The India Internet Foundation (IIFON) runs a community internet exchange in Kolkata to help smaller internet service providers save costs on data transit. Internet exchanges, or IXs, which have played a huge role in reducing network costs for ISPs, are a major part of the modern internet's infrastructure. MediaNama spoke to Anupam Agrawal, a trustee at IIFON, about why the foundation is running a community exchange, and what that entails. What follows is a slightly edited transcript of the interview. MediaNama: To start off, what exactly does being a community IX entail? IXs already proclaim their neutrality and cost-effectiveness for ISPs. Anupam Agrawal: Suppose you are a small ISP, a very small one at that. All the telcos' lines end 100 kilometres from the city. So, if after that somebody is taking internet to villages, it's the small ISPs. Let's assume a small ISP is servicing 100 customers, charging Rs 500 per customer. At the end of the month, they'll only earn Rs 50,000, of which Rs 35,000 goes to the telco, who provides upstream bandwidth. On top of this, they will have to pay costs for the wires and infrastructure in people's homes, and the salaries of the people collecting the fees. For a very small ISP, this business becomes a little profitable, where they can take Rs 15,000-20,000 home when they have somewhere around 300 customers. Till 100–150 customers, it's actually loss-making. Once the ISP has a cluster of 300 customers or so, that's when the business becomes profitable.…
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