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They are already buying transit from core-backbone.
https://www.hetzner.de/us/hosting/unternehmen/rechenzentrum
Interesting, must be for some routes only though - CB route goes via DECIX to Hetzner, hm
EDIT: Weird, seems the CB network is segregated, one route direct and one via DECIX - Both of high quality though.
In general i can't complain about Hetzners network, one of the few with pretty good peering to large ISPs (DTAG is Transit but at least they have UPC peering), though i don't have any servers directly there (maybe @Fusl can shine some more light on it)
UPC peering?
At least unitymedia (UPC in germany, AS6830) is routed via NTT.
Also, if you want to have a good connection to DTAG customers you have to buy their
double paid traffic option.
http://wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Double_Paid_Traffic/en
Seems to depend on subnet, Unitymedia/UPC NL/Websites in UPC DCs seems to go via NTT - UPC Austria DSL seems to go direct, Cable again does not. Strange.
Now that is interesting! I did not know about this option (not too expensive). Thanks for that!
Sounds so similar to the "direct China bandwidth" b/s.
It's not, things like this have no right to exist, certainly not in the middle of Europe (and practically "of the Internet"). We shouldn't support providers intentionally congesting ports and then mafia-style asking people to pay up extra if they want "high-performance connections".
hm? It's not Hetzner that has the congested ports - it's DTAG that refuses to peer and/or upgrade peering ports while at the same time also not buying enough capacity (or peering) with their upstreams (thus, at peak times, ANY route to DTAG that is not directly peered is congested)
Mkay so it's exactly like the China Unicorn/Telecorn situation then. Customers in Germany should know better and one difference to China is that they actually have options to migrate somewhere away from DTAG, as the Internet access market is not that monopolized. And I'd say this is what we should hope for, not jump as enthusiastically as @Amitz at an opportunity to support a greedy state-owned provider in trying to unfairly exploit their market position for extra profit.
Is only the state ISP legally allowed to provide such services in Germany, or is it an open market?
Only 31.7% of Deutshe Telekom is state owned / controlled, the rest is owned by private invertors, publicly traded.
Thanks! But does it have a monopoly by law or is it competing normally with the rest? For example, there are "non-state" owned companies here in various sectors (that are controlled by the state though) that enjoy monopoly privileges (or oligopoly) by law.
I don't live in Germany and don't know, but i don't think they have monopoly by any law. Certainly there are other providers in Germany. But DTAG being the first probably has a big head start by owning a lot of infrastructure that was build back in the days.
I'm sure there's competition. But that's not the question here. Any ISP using their customer base to strong-arm other providers and DCs into China-style "premium bandwidth" agreements (threatening with congestion on the peering ports and degraded customer experience otherwise) should not be supported.
More or less open - last mile is usually owned by DTAG but often debundled and connected to a different ISP on the FTTC box. Prices for last mile access are government set (i think around 10EUR) and apply to other ISPs too (but only on copper, not on cable/fiber), not only DTAG infra.
Not entirely - The Chinese networks want to upgrade capacity, at least in LAX, but there is no one available that sells them what they want (can't just order 2+ x 100G ports on Level3, and a few additional 10G ports would be full within minutes - management of so many 10G ports (probably spans across multiple routers then also) is also hard). For their HK connections it is pretty much the same as with DTAG, yea, just way more expensive (no way DTAG charges 40EUR/Mbit).
I suspect Init7 pays around 0.50EUR/Mbit to their upstreams (as they sell at around 0.80EUR on large commits) and they said in their blog that DTAG wanted "more than double" of what Telia offered them (though without DTAG routes) - So likely DTAG transit, with enough commit, costs around 2EUR/Mbit.
Hetzners pricing addon is 5EUR/server and 3.50EUR/TB instead of 1.20EUR/TB - 3.50EUR/TB would mean around 1.16EUR/Mbit, maybe Core-Backbone gets transit from DTAG cheaper or has an old peering contract?
