The MPLS WG Archive

[Graham Cope <G.Cope@ftel.co.uk>]

Panos Trimintzios wrote:
> 
> Lixia is right bandwidth is officially a market commodity see:
> 
> Dow Jones to launch bandwidth index
> http://home.cnet.com/category/0-1004-200-1677726.html
> 


Being a commodity, however, should not be confused with being cheap.
There are also commodity markets in diamonds, gold and crude oil
(topical at the moment!).

That then leads back to the fundamental (and possibly off topic)
question as to whether IP QoS is really required.
  To do so a service provider must charge for the good QoS. Can they
really be bothered to put in such mechanisms? Where does that leave the
cosy transit agreements that ISPs traditionally have?
 If they cannot be bothered to charge (i.e. it costs more than they get
back from it) then the Internet will remain best effort. I suspect the
IP QoS will remain a niche opportunity for suppliers of premium class
business VPNs with over-provisioning being the long term solution for
most customers as bandwdith becomes cheap (it may be a commodity, but it
ain't negligibly cheap yet, especially in the access network).

Just a thought.


Graham