The IP world now has another Tier-1 network. Renesys reports that Cogent (CCOI) and AOL have finally kissed and made up, 6 years after they fought a peering war that Cogent lost – perhaps the last one they did lose outright. Since then, Cogent had been buying transit from NTT/Verio to get to AOL. But not anymore, the hatchet has been buried and the peace pipe has been smoked.
There are few titles more widely abused than that of a Tier-1 IP network. The reason is that the term is not an official one, and because of that it can be redefined and stretched by whomever wants to use it – generally marketing departments. There are only 10 tier-1 IP networks: AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, Level 3 (LVLT), AOL, Savvis (SVVS), NTT/Verio, Qwest, Global Crossing, and now Cogent. In fact, the tier-1 ranks have been expanding lately, NTT/Verio, Global Crossing, and Qwest were not on the list until just this past year. So much peering going on.
But it is generally wrong to use this as a measure of a network’s influence, it includes a historical bias and tends to lag reality. Right now, Savvis and AOL really aren’t the powers they once were, one could expect them to drop out of the club sometime – except that they (naturally) don’t want to. Cogent has been a major player for some time now in IP transit, although the competition has been getting fiercer lately, it was natural for Tier-1 status to happen sooner or later. I wonder if now that they have achieved this goal the peering wars Cogent keeps getting into will abate. Somehow I doubt it though.
If you haven't already, please take our Reader Survey! Just 3 questions to help us better understand who is reading Telecom Ramblings so we can serve you better!
Categories: Internet Backbones
Join Our LinkedIn Group
What about XO?
According to various sources, wikipedia amongst them, XO still pays to access both Level 3 and Sprint. I think it is paid peering rather than IP transit, but that line is blurry nowadays.
This is big new for Cogent.
This is only going to fuel their growth – big time….
I thought AOL paid for Internet access. Also, how about Abovenet, and tw telecom? I think Global Crossing, NTT/Verio, and Qwest were always Tier 1s.
I thought NTT/Verio were Tier1 for years. From my understanding they have never paid for transit and their backbone is global.