I'm also not sure how they do the routing for this DTAG addon - Outbound is clear, but inbound would only work by the /24, and not by single IP - Maybe they give you new IP(s) or have a special agreement with CB/DTAG to allow them to announce le 32? Who knows.
It is. Their customers are their asset. That's like saying the malls should not decide what price they'll sell their store spaces for example. You are saying that they should be offering access to their clients for whatever you (not you specifically, in general) decide.
It would have been a different story if their customers were legal "prisoners" in that ISP.
All that said, your decision to not want to do business with them is perfectly fine as well, for the exact same reasons. That's the whole idea - you/they take a position based on owned assets and the others decide.
It's simple, inbound is always routed via core-backbone.
Interesting, and do you think those customers are okay with that? Nope, they simply aren't aware that such negotiations are taking place. My point is that nobody should condone such practice, not those whom it's targeted at (DTAG's peering partners), nor DTAG's customers themselves.
I'm saying customers should receive what they paid for, which is quality Internet access, which assumes good peering to all popular destinations where it's feasible (and don't tell me it's not, in a place such as Germany which is practically made of IXes and cheap bandwidth).
An interesting read: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140718/06533327927/level3-proves-that-verizon-is-absolutely-to-blame-netflix-congestion-using-verizons-own-data.shtml As Level3 says setting up or expanding a peering port costs next to nothing when it's on the scale of these ISPs. That they sometimes choose not to, is just a matter of greed and politics.
nope, both our dedis route inbound from my ISP via Hetzners VIX link.
Sorry, I wasn't clear.
I meant It is always routed via core-backbone (inbound) from a DTAG connection, no matter if hetzner's DTAG addon is booked or not. They only change the outgoing route (hetzner->DTAG), when you book the option.
Ah, ok, that makes more sense - I know how it works then, thanks.
The pricing is actually pretty good for (near-)native DTAG transit, 100-115EUR/100Mbit is a good deal if you run a service that needs to rely on it.
Though, yes, in an ideal world this should not be needed at all - DTAG gets paid by customers (and that usually more than 1EUR/Mbit) and peering is essentially free for them (if they have capacity in FRA to turn up a transit link they clearly have capacity for a new peering port), i'm sure the large players (Google for YT, Netflix etc.) would happily even pay their setup costs for linecard/optics/CC.
Yes, ipso facto.
Because it makes exactly zero difference for their lives, which is exactly why they don't care.
That's an opinion and as such, I totally respect it. My opinion is that a company is irresponsible to its shareholders if it gives away profit to its competitors by not utilizing its assets to the greatest extend possible within the law.
They do (again, by means of fact). That's why I asked if they are legal "prisoners" to that ISP or not. I didn't like my ISP fo X reasons, I changed it.
Ah, so you must be how they call them, a libertarian. In any case, that's all beside the point, I'm just pondering what we should do with this situation, assuming it actually takes place. And a better answer seems to be not to jump at the Hetzner "special bandwidth" offer, praising how "cheap" it is, but rejecting it altogether and perhaps taking any opportunity to reach DTAG customers and let them know what's going on and what immoral and detrimental to the development of an open Internet practices their ISP attempts to pull at their expense.
Else next you'll find yourself needing to buy not just "premium DTAG bandwidth", but also five other ISPs' "premium bandwidth" deals.
Very true. Although in this discussion there is nothing anarchistic about it, it's totally classic European style liberalism (laissez faire) which is far from anarchism (some liberals for example where pro-absolutism, king and all that, which is hardly anarchy).
That is fine - ideas should be fighting for their market share and their popularity asserted. Of course, popularity does not equal efficiency but that's irrelevant in the sense that "whatever the people want".
I don't see any issue with that. There was no equivalent "net neutrality"* laws for all this time (I think they introduced something recently?), yet for some magical reason, I have internet access for the last 15 years, along with hundreds of millions.
*Which is a euphemism for "let the consumers sponsor the costs of the huge corporations".