[e2e] 0% NAT - checkmating the disconnectors

[Dah Ming Chiu]

I have only read the last 2-3 posts of this thread - interesting discussion.
What puzzles me is why it is necessary to have such a "social compact"
to ensure global transit. Isn't market forces strong enough to guarantee
connectivity?  In other words, if you are an ISP preferring to limit 
transit,
maybe some of your customers will find other transit providers?  Of course,
at some levels, when there is monopoly, there still needs to be government
regulations.

DMC

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David P. Reed" <dpreed at reed.com>
To: "David P. Reed" <dpreed at reed.com>
Cc: <end2end-interest at postel.org>
Sent: Monday, March 13, 2006 10:40 PM
Subject: Re: [e2e] 0% NAT - checkmating the disconnectors


> Note that in the commentary about "social compacts" below I was making an 
> analogy between the Internet compact and the AT&T-USGovt.  compact.   This 
> analogy is, of course, limited.   In particular the counterparties of the 
> Internet compact are the set of all other Internet participants, not the 
> government.   The Internet is not an entity that fits within the 
> jurisdiction of the US Govt.   It transcends that boundary by its very 
> nature as a framework for cooperation.  Similarly English language culture 
> transcends the US Government (though the French seem to think they define 
> the French language by governmental fiat).
>
> David P. Reed wrote:
>>
>> Greg Skinner wrote:
>>> I went back and reread Saikat's paper.  I did not view his remarks in
>>> the light that you seem to.  I read them as "a network operator would
>>> like to protect his network from abuse, and enable its authorized
>>> users to freely communicate."
>>>
>> I did not read the following paragraph from Saikat's email that way:
>>> Is there a way to architect the Internet to give the network operator
>>> full control over his network? So, when his boss (who paid for the wires
>>> and routers) asks him to block application X, he can do just that and
>>> not cause the collateral damage that firewall-hacks cause today.
>>>
>> It's important to realize that the Hushaphone decision was argued (and 
>> won) on the basis that AT&T's claim that ANY application they didn't like 
>> had a risk of "damaging" the network, which was demonstrably owned by 
>> AT&T.   So there is a plausible (but outlandish) risk that any user 
>> action can damage the network (even attaching a piece of plastic to the 
>> phone handset!)
>>
>> The resolution of Carterfone was not based on a demonstration the there 
>> was NO risk to the network from attached devices.   It was based on AT&T 
>> abusing its social contract with the US Government, whereby the 
>> government acknowledged a de facto monopoly, in exchange for a variety of 
>> public goods that it promised (such as investing in and deploying new 
>> technology via Bell Labs) and its failure to deliver those public goods.
>>
>> The same deal exists in the implicit Internet Compact (such as it is) - 
>> if you offer to carry IP traffic, you offer to carry all of it, just as 
>> all other AS's do.   Subject of course to making yourself a target of 
>> directed attacks that are in fact real.   The Internet as a whole aids 
>> each other in finding and fixing such problems.   Unilateral behavior 
>> leads to balkanization, and at that point there is no Internet.
>>
>>
>>