[menog] Peering

[Mike Hughes]

Nigel Titley wrote:

> Well, much as I respect Bill's reasoning for this, I believe there are 
> cases where building a distributed exchange point can work, particularly 
> in the case where commercial/political reasons prevent an incumbent 
> peering within country.

One example of a successful distributed (and cross-border) exchange is 
the NDIX in the Eastern Netherlands - http://www.ndix.net/en/

A mission of the NDIX was to increase access to fibre networks in the 
Enschede/Twente area of the Netherlands and to establish a cross-border 
fibre route into Northern Germany via the city of Muenster.

That mission has generally been achieved. Where procuring fibre was 
prohibitively expensive or impossible in that area five years ago, it's 
relatively easy now.

It's slightly different from other Internet Exchanges, in that as well 
as the classic BGP-peering IXP, it also acts as a cost effective 
transport platform for other regional services (e.g. local councils, 
education, healthcare networks).

I'm not saying it's a silver bullet. NDIX worked in the end because 
enough people wanted it to work. But it wasn't an easy ride.

Remco van Mook was the principal person behind establishing the NDIX and 
can tell a good story :).

Mike