Subject: RE: How the IPnG effort was started

From: "Michel Py" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 18:23:51 -0800

>> Noel Chiappa wrote:
>> The IETF needs to seriously face the reality of the
>> network that's really out there, not the network some
>> of us wish were there.

> grenville armitage wrote:
> I imagine any number of circuit-switching Telco-types
> said much the same thing to the emerging packet-switching
> fanatics 30+ years ago. And I know B-ISDN types said the
> same to "Internet fanatics" 15+ years ago.

I think you missed the point. As of today, IPv6 is in the same situation
ISDN has always been:

I Still Don't Need.
^ ^     ^     ^

ISDN which 10 years ago was supposed to be the digital miracle that
would save us from the analog crap and take over the world never took
off because the price was not worth the gain, the majority of phones and
dial-up still are analog and now ISDN costs _more_ than DSL or cable for
low-end data.

Michel.

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From: Juergen Schoenwaelder <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 07:56:22 +0100

> dial-up still are analog and now ISDN costs _more_ than DSL or cable for

What one observes in one part of the world is not necessarily true in 
all parts of the world.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder		    International University Bremen
<http://www.eecs.iu-bremen.de/>	    P.O. Box 750 561, 28725 Bremen, Germany

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:19:09 +0100

Michel,

> I think you missed the point. As of today, IPv6 is in the same situation

You might explain that to the people who say they need IPv6.

     Brian

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From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 14:21:21 +0200

> I think you missed the point. As of today, IPv6 is in the same situation

Comparisons to past successes or failures are fun, but
not always good indications of future. There are several
reasons behind why something takes or does not take off.
These include customer needs, timing (can the SDO complete
the specs before people deploy?), conformance to a
dominating technology (why would I buy Beta if all movies
are on Vhs?), problems working in all situations (does my
VoIP call go through a NAT?), business case for all the parties
that need to do something (can I charge you more if we
start offering <x>?), ease of use (zero configuration for
most of the network stuff is a requirement for success
as far as I can see), immediate benefits (or do you have
to wait before everyone else on the planet has it too before
you can use it at all?) and so on.

The trouble with looking at past failures is that they
make you feel like nothing can ever change. Yet we do have
examples of spectacular successes, even in cases where there
has been obstacles in the way, significant complexity or
existing, competing technology that provides some of the
same functionality. Say, switch from analog to digital
cellular technology. Many such successes occur in situations
where the market is growing rapidly, which makes it easier
to change technology. And I believe the Internet is growing
rapidly. For instance, there are billions of people in Asia,
hopefully most of whom will probably have Internet access
in the next ten years. Or the cell phone users, looks like
the trend is that everyone will also have IP (and IPv6!);
that's over a billion users more than we have now in the
Internet.

Also, the comparisons may not be exact matches: I wonder
what would have happened to ISDN if the numbering system
in the analog system had run out of numbers, and everyone
who got their phone after 1960, including all the Chinese
subscribers, would only be able to make, not receive
calls?

--Jari

---

From: [email-masked] (Kai Henningsen)
Date: 20 Nov 2004 13:49:00 +0200

> I think you missed the point. As of today, IPv6 is in the same situation

Whereas I have used ISDN for over a decade now, and so have enough Germans  
that it's been very many years that pretty much every BBS switched to  
support ISDN.

I hear you still use 56k Modems in the US. When people switched to ISDN  
64k over here, "fast" typically was 14.4k. It's been quite a while since I  
last used a modem ... 80's tech.

> would save us from the analog crap and take over the world

... well, over here that is pretty much exactly what happened ...

>never took
> off because the price was not worth the gain,

Aah. Capitalism at work, eh?

Over here, a standard ISDN line (two channels, three numbers) costs pretty  
much exactly the same as two analog lines (two channels, two numbers), and  
always has.

Makes for a slightly different cost equation.

>the majority of phones and

That's just ridiculous.

MfG Kai

---

From: "Stephen Sprunk" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2004 10:59:24 -0600

Thus spake "Kai Henningsen" <[email-masked]>
> [email-masked] (Michel Py)  wrote on 16.11.04 in 
> <[email-masked]>:

State-supported monopolies have an advantage in rolling out technologies 
widely before there's enough demand to justify them, solving the 
chicken-and-egg problem.  We choose to put the cost of new technology where 
(in our opinion) it belongs: on the people that are using it.  Different 
deployment rates (and subsidy rates) result which are appropriate for each 
culture.

> ... well, over here that is pretty much exactly what happened ...

And most parts of the world still don't have analog phone lines, much less 
ISDN or broadband.  9600bps modems are still futuristic technology in those 
places.

> Makes for a slightly different cost equation.

Whereas here an ISDN line still costs at least twice as much as two analog 
lines, plus often carries per-minute tolls even for local calls which are 
toll-free with analog.

>> the majority of phones and dial-up still are analog and now ISDN
>> costs _more_ than DSL or cable for low-end data.
>
> That's just ridiculous.

But that's the situation in the US...  DSL/Cable are significantly cheaper 
and faster than ISDN, often by a factor of 10x or more per kbps.

