On 15/09/2008, at 10:06 PM, Joe Abley wrote:
As an example, PacRimEast still had capacity in the late 90s,
strictly speaking. But given the difficulty in ordering anything
other than E1s on it at that time, did it really exist as a
terrestrial option for New Zealand ISPs trying to send packets to
the US? There was a lot of satellite transmission sold around that
time on PanAmSat, IntelSat and Loral transponders, and it's not as
if anybody was really using satellite out of choice. There are only
so many discrete E1s you can comfortably inverse-mux together before
it's really not worth bothering.
Satellite was mainly because it was cheaper in a world where 2mbps out
of Australia to the US cost US$150k/month. Circa around 1996 Telstra
Internet had 16x2Mbps to the US plus 1x2Mbps to NZ. That didn't
change until Southern Cross (SCCN) arrived in 2000.
(I started in the ISP industry in 1994 in Australia, so whilst some of
this is now a tad fuzzy, I was at least there for this bit. My home /
24 was 16 years old last month).
The timelines are no doubt different, since Europe experienced a
giant boom in Internet demand and infrastructure while smaller
markets like New Zealand were still preoccupied with X.25. However,
the original question was whether there had ever been a time during
which Europe had no option but to cross oceans to get to Asia, and
I'd be surprised if that wasn't the case.
I guess it depends how far back you look in telecommunications
history. The 1901 telegraph network was as extensive as today's
submarine networks (if not broader) (http://atlantic-cable.com/Maps/1901EasternTelegraph.jpg
). Australia had telegraphy connectivity via Singapore and the All
Red Route that the British ran and controlled since around 1879.
Perhaps someone who actually knows this stuff can throw some facts
into the thread and put a stop to my wild speculation.
SEA-ME-WE predates FLAG by almost a decade. I'm sure some digging
would reveal a bit more on that path either submarine or terrestrial.
Before SEA-ME-WE4 and 3 there was SEA-ME-WE and SEA-ME-WE2. SEA-ME-
WE had an inservice date of 1986.
MMC
--
Matthew Moyle-Croft Internode/Agile Peering and Core Networks
Level 4, 150 Grenfell Street, Adelaide, SA 5000 Australia
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.on.net
Direct: +61-8-8228-2909 Mobile: +61-419-900-366
Reception: +61-8-8228-2999 Fax: +61-8-8235-6909
