{"id":9603,"date":"2016-09-12T16:00:55","date_gmt":"2016-09-12T23:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/?p=9603"},"modified":"2017-05-11T08:39:43","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T15:39:43","slug":"cloud-therapy-ep-021-diversify-your-business-internet-paths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/cloud-therapy-ep-021-diversify-your-business-internet-paths\/","title":{"rendered":"Cloud Therapy: EP 021 &#8211; Diversify Your Business Internet Paths"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021.jpg\" rel='magnific'><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-9604\" src=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021.jpg\" alt=\"EP 021\" width=\"581\" height=\"323\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021.jpg 810w, https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021-300x167.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021-250x139.jpg 250w, https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/EP-021-600x333.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 581px) 100vw, 581px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>When you ordered that back-up <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/our-products\/access\/internet\/fiber\/\" target=\"_blank\">fiber Internet<\/a><\/span> line for your company, did you ask your building management company for a map of how the cables are entering the building? Did you ask the ISP for a map of the collapse points?<\/p>\n<p>If not, no worries. Listen to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/john-stephens-85228a6\/\" target=\"_blank\">John Stephens<\/a> conversation with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/mikesmithaerocom\/\" target=\"_blank\">Mike<\/a>, take notes and use his tips when your next contract expires.<\/p>\n<p>During his 23 years at <span style=\"text-decoration: underline; color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/company-profile\/time-warner-cable-navisite\" target=\"_blank\">Time Warner Cable Business Class<\/a><\/span>, John has held nearly every technical position at the company. He knows about diverse paths into buildings because he&#8217;s actually built them, engineered them and done troubleshooting on them.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois also makes his usual appearance to tell everyone about a price for a 100M <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Internet access\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Internet_access\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"wikipedia\">Internet connection<\/a> that you won&#8217;t believe. After that, Mike asks him to find something outstanding in a building in NYC that everyone has heard of&#8230;<br \/>\n<iframe style=\"border: none;\" src=\"\/\/html5-player.libsyn.com\/embed\/episode\/id\/4587406\/height\/90\/width\/640\/theme\/custom\/autonext\/no\/thumbnail\/yes\/autoplay\/no\/preload\/no\/no_addthis\/no\/direction\/backward\/render-playlist\/no\/custom-color\/87A93A\/\" width=\"640\" height=\"90\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\nWant more Cloud Therapy?\u00a0Subscribe to us on <a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/cloud-therapy-aerocominc.com\/id1112772590?mt=2\" target=\"_blank\">iTunes<\/a> or <a href=\"http:\/\/www.stitcher.com\/podcast\/cloud-therapy-with-aerocominccom?refid=stpr\" target=\"_blank\">Stitcher<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><strong>Click below to view a fiber map of your building and get a quote on the top 3 ISP&#8217;s.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><script src=\"\/\/static.leadpages.net\/leadboxes\/current\/embed.js\" async=\"\" defer=\"defer\"><\/script><button style=\"background: #f26e22; border-color: #f26e22; border-radius: 4px; color: #ffffff; display: inline-block; vertical-align: middle; padding: 16px 32px; min-width: 192px; border: 1px solid #f26e22; font-size: 1rem; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; text-align: center; outline: 0; line-height: 1; cursor: pointer; -webkit-transition: background 0.3s, color 0.3s, border 0.3s; transition: background 0.3s, color 0.3s, border 0.3s; box-shadow: 0px 5px 5px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6);\" data-leadbox-popup=\"144249073f72a2:136337e37f46dc\">MY TOP 3<\/button> \u00a0 <\/p>\n<h5>Transcript:<\/h5>\n<p>Mike Smith [host]: Cloud Therapy Episode 21. Hey, IT Nation, welcome to Cloud Therapy with AeroComInc.com where you learn about the latest cloud and telecom technology that is going to take your career to the next level. I\u2019m your host Mike Smith. Let\u2019s do it. Welcome everyone. Thank you for joining us on Episode 21. Wow! I can\u2019t believe we\u2019ve actually done 21 of these things already. The time is flying. And this episode definitely does not disappoint. Today I\u2019ve got John Stephens joining us. He\u2019s a sales engineer from Time Warner Cable Business Class. And John has actually been with Time Warner for 23 years. He started there when he was only 17 years old as he\u2019ll tell us as someone just working in a store. And since then he\u2019s held all kinds of different positions from every tier of support you can think of, to dispatch, to network engineer, to Ethernet support specialist and now a sales engineer. So he\u2019s done it all for them, really gotten a huge amount of experience and he brings that to the table today in this interview. So John tells us today about the different types of business internet access like fiber, cable and DSL. And what I really got out of this conversation he and I had was the things he taught me about diversifying your access. So if you have two different internet connections coming in, knowing things about the entrances to the building that you should be paying attention to or the collapse points with the circuits that you\u2019re bringing in with the different service providers. So he really gives a nice little list of ways you can check on how diverse your two internet connections truly are. So that\u2019s what I really got out of this. And I know you\u2019re going to get the same thing. So definitely look forward to that conversation. And we also, like we\u2019ve been doing recently, we\u2019ve got Josh Chamois joining us, our resident salesperson here at AeroComInc.com. And Josh is going to tell us how the heck you can get a 100M internet connection, that\u2019s a synchronous internet connection, for your company for only $225 a month. There\u2019s a promo going on right now and Josh is going to explain what type of internet connection that is and some of the details on that, as well as I am going to throw another curveball at Josh and tell him to give us a ballpark for a 100M connection in a very famous building in New York City. Can you guess what building I\u2019m talking about? If not, you definitely have to wait and see for yourself. And as always, I\u2019ve got a free gift for all of our podcast listeners. We love you guys. Thank you for listening. And as a token of our appreciation, I take the time every single month to put together this gift myself, and this month it\u2019s a list of all the promotions, not just one like Josh is going to tell you about but all the promotions on business internet from all the major service providers that are out there right now. And