roundtable: Re: feast-or-famine, FYI from Edupage

roundtable: Re: feast-or-famine, FYI from Edupage

Re: feast-or-famine, FYI from Edupage

DDeBar (Spikey@BestWeb.net)
Fri, 1 Aug 1997 23:06:27 -0400 

Message-Id: <199708020316.XAA05855@okeefe.bestweb.net>
From: "DDeBar" <Spikey@BestWeb.net>
To: <roundtable@cni.org>
Subject: Re: feast-or-famine, FYI from Edupage
Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 23:06:27 -0400


On Friday, August 01, 1997, Sam Simon <sam@simon.net> wrote:
> 
> James Love <love@cptech.org> wrote:
> > 
> > ..... Charging for usage has nothing to do with Congestion, unless the
> > charges are related to congestion.  FOR EXAMPLE, until recently, AOL
> > had usage charges, AND IT HAD CONGESTION PROBLEMS, when everyone tried 
> > to use the network at the same time.  I used to use DRI's pricey data
> > network, which had a $60 per HOUR usage charge.  Guess what, it was
> > congested as all hell at predictable times of the day.
> >
> >     If you want to charge for congestion, not usage, show how this can
> > be done.  But don't make assertions that usage pricing will reduce
> > congestion, if it will simply reduce overall usage, without doing
> > anything about the the congestion problems that happen when everyone
> > is on the network at the same time.
> >
> >     Jamie
> >
> > Curtiss Priest wrote:
> > >
> > > RESEARCHERS ADVOCATE INTERNET USE CHARGE
> > >
> > > Researchers at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center conducted tests that
> > > showed the average packet of digital data took 189 milliseconds to
> > > travel from Stanford University to Cranfield University in Great Britain
> > > and then back to Stanford.  They then developed a statistical model of
> > > Internet traffic showing that when users are encouraged by fast
> > > response times, they ramp up their Internet activities, thus creating
> > > the "storms," or bursts of congestion, that continually plague the
> > > Net.  When the response time slows to a crawl, users back off, and
> > > eventually things get back to normal.  To avoid the feast-or-famine 
> > > scenario, the researchers advocate charging all users according to 
> > > the amount of bandwidth they use.  (Chronicle of Higher Education 
> > > 1 Aug 97)
> > >
> > >            W. Curtiss Priest, Director, CITS
> > >       Center for Information, Technology & Society
> > >          466 Pleasant St., Melrose, MA  02176
> > >        Voice: 617-662-4044  BMSLIB@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> > >  Fax: 617-662-6882 WWW: http://www.eff.org/pub/Groups/CITS
> >
> > --
> > _______________________________________________________
> > James Love | Center for Study of Responsive Law
> > P.O. Box 19367 | Washington, DC 20036 | 202.387.8030
> > http://www.cptech.org | love@cptech.org
> 
> 
>   Jamie,
> 
>     You are right of course.  The point of usage charges is to (1)
> discourage use and (2) allocate cost to cost causers.  Cost in a network
> envrionment tends to be expansion to meet peak load demand.  Thus, it is
> important to charge only for those who contribute to peak, when they
> contribute to peak.  Sometimes, the cost of metering in this way is more
> expensive than the value it creates.  In any case, if there is to be
> unit charging, it should be focused on peak-load times.


Consider this. TV air and CATV is firmly in the hands of mega-media, 
and out of hte reach, price-wise, of the rest of us. If the charge for
bandwidth, as reasonable as it sounds from the perspective of a "user 
fee", is imposed, then most people will likewise be priced out of doing 
IN video.  Where, exactly, are the rest of us going to find a soapbox 
that is tall enough to us to be able speak to more, and look at, than 
one person at a time?

DDeBar  


Don DeBar
<spikey@bestweb.net>

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