The problem with that cost-benefit analysis is that a lot of the cost is not borne by the telcos. The entire UC Santa Cruz campus (as well as most of the city o

The problem with that cost-benefit analysis is that a lot of the cost is not borne by the telcos. The entire UC Santa Cruz campus (as well as most of the city of Santa Cruz) had no internet or telephone connectivity for a day. What do you think the productivity loss from that is? And how much will AT&T pony up? Answer: zero. The issue is not with detecting manhole intrusions, even though that's what everyone's talking about. The real issue is who the ---- thought routing all internet, land line, cell phone and 911 traffic for all of Santa Cruz through one fiber was a good idea. When someone's site goes down due to a hard drive crash and it turns out they had no backup, the kindest response would be something like "that sucks dude, but how the ---- could you not have a backup?" I don't see why the requirement should be anything less for a major telco. And don't even get me started on the reliability of Santa Cruz power...