there\u2019s at least 50 line items on this list. So if you\u2019re shopping for business internet, even if you listen to this way after it was originally published, this will give you a good baseline for what you should be looking at in terms of business internet connectivity, what type of pricing should these providers be throwing out to you. So from everything from Ethernet over copper, to fixed wireless, to fiber, there\u2019s a ton of promotions from a ton of different providers. And this lists them all. So all you have to do to get it for free is text the word \u201cISP Deals\u201d to the number 44222, again text the word \u201cISP Deals,\u201d that\u2019s deals plural, to the number 44222 and we will go ahead and shoot that document right on over to you for free. All right. So let\u2019s get to the meat of this episode starting with Josh. What\u2019s up, Josh? What do you have for us today? <a href=\"https:\/\/aerocominc.leadpages.co\/leadbox\/1447a5573f72a2%3A136337e37f46dc\/5630978613575680\/\" target=\"_blank\"><img class=\"alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/guaghI1WWkmKEn-ndpXFYqQLFyeQHhtA1xEpSJ4fta1V8Zyzi2HQLdf1e1RDIcozNiwHcskdhbBKIeS8G-h85Q=s0\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><script src=\"https:\/\/aerocominc.leadpages.co\/leadbox-1474918584.js\" type=\"mce-text\/javascript\" data-leadbox=\"1447a5573f72a2:136337e37f46dc\" data-url=\"https:\/\/aerocominc.leadpages.co\/leadbox\/1447a5573f72a2%3A136337e37f46dc\/5630978613575680\/\" data-config=\"%7B%7D\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nHey, what\u2019s up, Mike? I got some good stuff today. So this particular carrier I actually stumbled upon them when helping out one of my existing clients down in Huntington Beach. Their main objective was to get a backup circuit in place on their network. So they danced around or we danced around with a couple different ways we could achieve that with cable, DSL, but they wanted to get something with a little bit more bandwidth and a little bit more reliability.<\/p>\n<p>So we actually found a particular carrier. This particular carrier offers <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/our-products\/access\/internet\/fixed-wireless\/\" target=\"_blank\">Ethernet over fixed wireless<\/a><\/span>. So they actually have a promotion going on right now through October 2016 and they\u2019re offering a 100M symmetrical, which means 100M down and up, for $225 a month, free install. And the one stipulation is that the building that is in question or that wants to get this great pricing, it must be on their network. So there\u2019s a couple of tools I can use to make sure that we cross that bridge and make sure we\u2019re qualified and good to go on that promotion. But that is one stipulation, it has to be on net.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nFantastic. Well that\u2019s awesome. Thanks for sharing that with us.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nNo problem.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAnd then just like we did last time, I\u2019ve got another challenge for you. Are you ready for it?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nLet\u2019s do it.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo as we have done in the past, I like to throw out a famous place to Josh and test his skills to see. I give him a little challenge. He needs to find how many fiber providers are there, something like that, and just to show everybody that the things that we can do and how quickly do it and just have fun with it. So all right, Josh, Empire State Building.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nEmpire State Building.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nGive us just budgetary pricing for a 100M internet connection, not promotional pricing, I won\u2019t make you do that, that might take a little bit more time. But just give us some budgetary pricing for a 100M <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/our-products\/access\/internet\/fiber\/\" target=\"_blank\">dedicated internet connection<\/a><\/span> at the Empire State Building.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nBudgetary pricing for a 100M circuit. Al right. Give me one sec. So I\u2019m actually just throwing in some baseline information here, name of the opportunity, contact name. So since you don\u2019t have a real contact, I\u2019ll just put myself there and we\u2019ll do this. All right. So I have a nice little handy dandy tool I use for stuff like this. Believe it or not, this is pretty frequent that I get request similar to this, not just random places but client store, existing clients that might need a quick quote, and it has to be quick, it has to be quick turnaround, so I utilize this tool to get that achieved.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that makes sense. I think a lot of people are probably just browsing and saying, \u201cHey, we have a 10M right now.\u201d But how much does a 100M cost? When they\u2019re thinking of what kind of bandwidth they want, they\u2019re thinking, \u201cWell, should we go 50? Should we go 100? What\u2019s the pricing of each?\u201d That\u2019s a pretty cool tool.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nRight. Yup. All right. So just finalizing the service address here. All right, let me just double-check to make sure that looks good. All right. Boom! All right, tool\u2019s thinking, wheels are spinning.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWhile it\u2019s thinking there, what would you say is probably the most common bandwidth amount that clients are asking you for these days, like the businesses are coming to you saying, \u201cHey, will you give us a quote on X amount of bandwidth?\u201d What\u2019s the typical amount that you\u2019re seeing? What\u2019s the most common?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nI would say the most common is a 100M. It\u2019s competitive. I mean prices are continuing to go down for bandwidth and internet access. So the common number I\u2019ve seen over the last year or so is a 100M internet connectivity.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nCool.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nAll right. So still thinking, still thinking. Again, I think that the tool tends to think a little harder when you have a densely populated area like this where there\u2019s just a ton of carriers that are trying to capture that business that\u2019s in this specific area. I mean we\u2019re talking New York, New York here and prime location if you\u2019re running a business, so.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, it\u2019s probably a lot of carriers that\u2019s pulling information from. But yeah, while we\u2019re doing that just tell us what you did over the weekend, anything fun?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nOver the weekend what did I do? My daughter, she had a basketball game, so we did that. Jeez, what else did we do? I think this past weekend was pretty chill now that I think about it. We just came off of about a week and a half, almost two weeks in Las Vegas for my son\u2019s basketball tournament and then a subsequent family vacation which took a lot out of us, so we just laid low just trying to catch up and get back to normal speed of life.