

Internet Architects Warn of Risks in Ultrafast Networks - mrmaddog
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/technology/arista-networks-founders-aim-to-alter-how-computers-connect.html

======
Groxx
Oh God, the FUD... it's... _palpable_. And what in the _world_ do AWS and
Gmail outages have to do with Internet protocols?

That said, their new tech sounds interesting, but it's buried in buzzwords and
non-comprehending journalism. I don't have the slightest idea if it's just a
self-healing mesh with a new sticker on it, or if it's something _actually_
different.

~~~
HilbertSpace
"FUD". "non-comprehending journalism".

SO critical! SO reticent, yes, reticent!

But, but, but you have to understand that the article is written by a highly
professional practitioner of the highly professional journalistic profession
and published at the highly self-esteemed pinnacle of the professional
journalistic profession the NYT!

Hang on each NYT word as a pearl, ruby, emerald, sapphire, or diamond of
profound wisdom from, did I mention, the highly professional journalistic
profession, you are supposed to do!

It's almost as if you are suspecting that the article is some attempt at
creating a case of vicarious, escapist, fantasy, emotional, experience,
entertainment (VEFEE) via celebrity identification and the 'threat' from the
core of formula fiction and just independent of anything about the actual
technical problem or technical solution!

SUCH reticence!

On Friday I got the mail and saw a catalog from Toys R Us. There were lots of
toys for children 4-7. The boys were shown playing with toys based on
machines, tools, and construction. The girls were shown playing with toys
based on babies, people, and traditional housewife roles.

You seem to be saying that the NYT piece was written for readers interested in
people and not things, that is, was written for girls instead of boys.

You are saying that the NYT is effeminate? Written for girls 4-7?

But, but, but, as we know, the NYT is a highly professional pinnacle of the
highly professional journalism profession and would never stoop to mere,
simplistic, irrelevant emotionalism to patronize, insult, manipulate, and
pander to its highly respected readers!

~~~
HilbertSpace
Guys, sorry you didn't like my jab at the NYT.

But basically Groxx was correct: The article is "FUD" and "non-comprehending
journalism".

We can see what was seriously wrong with the article mostly just by looking at
the article:

The title of the article was "Internet Architects Warn of Risks in Ultrafast
Networks", but the article had (1) some biographical information on the
"Internet architects" but (2) nothing significant about the "risks".

So, the article was what I wrote: (1) Grab attention by the formula fiction
technique of claiming that there is a 'problem', i.e., the "risks", and (2)
have some 'characters', i.e., Bechtolsheim and Cheriton, the readers are
supposed to 'identify' with.

So, the article was not really about the risks, the Internet, or even Arista
but about the two people. We're supposed to 'identify' with the people because
they are wealthy and played significant roles in the early days of the
commercial Internet.

So, the article is an attempt to manipulate the readers by being deceptive, by
claiming to be about technology but really being just an effort to use formula
fiction techniques to keep our attention.

Note: "Formula fiction"? Sure: You've seen examples thousands of times; the
framework is simple, e.g., (1) introduce a character(s) the audience will
'identify' with, (2) have the character encounter a problem, (3) see the
character solve the problem and get the girl.

Why does the audience 'identify' with the character? Because the audience gets
a case of vicarious, escapist, fantasy, emotional experience entertainment,
that is, gets to enjoy 'feeling' that they ARE the character they have
identified with. Then the audience cares about the character much as they
would themselves and, thus, continues to pay attention to see how the
character handles the problem. Since the ancient Greeks, formula fiction

James N. Frey, 'How to Write a Damn Good Novel', ISBN 0-312-01044-3, Saint
Martin's Press, New York, 1987.

(NOT a very advanced book!) has been a "sure-fire way to get and hold the
attention of an audience" but, really, usually communicates next to nothing in
useful information. In particular, when 'journalism' is just formula fiction
it is just audience manipulation that promises information but gives only
vicarious, fantasy entertainment.

So, in the case of this article, we are supposed to start reading because of
the title with "Internet" and "risk", that is, technical topics, but keep
reading because we 'identify' with the two people introduced, Bechtolsheim and
Cheriton. That is, we are supposed to 'identify' with these two characters,
that is, like to be like them. We are supposed to want to be like them because
they are wealthy. Then, after we 'identify' with the characters, we want to
find out more about them and how they address the "risk". So, so far the
article is just a deceptive title and some simple formula fiction.

But the article does not finish the framework of formula fiction because it
does not show how the characters solve the problem and at the end the
characters do not get a girl.

Why avoid the solution to the problem? Because the solution is presumed to be
too technical for the intended audience. In spite of the title, the article is
NOT technical. A girl? There is none readily available in this story.

The shame is that the article is not about "risk" and the "Internet", is not
about technology, and is about two 'celebrities' much as in a movie tabloid.

So, in particular, the article is nothing like 'professional journalism' and
is, as Groxx described,, "FUD" and "non-comprehending journalism".

In being about people, in particular celebrities, instead of technology,
things, or tools for solutions, the article is, drawing from the Toys R Us
catalog I mentioned, more for girls 4-7 than boys 4-7. That is, the article is
'effeminate'.

