THE IMPLICATIONS BEHIND INTERNET PEERING
             Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are a new emerging industry in the current age of the Information Revolution. At the top of the chain are a few major Internet backbone providers. Although there are numerous amounts of ISPs dispersed in all areas, companies such as WorldCom (UUNET and ANS), GTE (formerly BBN), and AT&T (the former Cerfnet) make up the major ISPs that are known for their quality and service (Turner). The market of ISPs cannot be classified as a monopoly since there are thousands of ISP businesses and no one business is in full control of the industry. ISPs are not in perfect competition either because in this economy, perfect competition is near impossible due to government regulation forces regardless of how minute they may be. For the purpose of this paper, an ISP is defined as an organization that provides a basic Internet connection and manages its own network, regardless of its size. The focus of this paper is to present the issues regarding peering!
             Interconnection between all parties is one of the primary facets of the Internet. Every computer that is connected to the Internet has the ability to communicate with any other computer on this same network. This communication occurs by sending data packets back and forth between both machines. Along its path, a packet typically passes numerous routers that establish which way it has to travel. Normally, such a detour implies a decrease in the quality of service because transferring the same amount of data takes longer and response times (latency) increase ("Peering"). While this does not matter very much for electronic mail, it is an important factor for interactive activities like working on a remote computer via telnet sessions or surfing the Internet. Such delays can often be avoided when ISPs agree upon an additional, usually local, interconnection between their networks so that traffic between them...