rick@seismo.UUCP (04/11/87)
The Usenix Association is pleased to announce the funding of the UUNET
project on an experimental basis. This continues the association's
goals of fostering innovation and promoting the import and export of
new ideas.
UUNET is a non-profit communications service designed to provide access
to USENET news, UUCP mail, ARPAnet mail, and various source archives at
low cost by obtaining volume discounts. There are no restrictions on
what you may send nor on redistributing what you obtain from or through
UUNET. UUNET is effectively a common carrier. Charges are calculated to
recover costs.
Operationally, UUNET consists of a 10 processor Sequent Balance 21000
located in Arlington, VA. The system is connected to Tymnet via a
high-speed leased line. It can easily handle 25 simultaneous uucico
transfers and will be upgraded to match demand. It is administered by
the same people who are currently administering "seismo" (everybody's
favorite mail relay...). Operations personnel are on site 24 hours/day
Monday - Friday and someone is always on call on weekends. Availability
and reliability of the system will be high. The system is dedicated to
UUNET and has no function other than as a communications relay.
Currently the UUNET machine is tightly coupled to "seismo". This means
that having a connection to UUNET is effectively having a connection to
seismo, i.e. a well connected news and mail relay. UUNET should be
fully operational on May 1.
To access the UUNET system from within the United States, you dial a
local phone number (from thousands of US cities) and connect to
Tymnet. You are then connected to UUNET via the Tymnet X.25 public
data network. International sites may access UUNET via direct
host-to-host X.25 connection. No special hardware or software is
required. The connection to Tymnet is made with an ordinary modem
(V.22bis/Bell 212A/Bell 103). The standard UUCP communications
protocols are supported. Accessing UUNET will be as easy as with any
other UUCP connection.
The cost is $3 per hour of connect time during off-peak times ($5 per
hour from Hawaii). Off-peak times are 6:00 PM to 7:00 AM Monday -
Friday and all day Saturday and Sunday. (Your time zone is used to
determine peak or off-peak time, not necessarily the time zone in which
the UUNET system is located). It is anticipated that the most traffic
will take place during off-peak rates. Access is available during peak
rate times at substantially higher rates ($20 - $32 per hour depending
on location). There is a membership charge of $30 per month (less than
$1 per day) to cover administrative costs.
By comparison, ATTMAIL charges $2 per month membership and about $30
per connect hour. ATTMAIL does not offer off-peak rates. CSNET charges
a membership fee in the thousands of dollars annually, $54 per connect
hour during peak times and $30 per hour during off-peak hours. UUNET is
not intended to compete directly with either ATTMAIL or CSNET. Their
higher fees include additional services and a much larger support
organization. If you do not need (or can't afford) their extra
services, then UUNET may be for you.
There are several reasons why you should use the UUNET service.
1) Cost: If you are currently paying for long distance calls to send
uucp mail or news, then you should save a substantial amount of money
in communications costs.
2) Reliability: UUNET exists as a communications relay. It will never
be unavailable because some other project needs it. Nor will it be
unavailable because no one has the time to maintain it. It is run as
a business, not as sideline nor as a favor to other sites. The number of
intermediate hops for news and mail will be greatly reduced, thereby
increasing the reliability.
3) Availability: UUNET will be the best connected news machine in the
country. ANYONE can be directly connected to a backbone site and not
have to depend on the kindness of others to redistribute newsgroups
that are important to you. Of course, you may have a full newsfeed, a
partial newsfeed, or none at all. You get what you are willing to pay
for. (A full news feed would cost about $150 per month in connect
time.) UUNET will always carry all newsgroups. This includes any new
news categories that may appear other than the "standard" set.
4) Accessibility: UUNET will be able to function as an official gateway
into the ARPANET. This also means that you will be able to directly
access other networks that are similarly gatewayed into the ARPANET
(E.g. BITNET, CSNET, etc). In the future, gateways to other existing
mail services will be provided (E.g. MCImail, Telemail, etc). UUNET can
also act as the mail forwarder for your domain.
5) Archives: UUNET will make available for uucp access an extensive
archive of publicly available Unix software. At a minimum, this will
include the latest GNU software, the latest Kermit distributions (for
many cpu types, not just Unix), all the ARPANET RFCs, access to the
Simtel-20 archives, and the netlibd archives at Argonne (EISPACK,
LINPACK, etc). Again, you pay only for the cost of transferring the
software. You will never again have to worry about how to obtain
software that is "available for public ftp". It will be made available
for you to uucp.
As previously mentioned, Usenix has funded UUNET for an experimental
period. Currently funding exists through July 31. To offer these
services at these prices, UUNET must generate a large volume of
traffic. If a large enough volume of traffic is seen by the end of
July, Usenix will spin off the UUNET experiment into an independent
non-profit organization that will continue the service with the same
basis. If a large enough interest is not shown to allow UUNET to
recover its operating costs, Usenix will regrettably have to
discontinue funding.
In summary, if your organization has come to depend on electronic mail
and news as part of its daily business, you need a professional
communications service that you can depend on. If you are considering
subscribing to UUNET, please do so soon. If enough early support is not
shown, the service may not be available when you decide you need it.
As an incentive, any organization subscribing to UUNET in April will
have its May membership fee waived. (So, for the first month, your only
risk in trying the service is the hourly connect charge).
For a subscription form or for further information, please contact:
Peter Salus
UUNET/Usenix
P.O. Box 2299
Berkeley, CA 94710
+1 415 528 8649
{seismo,ucbvax,cbosgd,ames,amdahl}!usenix!peter
---rick