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nOh man, back-to-back.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nYeah, back-to-back.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s brilliant.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nLot of late nights and early morning hours. It was tough. But it was fun, it was fun.<\/p>\n<p>All right, so we\u2019re getting close. My tool is finalizing its results. Yeah, so the cool thing is to be able to offer quick information like this from a client. It just really shows value in my tool and myself, which is always a good thing. Speed kills. The faster the better, not only in sports but in the business world as well. And if we can be responsive and quick to act, I think we\u2019re doing well.<\/p>\n<p>So all right, I got some. Now you just wanted some budgetary pricing, correct?<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nAll right. So let me scrub this list a little bit. So the cool thing about this tool, it actually gives you quite a few different options. So I\u2019m going to exile some of this access, so I got pricing back for 2 gigs, a gig, 600M, 500, 400, 300, 250, I\u2019m going to narrow this down just to refine this list a little bit. All right. So budgetary bid for 100M symmetrical Empire State Building, best pricing I see right here, 1379.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\n1379.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\n1379. Yup.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAnd that\u2019s just budgetary.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s budgetary.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s pretty good. So that\u2019s basically the shelf price, 1379. So you know that we can get lower than that, right?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nAbsolutely, yeah. If I get a channel manager involved, usually we can sharpen our pencil a little bit on that price point and get it down a little bit. Yup, you\u2019re right.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWhat would you say in a high-rise building, in a major metropolitan area, what would you say, is it is a good price right now in \u2013 we\u2019re recording this in August 2016 \u2013 we got to do the month because the prices are dropping so fast, but what would you say is a good price in your mind for a 100M in a building like that?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nIn a building like that which per this list is just loaded with different carriers, I would say a competitive bid for a 100M you can probably get it as low as $700 a month. There\u2019s a couple of carriers I have in mind that I won\u2019t disclose the name but I\u2019ve seen them quote bids as low as 600, even 400M dedicated symmetrical.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s for <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/our-products\/access\/internet\/fiber\/\" target=\"_blank\">fiber<\/a><\/span>, right?<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s for fiber, correct. And so I wouldn\u2019t say 700 isn\u2019t too far out of the realm of possibility, absolutely not, especially in an environment like this with so many different carriers coming in.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah. And there\u2019s always the promo that you mentioned earlier where there\u2019s providers out there doing things crazy stuff like fixed wireless for $225, so it can get that crazy.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nYeah. So yeah, message here, if you need more bandwidth now\u2019s the time to look because the prices are extremely competitive, so.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAwesome. Well, cool. Thanks for sharing. Thanks for playing along. And we will catch you next time.<\/p>\n<p>Josh Chamois:<br \/>\nAll right. Thanks, Mike.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo if any of you guys are inside of a business right now that is located inside the Empire State Building, I hope you\u2019re paying at least as low as the price Josh just gave you for that 100M or better, otherwise you definitely need to be contacting us or someone else. But if you want Josh to run a similar query that he just did for the Empire State Building, if you want him to do that for you guys real fast for free, just email us, no big deal, sales@ aerocominc.com or hit us up on our chat window on our website or call us at 877-465-3505, and we\u2019ll be happy to check out something like that for your building. Doesn\u2019t take much time at all, we can actually dig down a little bit further too. And no obligation. We will just do that for you, no big deal. So just give us a call and you\u2019ll actually probably talk to Josh, so that\u2019ll be even more fun, as you can tell he\u2019s a real nice guy.<\/p>\n<p>All right. So on to the next part of our program, we\u2019ve got John Stephens joining us as I talked about in the initial part of this episode. John is a sales engineer, a 23-year veteran at <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/company-profile\/charter-spectrum\" target=\"_blank\">Time Warner Cable Business Class<\/a><\/span>. So he started there when he was 17 years old as he will explain. And he\u2019s going to talk about different types of business internet access and diversifying your internet access. So if you\u2019re going to get two different types of connections from two different providers, especially if they\u2019re going to be wireline providers, you really need to do your homework on whether or not those are truly diverse pads coming into your building. And he gives us some ways to check that and believe me, he knows. He\u2019s actually installed the things in the street for Time Warner, so he knows what he\u2019s talking about.<\/p>\n<p>So without further ado, here\u2019s my conversation with my good buddy John. Oh, and one more thing, don\u2019t worry, you don\u2019t have to take notes on any of this stuff. Make sure you go to AeroComInc.com\/info\/blog and we\u2019ve actually got the whole transcript of this podcast. So you can just go to the search bar, search for anything related to this podcast like John Stephens, Stephen is spelled with a PH and you actually go right to this podcast and read all the transcripts right there. So don\u2019t bother taking notes, just sit back and listen and relax and learn a little bit from John.<\/p>\n<p>Welcome to the program, John.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nHey, thanks for having me.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nNo problem. So tell us a little bit about yourself personally and professionally.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSure. I have a long history with Time Warner Cable. I\u2019ve been with Time Warner Cable now for the last 23 years. Yeah, actually, believe it or not, it\u2019s my first job and my only job aside of your traditional 16-year-old flipping fish patties at Arthur Treacher\u2019s Fish and Chips. I started at 17 in Time Warner Cable in the New York City market.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWow!<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, it\u2019s been a while.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAt 17.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYes sir, yeah.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s cool.