Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 439 posts

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#71

Post by tptacek »

kloch wrote: post #19
Octoth0rpe wrote: post #9

A couple of fun facts about this guy: His little ISP is AS267, which is a SHOCKINGLY low number. That's like.. the ISP equiv of a 4 digit slashdot id, or owning something like sodapop.com. He's also one of the authors of RFC 5575, which is a pretty big deal in the DDoS world.

I don't know (or care) about how he got that ASN but ARIN does occasionally recycle returned 3 or 4 digit ASN's, including very recently: 20220607|arin|US|asn|888|1|assigned|66e25d155d3f3d57ff208733b59f8cc8 20220607|arin|US|asn|889|1|assigned|5b048aafff56a02f895e68ac5188853b 20220607|arin|US|asn|890|1|assigned|708d3f11915973323c76a5f95fa2d775 20220607|arin|US|asn|891|1|assigned|ab9bfca0becd32b7fe44c7ea0ba1aac3 202206…

He's been a backbone guy since the the mid-1990s.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#72

Post by Bloating »

samwhiteUK wrote: post #10

I'm going to put my hand up and say I have absolutely no idea how an ISP works. He runs cables to each house in the area... now where does the other end go?

There are wholesalers that provide "dark fiber", then you buy data services from another "wholesaler". When I looked into it, dark fiber was available through some utilities and through a government funded non-profit. Data to light-up the fiber was available through several different data centers that connected to that dark fiber.

You still had to build-out the last mile though, and thats what will get you. You either need private easements, or be a registered telecom utility to use public utility easements. That last mile is $20k +/-, depending on your circumstances. If your semi-rural or less, there's ROI sucks. Hence, many smaller ISPs are wireless.

At least in area, there are already a number of wISPs, 5G is rolling out, Starlink eventually. and lots of gov't funding going to the big players to expand their networks (and drive the start-ups out of business.)

There some other business models out there too that look interesting. Underline in Co Springs, for example. They provide a basic tier of service, in order to qualify as a telecom, install the fiber and then allow multiple competing ISPs to use their network.

IMHO, any utility that has the benefit of government privilege should be required to allow competors to use the infrastructure that the taxpayers funded.

I'm waiting on one of you brilliant folks to defy the laws of physics to create a decentralized, wireless mesh internet.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#73

Post by wollsmoth »

brentm wrote: post #66

This seems like a fun project to work on but what is the financial game here? Does he invest in building the network, operate at a loss and then sell to someone like Comcast? I assume building a remote fiber network that can reach 600 houses has to incur huge CapEx (way more than $2.6M right?) and at $50/mo a very long payback period. However it works, pretty awesome project, kudos.

looks like he's been able to find some deals on equipment and stuff since he operates on such a small scale. I guess he can just continue as a small business indefinitely if he gets enough cash flow.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#74

Post by tptacek »

upupandup wrote: post #52
Octoth0rpe wrote: post #9

A couple of fun facts about this guy: His little ISP is AS267, which is a SHOCKINGLY low number. That's like.. the ISP equiv of a 4 digit slashdot id, or owning something like sodapop.com. He's also one of the authors of RFC 5575, which is a pretty big deal in the DDoS world.

can somebody ELI5? what is this code mean? what is RFC 5575?

The RFC number is less interesting then the ASN; he has a low ASN, which is for backbone nerds a little like getting a very short domain name; the short ones are long since exhausted, so it's like an O.G. indicator.

(An ASN is a BGP4 network number; think of it as an address in the backbone routing network.)

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#75

Post by failrate »

brentm wrote: post #66

This seems like a fun project to work on but what is the financial game here? Does he invest in building the network, operate at a loss and then sell to someone like Comcast? I assume building a remote fiber network that can reach 600 houses has to incur huge CapEx (way more than $2.6M right?) and at $50/mo a very long payback period. However it works, pretty awesome project, kudos.

It is government subsidized. He just wanted good internet in the area.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#76

Post by nixgeek »

bombcar wrote: post #36
dataflow wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't find any section of that guide that talks about peering or whatever ISPs are supposed to do to connect to the broader internet. Do you see any step that explains this?

As a small ISP you don't peer - you just buy transit from a bigger ISP. So the basic steps are: 1. Buy a 1G/1G or 10G/10G whatever link to a building you own. 2. Resell that link in parts to customers. Or you can get yourself into a POP (point of presence) somewhere that multiple providers are also in, and get transit that way. Depends on where you are and what you can get access to.

