Re: Resilient Internet

[Matthew Petach via NANOG <nanog () lists nanog org>]

On Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 9:19 AM Tom Beecher via NANOG <nanog () lists nanog org>
wrote:

> > *nods* Well, and that's the rub. Their expectations don't match any
> > Internet SLA I've ever seen, much less for standard broadband. However,
> > simply telling the customer that we're within our SLA or proving it's not
> > our fault doesn't do much to enhance customer satisfaction and thus
> doesn't
> > help our reputation. Hearing from others that the broadcast industry has
> > already figured this problem out and sends the same stream via multiple
> > paths is a big help in getting us going in the right direction.
>
>
> If we assume that these 6 1s interruptions are actually the fault of the
> network providing the connectivity, then you're already much better than 6
> 9s of reliability, as Jay said. You'd be hard pressed to get much better.
> But again, without technical proof here that the network service itself is
> actually the cause of the issue, you're kind of in the tall grass still.
>
> We had broadcast video teams internally years ago that would come to us
> with all kinds of similar 'small burp' problems, and blame the network for
> it. In 95% of cases, the problem turned out to be their equipment or
> applications doing it to themselves. Had nothing to do with the network at
> all. Hundreds of hours were sunk proving that.


The flip side to that, though, is the 5% of the time when it turns out to
be
misunderstood queue handling on a particular type of linecard when it is
configured with non-default queue parameters and microbursts hit the
linecard buffers...and after hundreds of hours of debugging, it really does
turn out to be a network problem.  The customer always remembers that
5%, and comes back wagging the finger at the network for every hiccup,
conveniently forgetting the other 95% of the times when it wasn't the
network.   ^_^;;



> You don't have to meet every expectation of every subscriber. It's totally
> fair for you to say "It appears as if the service we provide may not be
> suitable for your needs. We'd be happy to continue to provide you services,
> but it may be beneficial for you to investigate other options."  Reasonable
> people will respect that. Unreasonable people stomp their feet and yell,
> but those people are going to stomp their feet and yell no matter what.

Also known as the "here is your SLA credit refund for the 1 second of lost
traffic.
We're so sorry.  Please don't spend it all at once." answer.  ;)

Matt
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