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nI know. I can remember doing my homework in the executive conference room back in our offices in Staten Island, New York. Believe it or not, that\u2019s how long ago it\u2019s been.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo what was your position when you first came in at 17 years old? They put you right into sales?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nNo. So we didn\u2019t have all the position alignments that we do now as back then. So you were just kind of whatever happens. And I hate to put it like that, but I was in the what is now known as your cable store experience or the experience center. So I was taking payments, giving out cable boxes, taking in returns of cable boxes among other things and sales because I\u2019m the front line right there face-to-face. At that time, the cable was in its pretty much infancy in Staten Island. So there was a lot of new installs going on at that time. It was a good time to get into the business, and especially being at such a young age my brain was just absorbing everything that was thrown at me.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that\u2019s really cool.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, and it\u2019s progressed over the years until basically I got to a point in 2001 when we have launched the Road Runner product and I was first on board for New York City, well, in that area, in that section of New York City, I should speak more accurately on that, and to do the support. And then I transferred to the Los Angeles market for obvious reasons. No mosquitoes, palm trees and nice weather, all the usual suspects. So I transferred out here and built on that. I went from tier-1 tech support up to tier-3. Then in 2004 I made the changeover into Business Class where that was in its infancy out here as well. We were just building fiber rings and doing a whole lot of investing in the outside plant, as well as leveraging what we had on the legacy side for routers and switches to turn up circuits as efficiently as possible. But that has since grown a lot over the years.<\/p>\n<p>I transitioned out of the call center out to the field and became a field engineer installing and supporting a lot of these fiber circuits that are up nowadays, the larger ones, for that matter. After about, I would say three or four years, then I went to be a network engineer in the edge routing to core routing team. We\u2019re supporting all the network architecture that we had, deploying it. But what was really exciting about that role was the multiple flavors, because at the time the LA Basin was actually a hodgepodge of Time Warner Cable, Adelphia and Comcast because we had taken over, at that time, those two other sections of companies. Adelphia, as we all know, went bankrupt and Comcast there was a territory swap of us.<\/p>\n<p>So we were in the process of flattening the network, and what better time to upgrade everything while we\u2019re flattening it. So I was working on Alcatel, I was working on Juniper and Cisco, so I got just a wealth of growth opportunity out of that and a lot of sleepless nights doing migrations and troubleshooting. In retrospect, it was an amazing time to go through it and I learned an abundance during that time.<\/p>\n<p>And in the evolution they had a sales engineering spot opened for the carrier space and that\u2019s when I took my first step into the sales engineering role to help design and come up with solutions, more so out-of-box solutions. One of our sales leadership, one of our vice presidents, he actually had dubbed me Radar O\u2019Reilly from MASH because he would say, \u201cGet Radar, he\u2019ll figure it out.\u201d And it brings me to today where that\u2019s what my day-to-day is. I\u2019ll get to see something that comes forward, usually more often than not cookie-cutter type of stuff. But there are one-offs where you need a little bit more than just your standard 10M DIA, something that needs a little bit more attention, a little bit more hand-holding, if that makes any sense.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, absolutely, that\u2019s cool. So yeah, you\u2019re sometimes out there just doing some standard stuff and sometimes you\u2019re like MacGyver out there. I like MacGyver better than Radar. You need to tell them, \u201cHey dude, give me a more respectable nickname there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. Oh, I got it. I\u2019m just so used to it now.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s cool. Well, how about personally, any hobbies that you like to do after work or tell us a little bit about yourself after work?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSure. Well, ever since being a little kid I\u2019ve always been somewhat of an audio file. And being a child of the \u201880s, I love vinyl. So I\u2019m a vinyl scavenger. I love to get vinyl from the \u201850s and the \u201860s that has obviously superior presses to what you would find anything on vinyl, especially nowadays you are not going to find much vinyl that\u2019s any good anymore unless you pay through the nose. But I do enjoy music a heck of a lot. I can\u2019t say I could play any instruments, that\u2019s for sure, but I have a keen ear for a good audio sounds and I also can\u2019t dance very well but that\u2019s a different story.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo I guess is it all types of genres that you enjoy or are there certain couple genres that you like?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nMore so jazz, classical, all along those lines. And I do do a lot of volunteering work on the side as well to obviously to help out people that are little or a lot less fortunate than myself.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s fantastic. Any particular organizations that you support frequently?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, really just a food soup kitchens or food pantries, anything that can use to help all help really.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s fantastic. That\u2019s great. Speaking of vinyl, I think my first ever record that I purchased, I\u2019m 41 years old, so right when I started liking music as a kid, I think that\u2019s when vinyl was right at the end and a lot of people were buying tapes. But I think the first record I purchased was Run-D.M.C. It was something like that. I think it was either Beastie Boys or Run-D.M.C. or something like that. So I think that was right around fifth or sixth grade for me that when rap hit the scene and I think I bought a couple of records and then it was all on the tapes.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYou know it\u2019s funny, is when I was a little kid my parents had just a panoply of 45s and the one that I loved the most was labeled or called Hooked on Classics and it was just some hodgepodge together of classical songs just put together and I remember being a little kid thinking, \u201cWhy do I like this?\u201d But it grew and then when everybody else is playing Milli Vanilli, I was rocking Manhattan Transfer.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s true. You bring up the 45s, I\u2019m like, \u201cActually I take that back.\u201d I think Prince\u2019s 1999 on a 45 single was probably my first and then I think it was Men Without Hats, the Safety Dance.