As a small ISP you definitely can peer and many do, you just aren’t going to get settlement-free peering with any of the big eyeball networks like Comcast.

Something like Seattle IX is a good example of where lots of peering sessions could be established (although I haven’t looked at Jared’s ASN in any detail to see where it’s present).

https://www.seattleix.net/home

Any traffic you’re able to offload via peering you wouldn’t be paying an IP transit to haul, so it’s worth seeing if networks like Netflix are on the Route Servers (https://www.ams-ix.net/ams/documentation/ams-ix-route-server...) at any IX nearby your network, seeing if you can negotiate a session over the IX even if they don’t participate in the RS, or seeing if you can do PNI (sling a cable between your networks in a facility you’re both located in).

Edit: Jared’s on Detroit IX. https://www.peeringdb.com/net/20268

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#77

Post by toss1 »

rvnx wrote: post #3
qwe----3 wrote: post #2

> over $30,000 for each of those homes to get served This doesn't seem very efficient to me.

To say the least, it's more about siphoning public taxes

The point of taxes is to provide collective goods, such as infrastructure, defense, education.

One of the first thing the US's founders did was create the postal service, which was to provide mail service to everyone, regardless of location; it literally costs the same to mail a letter across the street as to send it to some house in Whoknowswhere, Alaska. This provides a minimum communications infrastructure.

One of the best things that were done in the New Deal was the Rural Electrification Act, which ensured that electrical service was provided to everyone, providing a minimum availability of a critical energy source.

Also essential was the initial telecommunications acts, which required providing telephone service at the same rates to all addresses. Again, providing this service universally ensures that the entire country has a baseline communications infrastructure.

This is why the telecomm companies have been aggressively stripping copper telephone wires from their system and replacing everything with fiber or coax — because the laws requiring universal service are tied to phone service and copper wires. This is why we wind up with companies like Comcast saying "F*$k-You - $50,000 for 500m of wire" to to everyone that isn't instantly profitable.

These universal service mandates are not to benefit each individual living on some remote farm or homestead, or just more remote suburbs/exurbs.

They are to benefit THE ENTIRE NATION. Everyone benefits from infrastructure, and benefits most when the infrastructure is more universal, when everyone can has power, can communicate and can transport goods.

You live in an advanced society with advanced infrastructure. When that infrastructure gets built out, perhaps notice that it is a good thing, instead of thinking of only your own petty concerns.

Or, go find someplace where there are no taxes and you get to do everything yourself (hey, if you want it done right, do it yourself, right?) - see what you can find and how well you can live with no roads, comms, power, security, etc. Report back.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#78

Post by MerelyMortal »

moffkalast wrote: post #40
kevmo314 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From https://startyourownisp.com/posts/fiber-provider/ , doesn't this site basically say connect to another ISP?

Well there three tiers of ISPs, each one buying service from the one above them. It's ISPs all the way down, and the higher up you go the more expensive the hardware to run it gets.

I feel like this could be made into an ISP Tycoon game.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#79

Post by Octoth0rpe »

upupandup wrote: post #52
Octoth0rpe wrote: post #9

A couple of fun facts about this guy: His little ISP is AS267, which is a SHOCKINGLY low number. That's like.. the ISP equiv of a 4 digit slashdot id, or owning something like sodapop.com. He's also one of the authors of RFC 5575, which is a pretty big deal in the DDoS world.

can somebody ELI5? what is this code mean? what is RFC 5575?

RFC 5575 is a widely adopted specification implemented by router vendors that lets ISPs (think Comcast, Verizon, Deutsche Telekom, Akamai) block certain kinds of traffic at their routers using rules called "Flow Specifications". A rule looks _something_ like "Drop traffic if it's on Port 80 and its packet size is 252 bits". That level of logic is good enough to block many simple DDoS attacks, and since it's done on a router, it's hardware that the ISP has to buy anyway. The more expensive / but also more powerful solution usually involves a dedicated piece of hardware that does packet inspection.

Re: Man who built ISP instead of paying Comcast $50K expands to hundreds of homes

#80

Post by mmastrac »

Bloating wrote: post #33
TrueGeek wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: he had $2.6MM in help from the "American Rescue Plan's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds". He's being paid by the government to bring Internet access to homes in the state that aren't currently wired for it.

Gotta pay your fair share, so it can be granted out for someone elses gain

This is literally how societies function - you contribute a small amount to the general pool, you use small amounts from the general pool. In some cases bigger chunks go for bigger works like ISPs or bridges. I certainly hope you don't want a world where every road, bridge and traffic light is independently owned.
Post reply on HN