call theirs a Big Mac. Your beef is range-bred and USDA Grade A? No, theirs is farm-grown, frozen; I don't know for how long. Well, I can buy fifty of their Big Macs and resell them, but by the time I get just two of yours sold they'll go rotten and be no better than theirs. Seems theirs has a longer halflife."
Or health care:
"Yes, I'd like your prices on medical attention, please."
"Sure, how can I help you?"
"I require medical attention. The place across town offers it for X"
"Oh, we're MUCH cheaper than that. Our overhead is VERY low, and we pass on the savings to you."
"Well, I think I'm going to need to make a decision immediately."
"I can have our complete line of medical facilities ready to deploy in fifteen seconds."
"Well, they said they were AMA rated, had something called "doctors" on staff, and said they accepted all kinds of insurance."
"That's just marketing. You're here now, we're ready now, we can take care of you now and for a lot cheaper. Trust me: those people can't give as good service as we can because they're too big for their own good."
"Well, they said they had an operating room, "surgeons," and something called an intensive care unit. What do you have?"
"We have these brand new Zee first aid kits! And, we have TEN of them!"
<patient drops dead of the heart attack that started before he even walked in>
It doesn't stop there. We have twenty-station hands-on labs in two counties and have a pretty extensive set of courses Internet and non-'Net related. Our turnout is about even with the guys with the weekly free seminars.
And people wonder why the dropouts have such a bad taste in their mouth and decry the Internet's success.
>I have no interest in your real estate, but I *KNOW* that customers of
>most, if not all ISPs care about the reliability of their network, ergo,
>the connectivity that their ISP has to its neighbors and that IS a
>selling point.
Please rephrase this wordy sentence using the English Language.
>If your sales people (for all of you small ISPs out there that don't have
>connections to 3+ NAPs) aren't using the "We are connected at TWO points
>where [insert rival network name here]'s network is only connected to
>ONE!" pitch, you have the wrong sales people.
Then thank God you have them all.
>PS: can you format your text for 80 columns next time so that I don't have
> to do it in my reply?
It is. BTW, you're set to 60
While we're on the topic, why did you CC me if I'm on the list? Do you think so highly of your words that you feel I need two copies? Or three? Before you know it, I'll be in the CC line of every replicated reply. STOP CCing ME IF I'M ON THE LIST!
Carl