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSafety Dance. I actually have that still.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s awesome.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, that was great.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that\u2019s cool. I see those stores here and there with vinyl in there and I\u2019m not a vinyl collector myself, but that\u2019s cool. I don\u2019t know what I did with those records but I probably just chucked them or something. But yeah, it\u2019s interesting that you said the ones from the \u201850s are made with higher quality though, huh?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nOh, 100%. Even when you go to thrift stores or even Goodwill for that matter, you\u2019d be surprised what you can find out there and you basically just pick up the record and feel it and you see how much heavier it is in comparison to something, for argument\u2019s sake, like your Michael Jackson Thriller album from the \u201880s. The quality is just not there. But if you get something that\u2019s In Living Stereo it actually will say on the cover, wow, that\u2019s amazing. It sounds, to me, light years better than any CD I\u2019ve ever heard.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWow! I didn\u2019t know that. I just assumed it wasn\u2019t as good a quality. I was thinking, \u201cOh, they made them thicker because they have those record players in cars and you don\u2019t want to scratch it on as you\u2019re bumping around in your car.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. And that may have been the school of thought back then. But if you hear it on a regular home system that you may have at home, my goodness, you\u2019d be shocked at the difference that the vinyl from back then how much different it is from today.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s cool. Gosh, I didn\u2019t think I was going to learn that today, but that\u2019s awesome. Thanks for sharing.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nHey, no problem.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, all right. So today John and I were talking before the podcast about his topic and since he works for Time Warner Cable, I don\u2019t know if there\u2019s anybody who does more access circuits than they do or at least it\u2019s got to be a close tie there. So one of the things John knows about more than anything else is access. I think he decided to talk about the different types of access available and also the advantages of each type of access and then in addition to that, the ways you can setup diversity of access. Obviously limiting downtime is a big deal and access is getting less and less expensive. So with that companies are interested in diversifying their access to make sure they have as much up time as possible. So John\u2019s going to cover all those topics for us today. And with that I\u2019ll just turn over to you, John.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSure. So the main thing as it pertains to access and transport, a lot of the times people look to have that diversity built-in. Before we go into the diversity, let\u2019s just do a glaze over here on the different access transport technologies where you have your standard <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Twisted_pair\" target=\"_blank\">twisted-pair<\/a><\/span> service with DSL or the likes of that, where it\u2019s very low cost and high availability. And then you\u2019ll go into more of the cable company, one where the cable modem, the DOCSIS cable modem. Again, it\u2019s a low-cost modified SLA best effort service. It\u2019s a little bit different from your twisted-pair service because it\u2019s not distance critical to the central office, the way those are, and it has an asymmetrical bandwidth.<\/p>\n<p>Then you have your fiber optic connections whereas you have high availability. The SLAs are obviously four 9s, five 9s, depending on upon who your carrier is and working with a symmetrical bandwidth. And as with fiber, you can have 1 gig, 10 gig, 40 gig, it really depends on what the needs are. And honestly, when someone\u2019s ordering any one of those transport technologies, the long pole in the tent is cost and it always is. But aside of the monthly recurring cost you have to think of what it\u2019s going to cost to you if it goes down. So while your bill maybe, let\u2019s just say for argument\u2019s sake, $80 with a cable modem, but if that cable modem goes down you stand to lose, I don\u2019t know, $150 an hour, you have to think of weighted out risk, \u201cOkay, does it make sense to just go bump it up to $400 a month solution to save me from having to worry about the possibility of this going down,\u201d at least on a guaranteed level, and get your money back, having the carrier put their money where their house is, if you will.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, I even think of it at even a higher cost. Just from my standpoint having on the company for 13 years, I always think of the cost as payroll, just having butts in seats. And if your internet goes down, I\u2019ve had our internet go down before, and everybody just sits there when it goes down and they just act like, \u201cI can\u2019t do anything. I can\u2019t work, our internet\u2019s down.\u201d And so basically you\u2019re losing that payroll for that amount of time, at least 80% of what you\u2019re paying those people, if not all of it.<\/p>\n<p>So I always look at it like if you really do the math, you go, \u201cGosh, how many people do you have on payroll that are using your internet connection on site, how much are you paying them per year,\u201d and you can break that down to an hourly cost story. You go, \u201cIf we lose our internet, literally how much money and payroll efficiency are we losing that we pay people to work and they\u2019re not working?\u201d And you boil it down that way. But I think a lot of times, from the IT department, sometimes it\u2019s hard to translate that to management. But I think that\u2019s really important for IT professionals to really understand that concept and speak that way to their management.<\/p>\n<p>And I think when they do, it\u2019s like everybody kind of goes, \u201cOh, yeah, that\u2019s true.\u201d And it really, like I said it, emphasizes the need for diversity because that has totally crept up on us, the need for internet. I mean, gosh, when I first started in telecom in \u201899, we used to actually ask the question, \u201cIs your internet critical to your business?\u201d And if so, then we\u2019d sell them the T1. If not, you sell them DSL. And now that question is a joke. It\u2019s like, \u201cIs internet critical to your business?\u201d You\u2019re like, \u201cWho says no to that?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nRight, exactly. Exactly. And it goes down to even just like a point-of-sale. You have, let\u2019s say, your standard some sandwich shop, at $5 a foot-long and you\u2019ve got 20 people online and your POS is down and they want to use their credit card, you\u2019re in a bind, to say the least. So it\u2019s all worth the investment versus the headache. I\u2019ve heard it said, \u201cWhat\u2019s the price you put on your sanity?