LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Richard Russell <richardrussell@mail.com>
  To  : Jason Tan <jason@rebel.rebel.net.au>
        Simon Hackett <simon@internode.com.au>
  Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2001 23:27:52 +1030

RE: AOL? or best ISP

> I suspect it would be fair to say that the that cached and local traffic
> is very very very low cost.

except for the cost of the equipment to cache this effectively...

> So by all means charge for the bytes that cost you(in fact of coure you
> should charge exactly how you want, it is your business), but uless
> you differentiate between bytes that actually cost you and bytes that
> dont, then you are not simply charging the customer for the bytes that you
> are charged on.
> You are likely charging on way more than that  form the last time I
> checked your price list(the installfest).
>
> Some ISPs recognise this and charge these bytes at different rates or do
> not count them against the bytes yioyu are charged against.
> This seems reasonable and equitable to the ISP and the user.

but how understandable is it to the average user? Could you imagine trying
to explain to users the concept of caching, and that if they go to
www.a.popular.site.com, some of the stuff will be cached, and some won't,
and they won't be able to tell what's what, and that it's possible that if
they are the first people at the ISP to access a 10Mb file, they will be
charged 18c/Mb for it, but if someone else had already got to it, they would
get charged only 2c/Mb... I think for the average user, and even for most of
us, it would be preferable for the ISP to cache and reduce the average cost
per Mb to say 15c/Mb through this caching... etc...

<snip we love/hate Internode>

IMHO, it would be good to stop talking about Internode now... I think the
Internode guys have done well responding to criticisms and questions, and
taking this any further would be completely unproductive. I think we have
established that Internode aims to be good and fast before it aims to be
cheap, and that there are other ISPs around offering different combinations
of good, fast and cheap... I think we have also established that some ISPs
are profitable and some are not (and Internode claimed to be in the former
category), and the sustainability of an ISP matters to some consumers and
not to others. There are many other things that we have established, so
unless there is something new to establish, let's leave it be, or at least
remember that this is LinuxSA, not InternodeSA :)

JMHO

rr

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