S

Stephen Sprunk         "God does not play dice."  --Albert Einstein
CCIE #3723         "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the
K5SSS        dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking

---

From: [email-masked] (Kai Henningsen)
Date: 21 Nov 2004 09:29:00 +0200

> deployment rates (and subsidy rates) result which are appropriate for each

But the monopoly ended long ago; the pricing continues pretty much  
unchanged. So it seems to me there's something wrong with your analysis.

ISTR that the local competition (the one who's laying down cables like  
crazy, pretty much every time a street is dug up) started with offering  
ISDN *only* (not sure if they ever changed).

Anyway, back when ISDN was rolled out, I was under the impression that the  
US generally had digital exchanges, and Germany still had lots of pre- 
digital ones - tone dialling was only just becoming available and  
certainly not everywhere, whereas from what I heard pulse dialling in the  
US was essentially dead for a good while. (I have never heard that you can  
do Caller ID on analog lines over here, either. People who want that use  
ISDN.)

So this says to me that the rollout of the basics here was *later* than in  
the US - not earlier.

But I also remember many tales of woe about battling ISDN standards in the  
US, and every phone company having their incompatible own. Possibly that  
had quite a bit to do with the differing results ...

No, I don't think it was a question of monopoly. Rather, it looks a lot  
like the good old OS/2 marketing problem - you *can* market a technology  
to death.

> lines, plus often carries per-minute tolls even for local calls which are

Well, ours aren't toll-free either way.

My general impression is that nobody in the phone company business here  
likes providing POTS.

I should perhaps add that as far as I can tell, the vast majority of DSL  
is via phone (pretty much none per tv cable - for some reason, that  
business never got off the ground here despite regulatory pressure to do  
so), and the first offers I can recall were as add-on to ISDN. I believe  
it was quite a while before it was offered as add-on to POTS, too.

> and faster than ISDN, often by a factor of 10x or more per kbps.

Sure - but over here the standard "save EUR XXX" packet is DSL+ISDN-for- 
phone, or at least that's my impression.

MfG Kai

---

From: "Stephen Sprunk" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 12:41:39 -0600

> [email-masked] (Stephen Sprunk)  wrote on 20.11.04 in 
> <004201c4cf22$768a7680$6801a8c0@stephen>:
> crazy, pretty much every time a street is dug up)

That's also a major difference; our local competition re-uses the cable 
plant of the incumbent carrier.  Streets being torn up is largely due to 
long-haul carriers (which mostly lay their own fiber, or swap strands on 
different routes) putting new fiber down; nobody here lays new copper when 
there's old copper still available.

> started with offering ISDN *only* (not sure if they ever changed).

Interesting.  Deregulation of the local market here happened after ISDN was 
dead and DSL was starting to appear.

> do Caller ID on analog lines over here, either. People who want that use

Digital switches had been added long before digital lines were available to 
customers; the two had little to do with each other.  However, one can still 
find a rural exchange here or there that has an analog switch.

Caller ID, Call Waiting, Three-Way and other "extra services" were added to 
POTS lines here quickly after ISDN was available or even at the same time, 
so there was little incentive for non-data users to switch to ISDN at all.

The failure of ISDN was mostly due to the tariffs not being comparable to 
two POTS lines since it was viewed as primarily a "data" service.  However, 
even where it was "available" and people tried to order it, telcos found 
that loads, amplifiers, taps, and other analog cruft had been added to far 
more lines than commonly thought and getting a pair "conditioned" for ISDN 
use took much time and money.  DSL succeeded largely because it doesn't 
require conditioned lines (or new phones for the voice part) or changes to 
the switch linecards.

> had quite a bit to do with the differing results ...

It was that each switch vendor had their own signalling, and which you 
needed to configure your equipment for depended on the particular switch 
used in your exchange.  The NI-1 (for BRI) and NI-2 (for PRI) standards came 
much later, long after ISDN was effectively dead.

> like the good old OS/2 marketing problem - you *can* market a technology

I don't recall ISDN _ever_ being marketed to consumers here; if it was, it 
ended before the early 90s when I got into telecom.  BRIs did (and still 
does) see a fair amount of use in businesses for WAN backups, and PRIs have 
finally taken over for voice trunks, though CT1s are still in widespread use 
since they're cheaper.

> Well, ours aren't toll-free either way.

Ah.  Most (all?) US POTS lines have free local calling within their 
exchange, usually to neighboring exchanges, and in many states (each 
regulates differently) across entire cities.  ISDN subscribers pay tolls for 
"data" calls and sometimes even "voice" calls regardless of distance, though 
that may have changed recently in some areas.  Long-distance toll rates were 
also typically higher for ISDN calls, even voice ones, for reasons I've 
never been able to figure out -- it's a single channel either way.

> My general impression is that nobody in the phone company business here

Well, our telcos have tens of millions of POTS linecards already purchased, 
so why would they scrap all that equipment and convert customers to ISDN for 
no perceived benefit to either party?  Perhaps if we hadn't already recently 
converted from analog to digital switches (before ISDN was available), the 
conversion would have been less expensive.

