Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > John Leslie wrote: >> >> Since no current ISP "provides the capability to transmit data >> to and receive data from all or substantially all Internet endpoints," >> it's hard to see what the folks who wrote this think they're going >> to regulate. >> > Wait a minute... isn't the Internet "capital I" defined precisely by the > collection of IP addresses that are reachable from each other? I'm not aware of any definition which says that... > If you can't exchange IP packets with an endpoint, is it really on the > Internet? The "Internet" is, by all definitions, one particular "network of networks" which uses the IP protocol. Thus, IMHO, an endpoint is "on the Internet" if it connects to one of the networks in that particular "network of networks". > (Yes, NAT confuses things a bit - but arguably it's the public address > of a NAT device that's the "Internet endpoint"). That is a reasonable interpretation. But, I must disagree that there is any generally-accepted definition of the term "Internet endpoint". > And yes, firewalls also complicate matters - but, the "Internet > wallplug" in my office has the "capability" to exchange packets with > all other IP addresses on the net Fascinating... I've never heard of an "Internet wallplug" before... > - but that doesn't require that they be willing (or able) to respond. I can understand your exception re: "willing"; but it seems strange to claim that an "Internet endpoint" which is "unable" to respond fits the new FCC definition. Please understand what ISPs actually do: 1. We receive packets and _try_ to route them to another node which we have reason to be "closer" to the destination address; 2. We advertise our "closeness" to particular ranges of IP addresses. That's it, folks. Whatever else we do in support of these cannot change the fact that we cannot deliver packets "to" most IP addresses; and we cannot even know whether a packet we may deliver to a customer is actually "from" a particular IP address (least of all whether it is in response to a packet our customer asked us to forward). It's all "best effort" -- which means we make no representation whether any packet will reach the nominal destination. > Miles Fidelman -- John Leslie <john@xxxxxxx>