Is such common for the NYT? My conclusion is that it is essentially standard
for the NYT -- aim at mostly a female audience by using the techniques of
formula fiction to manipulate the audience and to concentrate more on people,
personalities and emotions than things, tools, or facts; yes, the NYT can
understand what Toys R Us understood. So, really, except for rare cases, the
NYT has nothing important to do with providing 'news', that is, informing its
readers about important events in politics, the economy, etc. but is just a
manipulation to get attention based on false promises.

The article's mention of 100 Gbps up to 1000 Gbps = 1 Tbps is now old news.
The 1 Tbps is just for one wavelength on just one fiber where with 'dense
wavelength division multiplexing' (DWDM) can put, typically, some dozens of
such wavelengths on one fiber and some dozens of such fibers in one cable so
that "ultrafast" is much faster than the NYT was explaining. In particular,
the "ultrafast" the switch sees is heavily from the total data rate from all
its inputs which might be a few connections at 100 Gbps or many more
connections at the now common 10 Gbps. That is, the "ultrafast" is not just
from the data rate on a single wavelength, not just from the possibility of a
standard for 1 Tbps per wavelength.

For me, my startup, if successful, could use servers with 10-100-1000 Gbps
NICs and a server farm LAN 'switching fabric' that could handle such data
rates and also be reliable, maintainable, and scalable. I've looked at a high
end Cisco LAN switch but would like to know more. So, I would have liked to
have learned more about the "risk" and how Arista is addressing it. Alas, the
article had no such content.

Again, the article is not journalism, is not about technology, and is not to
inform the reader but is to manipulate the reader by being about 'celebrities'
as in a movie tabloid, all standard for the NYT. The NYT doesn't know much
about technology and doesn't care much about journalism but is a devoted,
grand expert at manipulating readers with formula fiction about people.

If you didn't realize such things, then now you've learned.

Why did I post such jab at the NYT? Because I very much want them to pursue
journalism to inform the public. Indeed, my conclusion is that by a wide
margin the worst problem facing the US and the world is the news media that
does not provide the information needed for informed citizens. So, we get,
e.g., US Federal Government directed actions, especially via Fannie and
Freddie, that blew the housing bubble that crashed, took the reserve capital
of the banks, wiped out the banking system, put about 50% of the home
mortgages 'under water', and gave us The Great Recession that no doubt has
resulted in significant increases in rates of substance abuse, wife abuse,
child abuse, infant mortality, stress and clinical depression, divorce,
homelessness, untreated medical problems, and suicide and great losses of
social and intellectual capital and production. I blame the news media, in
particular, the NYT.

------
nl
The title is disappointing.

This is about Arista Networks, a Bechtolsheim funded network device company.

The interesting thing is - as near as I can make out - Arista is another
software-defined networking company (in this case the software seems to be
designed to isolate bugs(?)).

I'm not in the field, but I deal with people who spend large amounts of money
on hardware network devices, and it is clear to me (as a software guy) that
the whole network device field is going to disrupted by software any day now.

~~~
asharp
Arista switches are switches with the actual data path in silicon but with the
CNC running on an onboard processor running linux.

It's cool, it's both stupidly fast (wormhole switched, etc) and very
configurable. Just costs an arm and a leg.

~~~
nl
I think that's pretty much what would be expected at this stage.

High-performance devices will probably require custom silicon for a while yet,
but they can charge a premium.

Lower end devices will probably have less custom silicon, more software and be
cheaper.

~~~
asharp
Basically, yeah.

All lower end devices end up with basically same batch of ASIC, anyway just
due to cost.

Most switch stuff, however basically comes down to needing more hardware. Cam
costs a certain amount, packet buffers cost a certain amount (Or wormhole
switching silicon costs a certain amount), etc. None of that you can ever
really move into software. At least not decently.

~~~
nl
_None of that you can ever really move into software. At least not decently._

For pure switches, you might be right (for a while at least). But there is
plenty of higher level stuff that is at least partially implemented in silicon
(and/or inaccessible software) that is about to be eaten by software.

Things like load-balancing, for example:
[http://perspectives.mvdirona.com/2011/05/20/SoftwareLoadBala...](http://perspectives.mvdirona.com/2011/05/20/SoftwareLoadBalancingUsingSoftwareDefinedNetworking.aspx)

~~~
asharp
Good point. I'm not sure what most of that stuff was doing in hardware in the
first place, tbh. Haproxy has been better then hardware load balancing for a
long time.

What is interesting is the move off cisco's proprietary routing algorithms and
into more standard quogga/etc.

------
DrJokepu
“I’ve made the claim that the Chinese military can take it down in 30 seconds,
no one can prove me wrong”

Is this the new journalistic standard at the New York Times now?

~~~
shin_lao
Spot on. Anytime the salesman resort to hyperbolic examples involving the bad
guy du jour you know you're being sold snake oil.

------
drKarl
"An engineering standard for a terabit per second, 1,000 gigabits, is expected
in about seven years."

1Tb/s network speed! In which score would that kind of technology set us in
the Carl Sagan's information based Civilization scale?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale#Extensions_to_t...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale#Extensions_to_the_original_scale)

~~~
asharp
What's sad is that 1tb/second isn't actually that fast anymore.

I can get over 1tb/second of switching cap in a switch that costs a few grand.
Mind, I can't do this with Ethernet yet, but then again Ethernet was never
meant to go above 10 megs.