\u201d As a business owner, that to me is a big field, outside of what you had mentioned there with the labor costs because those can be a lot more than the $5 foot-long.<\/p>\n<p>But now I want to talk about the diversity. A lot of the times people will get, let\u2019s say, a cable modem and a twisted-pair solution or whatever they get from the wack. But the problem is you have to look at it, sure you have two different pieces of equipment, you have two different lines, but you\u2019ve got to look deeper than that. You\u2019ve got to see, first of all, how are they coming in the building, are they coming in on separate entrances into the <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Demarcation_point\" target=\"_blank\">MPOE<\/a><\/span>? That\u2019s your first line right there. Obviously heading north back to the provider\u2019s network, you\u2019ve got to see how it\u2019s physically cabled into the building because if you\u2019re in the same conduit and there\u2019s a construction company outside drilling and bust the conduit, breaks both cables, now your diversity is gone, you have a collapse point right there, all services are out.<\/p>\n<p>So what you want to do is make sure that if you have, again, a twisted-pair from the wack or whatever, the DSL, and then you have a cable modem from, let\u2019s say, Time Warner, you want to make sure that they\u2019re coming through on separate conduits so just in case there\u2019s any issue. And that\u2019s just the beginning. Then when it gets out into the street, being underground, you want to see that it\u2019s traveling at different route.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo wait a minute, sorry to interrupt you, John. But on the conduit side, how do you figure out if those two connections are going to be in a different conduit? When those sales reps are sitting there talking to you, how do you take the conversation away from, \u201cHey, let me get a quote, but get some real information on is this going to be coming in the same conduit as our current connection?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s actually a really good question. Typically your building manager should know or like an ROE team from the carrier will more than likely know for sure if they\u2019re coming in along the same path. Each one of these carriers, including Time Warner, has an ROE team, or the likes thereof.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWhat does that stand for?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nRoute of entry. That will be able to identify if it\u2019s a conduit that, let\u2019s say, Time Warner Cable put in when they pulled in the copper or something that they\u2019re just riding in <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/company-profile\/verizon-business\" target=\"_blank\">Verizon<\/a><\/span>\u2019s conduit or <a href=\"http:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/company-profile\/at-t-business\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">AT&amp;T<\/span>\u2019<\/a>s.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo maybe it\u2019d be like at some point if they like the pricing and the solution looks good, at that point start pressing that sales person that, \u201cHey, I really want to talk to somebody, maybe an ROE team or can I talk to your sales engineer about is this going to be delivered in a separate conduit,\u201d and really say like, \u201cHey, we\u2019re not going to move forward until I figure this out because this is a big deal.\u201d Because I can see all these sales are going to glossing that over going, \u201cOh, yeah, totally.\u201d But I\u2019m like I wouldn\u2019t listen to the sales rep on that in my experience. I\u2019d definitely get an engineer in there whose job isn\u2019t to be the yes man, whose job is to get the right people involved and go find someone from the ROE team maybe, right?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. And that\u2019s basically what happens. Let\u2019s say in Time Warner\u2019s world we have a site survey that basically has all that detail and we have construction folks that do it as well, so if that level of detail is requested, it can be provided. That\u2019s a business as usual for us.<\/p>\n<p>But in that same rule apply it as it pertains to the outside as well, be it overhead poles or underground, you want to know what route it\u2019s traveling to be diverse from your <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Local_exchange_carrier\" target=\"_blank\">LEC<\/a><\/span> and your cable company. You want to make sure that it is, again, at least as separate as possible because the lower cost ones, like your cable modem and your DSL for example, more likely they\u2019re going to be traveling along the same path or they may have some collapse points along that path back to the central office or back to cable company\u2019s hub site.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nNow what\u2019s a collapse point?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nLet\u2019s say whatever cabling, whether it\u2019s the optical node cabling for the cable company or whatever cabling that they use from the LEC is along the same, let\u2019s say, route on the same span on a pole or an underground vault.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nSo it\u2019s like a collapse point is where they consolidate conduits or whatever and go, \u201cHey, these are all coming in from different paths and here\u2019s where they collapse down into a single path or we put them on the same pole?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYes, sir. That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nGot it. So that makes sense to understand where those are saying like, \u201cYeah, it was diverse up until First Street, and on First Street there was a collapse point where it all became the same.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nRight. And you will have that a lot of times. You\u2019ll see that in areas where you have some, for whatever reason, challenges, a mountain for example, like down in St. Black Mountain there is literally only one path up, I\u2019m just using that as an example. Or you have SoCal Edison, you\u2019ll have the cable company, they are all right in the same path, so that\u2019s a collapse point.<\/p>\n<p>So there\u2019s a lot of variables that will dictate a collapse point if it is down to something like that. But usually it\u2019s just a cost thing. It really is contingent on what they\u2019re actually using as far as DSL or big cable company, whatever they\u2019re having there. And it\u2019s all a matter of planning. The cable company, for example, could just use whatever going into the building, whatever conduit is already there, or they can put their own. It really depends on it. It goes with the whole negotiation with the property management.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, that makes sense. In terms of cost threshold, because I know coming from the sales standpoint there\u2019s always cost thresholds where service providers start to do more for a customer where if a customer is going to spend a couple hundred bucks a month on a transport internet circuit, the provider\u2019s not going to do a whole lot for you because they\u2019re going, \u201cHey, all in all we\u2019re making $10 month in profit off this thing, by the time we pay everybody we\u2019re not going to do anything special.