Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: net.mail
Subject: Re: The TRUTH about .UUCP
Message-ID: <6021@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 4-Oct-85 15:17:46 EDT
Article-I.D.: utzoo.6021
Posted: Fri Oct  4 15:17:46 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 4-Oct-85 15:17:46 EDT
References: <593@down.FUN> <10476@ucbvax.ARPA>, <5202@allegra.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 45
Keywords: sponge leech freeloader domains routing_overhead

> ...  Both sides are quite willing to use allegra... to move the mail, but
> nobody has offered ... to pay for the service.
> ...  It isn't difficult to stop it, as the growing number of
> sites that simply refuse to forward mail have found out.  But the net will
> crumble if the policy is universally adopted...

An interesting side issue on this is the potential for additional overhead
if sites must do routing of incoming mail, i.e. it arrives with a domainist
address and the site must figure out where to send it.  This becomes much
more serious at "well known" sites (e.g. allegra) which are obvious places
to send mail when you don't know exactly how to get to the site specified.
Examples:

	"I don't know where 'down.FUN' is, I'll just punt it to <my
	nearest well-connected site, e.g. allegra> and let them figure
	it out".

	"I have no idea how to get to 'garfield.east.canada', I'll just
	send it somewhere in east.canada, like say utzoo, and let them send
	it the right way."

The problem is not so much the additional overhead of doing routing, but
the additional volume of traffic that such strategies cause.  The creed
of the domainists is that sites should determine more direct paths (how?)
and remember them, to speed traffic and avoid overloading central sites.
What the creed does not supply is the strong incentives that would be
necessary to actually convince people to do this, when it's so much easier
to just freeload a little more on the central sites.  Ironically, the *lack*
of routing mail relays so far is a powerful motive for decentralization
of the routing process, i.e. the sender does the work because it's the only
way he can depend on getting it done at all.  This enforced decentralization
is visibly collapsing as routing relayers become more common.  Example #1
above is already a common tactic.

We are seriously contemplating setting a firm policy that we will *not*
re-route mail that we relay.  That is, mail that arrives at utzoo had better
be addressed to "neighbor!...", where "neighbor" is one of our neighbors,
or we won't relay it.  This happens to correspond to the routing policy (or
rather non-policy) of old-style uucp mailers, but that is an accident rather
than a major reason.  This policy is not being proposed out of laziness or
conservatism, but out of distaste for the probable consequences of providing
a free routing service to the world.
-- 
				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry


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