[ih] OSI and alternate reality

[the keyboard of geoff goodfellow]

The Other Side of The Coin of the Internet not charging (by the ARPANET
"WAN model") of packet data sent (or transited between WAN's) was that
there was No Impetus on/for efficiency in:

#1.) minimizing the amount of info/data sent across the network
-or-
#2.) the number of packets (handshakes) to effectuate a "transaction"

for the sake of an e.g. SMTP necessitates ~13 back-and-forth interactions
to transact the sending of an email from either a UA or MTA to another MTA.

in a "thin pipe" RF environment where efficiency of spectrum (and cost!) is
paramount not only is every BIT precious/sacred but also is the
minimization/seizure of the spectrum "sacred"

in the case of implementing RadioMail (the first two-way wireless email
service on the ARDIS Single Frequency Reuse (SFR) MDC-4800 4.8 kbps
wireless network with its max packet length of 256 bytes [
https://www.sigidwiki.com/wiki/MDC-4800]  (as well as on the Ericsson
Mobitex wireless network of RAM Mobile Data at 8000 bit/s,) we developed
the RadioMail Transport Protocol (RMTP) that not only sent/received email
over-the-air in 1 packet "transaction" (if everything fit) but also
"denuded" a transited email into being as "small" as possible -- for
example rather than sending Date: xxx, From: yyy at host.com, Subject: foo,
etc it became ^Dxxx^Fyyy at host.com^Sfoo and was "reconstituted" on the other
end so as to minimize bits transmitted over the air.

yours truly often thinks of how might our Dearly Beloved Internet (and the
APRANET before it) protocols summarily evolved differently if there was
such an emphasis put on efficiency/"bit miserliness" as well as making them
be as less "chatty" (back-and-forths) as possible?

the solution always seemed to be MORE BANDWIDTH (i.e. a fatter pipe) rather
than from the get go making the protocols themselves be as bit (not byte!)
miserly as possible.

it seems that today we are reaching/now at a point where even with
essentially "unlimited" bandwidth The Solution to "congestion" or the
"cause" of degradation why things aren't "working" is/has been causing
folks (say like Dave Taht and the bufferbloat.net fq_codel, cake
& LibreQoS team) to be more "recognized"/"respected" for their efforts in
making The Internet a better place/more efficient/usable for all.

geoff