Trends show nobody likes buying POTS here either; mobile phones are rapidly 
becoming the primary phone system, and VoIP over broadband is seing 
explosive growth for those who aren't ready to give up a landline.  POTS is 
finally dying -- we're just skipping the ISDN step for something better.

> it was quite a while before it was offered as add-on to POTS, too.

It was originally designed as an add-on to POTS here, and I'm not sure it's 
even possible to add ADSL onto an ISDN line.  The latter seems pointless, as 
the only advantage of ISDN over POTS is data rate, and DSL blows both of 
them away.

S

---

From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 22:01:35 +0100

since this has gone rather far afield from IPng, I'm changing the subject 
line....

--On søndag, november 21, 2004 12:41:39 -0600 Stephen Sprunk 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> It was originally designed as an add-on to POTS here, and I'm not sure
> it's even possible to add ADSL onto an ISDN line.  The latter seems
> pointless, as the only advantage of ISDN over POTS is data rate, and DSL
> blows both of them away.

in this benighted country, where caller ID on analog phones only became a 
reality a very short while ago, the ADSL line in my basement has come in 
over my ISDN circuit ever since it was installed.

That's what the copper pair that went in the right direction was doing at 
the time.... so it just HAD to work...

---

From: [email-masked] (Kai Henningsen)
Date: 28 Nov 2004 19:39:00 +0200

[email-masked] (JFC (Jefsey) Morfin)  wrote on 21.11.04 in <[email-masked]>:

> packet-switch networks. The internet (small "i") is not even defined in the
> French law where the word is broadly used and understood as the generic
> support of the "on-line public communications" and the digital ecosystem of
> the nation. I suppose the German legal understanding is equivalent since
> the French law applies the European directive.

I'm not aware of any German law talking specifically about the Internet  
(needs to be capital I in German). The RegTP (the regulators, regtp.de)  
talk quite a bit, and IIRC once so did the Kartellamt (our version of the  
Monopolies and Merger Commission), but no laws that I know of.

And of course our politicians like to talk about it just as much as the US  
ones.

I can't make much sense of the rest of your message. I see that you're  
passionate for *something*, but what is very unclear; you seem opposed to  
the IETF, but for no sensible reason I can determine. Oh, and you seem to  
trust the market far more than I do - you sound positively US in that  
respect.

> Do not think that Yankees will understand us

... I'm beginning to think it's the French who understand differently.  
(The US just often plain do not know what happens outside their borders.)

>  Can you have an IP address associate with your
> ISDN?

That doesn't even make sense!

>  Can you use X.25 on your ISDN?

With whom? X.25 seems to be dead as a doornail.

>  OSI is
> too rigid for them

In fact, *OSI* is mostly dead as a doornail.

MfG Kai

---

From: [email-masked] (Kai Henningsen)
Date: 28 Nov 2004 19:25:00 +0200

> there's old copper still available.

No, the people I talk of (citykom.de) seem to lay down lines when the  
street is dug up for some other reason, so as to already have it when  
customers show up.

Back from when they were started owned by city services, it seems they  
still have good contacts.

*Other* carriers indeed tend to simply rent the last mile from the ex- 
monopoly (at regulated prices). (Or when we're talking DSL, just connect  
to the DSL endpoints customers rent from the ex-monopoly with their ciscos  
or whatever, and go on from there.)

> so there was little incentive for non-data users to switch to ISDN at all.

I have the impression some of that got added to POTS, but there was very  
little consumer interest (apart from being able to suppress CallerID). The  
general impression seems to be that people who want that want ISDN.

And anyway, S2M (30 channels on one pair) means big business definitely  
wants ISDN.

> > Well, ours aren't toll-free either way.

Or to expand, there seem to be a few tariff experiments with free calls on  
weekends and stuff like that, but IIRC those aren't limited to local  
calls.

> "data" calls and sometimes even "voice" calls regardless of distance, though

Another differentation that over here only exists in the mobile market.

> even possible to add ADSL onto an ISDN line.  The latter seems pointless, as

I heard - don't know if it's correct - that Deutsche Telekom actually  
drove the development of whatever changes were necessary to do ADSL  
together with ISDN. Something about frequency differences?

Very few sources for DSL "modems" when they started, and not able to cope  
with demand for quite a while (both not enough "modems" and not enough  
line cards) - which sounds compatible with the previous paragraph.

> the only advantage of ISDN over POTS is data rate, and DSL blows both of

But DSL does not work (at least pre-VoIP) for end-to-end phone  
connections. ISDN does.

Anyway, the point was that many people - mostly exactly those who would be  
interested in DSL - *already had* ISDN. And thus a digitally-capable  
copper pair.

Incidentally, I suspect a lot of the drive behind ISDN was that (a) we had  
lots of copper pairs in use (perfectly fine to do ISDN on), and (b) using  
ISDN meant more channels without more copper pairs - laying new pairs is  
expensive.

MfG Kai