\u201d But at what point that you see the customer start to be able to dictate that kind of stuff where they\u2019re like, \u201cHey, I know you don\u2019t have anything built in, but can we get a diverse path all the way back to your PoP that\u2019s completely separate from what we have?\u201d Is there threshold like, \u201cHey, if they\u2019re spending 1,000 bucks a month, a couple thousand bucks a month on a gigabit circuit,\u201d where\u2019s that threshold, do you think?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nIt really is the contingent. So that\u2019ll be the part of the initial question that I would ask is, \u201cAre you looking to be diverse from who you currently have?\u201d Assuming they have a circuit in place already, right? So I would ask, \u201cOkay, are you looking to be diverse from them?\u201d And then when we trigger a site survey, when they do a sidewalk, \u201cPlease be diverse,\u201d or \u201ca separate conduit from what the LEC is using,\u201d and \u201cplease take,\u201d let\u2019s say, \u201ceastbound route back to hub site to be diverse from the LEC.\u201d Just off the top of my head type of an ask on a site survey, so our construction department.<\/p>\n<p>And that\u2019s more along the lines of a fiber request, because then what they\u2019ll do is, it\u2019s how our ring is designed. So when we bring fiber into a building, it\u2019s basically just a fiber lateral off the ring. So we have an eastbound route and a westbound route into a hub site, one of our critical infrastructure buildings. So what we\u2019ll do is we can tell them, \u201cHey, take this route as opposed to this route so that it could be diverse, number one, from let\u2019s say the LEC, or number two, be diverse from ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So if we have, Time Warner, let\u2019s say, has a circuit in there already, they want diversity but they don\u2019t want to go to the LEC, we can do it being diverse from ourselves just by nature of the ring going in westbound route back to our hub site and then connecting to either a separate router altogether or a separate card on the same router that has power redundancy, route engine redundancies. It\u2019s like two routers in one because it\u2019s fully redundant to itself. So that\u2019s part of it too.<\/p>\n<p>But as far as the outside plan is concerned, as we\u2019re talking about redundancy, it doesn\u2019t stop at the end pole of the building, it\u2019s got to continue on out into the street back northbound into the provider\u2019s network.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s a great point because we\u2019ve sold a lot of fiber to customers and I can maybe tell you one time where a customer wanted to see the fiber maps of how it was going to be built out and demanded that it be on a diverse path. So just for everybody listening, I mean that\u2019s just something, if a provider is going to build fiber, which I don\u2019t know maybe half the time if you\u2019re getting fiber coated there, if there\u2019s a build involved, that\u2019s a great time to get involved. And the provider is not going to bring it up to you if you don\u2019t bring it up to them. They\u2019re just going to install it in the easiest, fastest way possible. But if diversity is a big deal to you, it\u2019s true, it\u2019s like they\u2019re building it out anyway, that\u2019s a great point, make sure you bring it up there and say, \u201cHey, we want a diverse path from our current circuit that we have and here\u2019s the way that\u2019s coming in,\u201d so that they know. Because otherwise if you don\u2019t say anything, they\u2019re not going to say anything to you.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nAnd the other thing too is if you want to know what path they are in now, it\u2019s simple as making the phone call to the building management and saying, \u201cOkay, I want to order a circuit from, let\u2019s say, Charter or Time Warner, and right now Verizon is coming in on. I know they\u2019re coming in and I have a circuit with them now. Can you tell me what conduit they\u2019re in?\u201d And your building management should be able to give you that level of detail.<\/p>\n<p>Now, Verizon or AT&amp;T, let\u2019s say, can tell you what route they are taking back to their <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Telephone_exchange\" target=\"_blank\">CO<\/a><\/span>, they should be able to provide you with at least something along those lines. And then you just give that to, let\u2019s say, Charter, Time Warner, Comcast, anyone of the usual suspects, and say, \u201cI need you to be not on any of this route.\u201d And that gets uploaded into a site survey and cost it out so that we know exactly how we have to build it to be fully diverse.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat makes sense. And the provider will let you know at that point, \u201cHey, it\u2019s going to cost us this much, we can do it for free because it\u2019s not going to cost a whole lot and your monthly recurring charges are going to cover it,\u201d or the provider will say, \u201cYou know what, we can do it for free without the diversity that you requested.\u201d And if it\u2019s going to cost them a lot of money to build out that diversity, the provider will say like, \u201cOkay, well we can do it that way but it\u2019s going to cost you extra amount, 1,000 upfront, like 2,000 bucks upfront for us to install it that way,\u201d or whatever the case is.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. And a lot of the times too, it really is contingent on what type of diversity your end user is looking for. They may be just looking for building ingress diversity and not too much worried about what\u2019s going on outside as far as the poles are underground. And I\u2019ve seen that, and they\u2019re totally fine with that. But they want building diversity. And that\u2019s a simple phone call to the building management.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah. And I guess the logic there would be that they\u2019re thinking, \u201cWell, if something gets cut further out into the street, there\u2019s going to be a lot more people affected,\u201d so they\u2019re going to fix it faster as opposed to if something\u2019s just going on in our building, then the timeline for them to fix, there\u2019s a lot less customers affected so there\u2019s going to be slower time to repair than if you have thousands of people down that provider\u2019s going to be out there within hours fixing it. But if it\u2019s just your building, that might be a longer process.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. You know what\u2019s interesting too is when they pull the fiber in, depending upon the design and how much fiber the carrier has out in the field, they will always obviously pull in a pair, but it could be a pair that goes from your site directly back to the CO like just one long jumper, duplex jumper back there. Or it could be a pair to a <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Multiplexer\" target=\"_blank\">field MUX<\/a><\/span> that separates it out on channels and then just has a common pair that takes it back to the central office or hub site where there\u2019s the MUX on the other side to break out the channels again.<\/p>\n<p>But I\u2019ve actually been in scenarios where you\u2019ll have the pair end-to-end, no field MUX involved. And believe it or not, only one fiber was damaged but the circuit went down. So what you\u2019re able to do in that scenario is, as a field tech you put a MUX at the customer site and amongst back at the central office shoot the fiber and make sure one of the strands is good and bring it right back up while they fuse and find the break in the one strand and fuse and splice it. I\u2019ve seen that in the past too oddly enough.<\/p>\n<p>I was out in the field working one time and I had a customer go down and I just had one of my techs go to the hub site. I shot the laser across, we figured out that one was no good, that specific strand was no good. I shot the other one, he was able to see it light. I said, \u201cOkay, get an add-drop filter, let\u2019s bring this back up now so they don\u2019t have any further down time and construction and they don\u2019t have to lower the escalation on the ticket and not take their time but just get it done and mitigate impact to the customer.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThat\u2019s cool. Everybody who\u2019s listening, take notes. And there\u2019s also going to be show notes on our website. So if you go to <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/blog\/\" target=\"_blank\">AeroComInc.com\/info\/blog<\/a><\/span>, you can find this episode and look at that stuff because that\u2019s the type of stuff if you\u2019re troubleshooting, if you\u2019re troubleshooting downtime with a provider, you might want to bring that kind of stuff up to them and say, \u201cHey, is there any way you could do this?\u201d Because a lot of times the technicians have never done that before or they never heard of stuff like that being done and sometimes they\u2019re open to suggestions. And you bring that up, they go, \u201cYou know what, that\u2019s a good idea. Maybe we should try that. There\u2019s something.\u201d And so take note, that type of stuff might help you get back up and running faster than as opposed to if you just try to let them figure it out.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, and a lot of the times it could be something as simple as it\u2019s running too hot. And the carrier may not even realize it. And how you could tell, just to throw it out there for the troubleshooters, is if your circuit goes down, let\u2019s say it\u2019s a fiber circuit, and your port will have a status light lit, that\u2019s the smoking gun each and every time. But if you take the fiber and just slightly bend it, it causes attenuation. If the port comes up, it\u2019s coming in too hot, your carrier needs to pat it down with, I\u2019m making something up here, 5 dB pad, and they put it on there, it\u2019s done. Impact is mitigated.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nJeez, I\u2019ve never heard of that. I\u2019ve never heard a provider say, \u201cYou know what, you went down because our fiber was running too hot.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nThe link went into the other was coming in too hot. And you could literally just take a pen or a pencil and just wrap the fiber around the pen or pencil, it will cause attenuation and it\u2019ll bring it right back up.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWow, that\u2019s cool. I\u2019m sure everybody\u2019s getting something out of this for sure now.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nMacGyver.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nThere you go. That is a total MacGyver move. \u201cAnybody got a pencil on me or on you?\u201d That\u2019s awesome. Well, cool, those are some good points. Any other topics you wanted to cover on diversity?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah, if I can toot the Time Warner horn for a second here, what\u2019s great with Time Warner is we\u2019re able to do be diverse from ourselves not just on ring diverse, ring east-west diversity but we have adjacent rings that we can pull back to as well. So I\u2019ll just use San Fernando Valley for example. We have the east and west valley rings, so your main ring that you would normally pull from to get a lateral would be obviously readily available. We could also pull from an adjacent ring so that it goes back to completely different real estate and infrastructure so that you could have a one-stop-shop diverse solution within the same carrier. I\u2019ve seen that. I don\u2019t know to the level of detail your LECs can do, but Time Warner, and I\u2019m sure other cable companies, can do that as well.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that\u2019s true. I remember when I was working for <span style=\"color: #ff6600;\"><a style=\"color: #ff6600;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/company-profile\/xo\" target=\"_blank\">XO Communications<\/a><\/span> we used to call it multi-homed, it would be like where all of your traffic is coming and going out of a different core router of theirs where they give you a diverse path back to a separate central office within that service provider and a different core router that all of your traffic is going in and out of it. Obviously they\u2019re going to charge you for that. But if somebody wants a lot of diversity, if someone\u2019s getting a gig circuit or 2 gig circuits, something like that and they really care about diversity, that\u2019s a great point.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYup. And that diversity, to me it\u2019s a big thing, especially when you go off into higher bandwidth circuits, your 10 gig wave or something like that. Anybody that orders 10 gig definitely has need for speed and they don\u2019t want any downtime. So when you\u2019re factoring in diversity, you want to make sure end-to-end that that thing is diverse on those higher bandwidths.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, absolutely. Obviously if you need that much bandwidth, your business is really leaning on that connection, so yeah. So a lot of bad stuff is going on if you\u2019re down.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nOh, my goodness, yeah. I\u2019ve seen customers that will request transport circuit and look to LA for example, look to completely circumvent downtown LA, they don\u2019t want to go near just to avoid any disaster.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that\u2019s true because especially in cities there\u2019s always a lot of digging and construction going on.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYup, that\u2019s the main thing. And if it does go down, especially like you said digging in those cities, even if it adds on a couple of milliseconds of latency, your latency is so low to begin with on an optical wave that it\u2019s not even really noticeable. Obviously depending upon what application you\u2019re using, there are variables there. But it may be worth it to mitigate any type of downtime if you can request to the carrier, \u201cHey listen, I want to go,\u201d let\u2019s say, \u201cfrom Ventura down to Costa Mesa but I don\u2019t want to take in the route of downtown LA, can you please route it somewhere else?\u201d That can be done.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nVery cool. Well, cool. I think that\u2019s some great information. I think everybody learned a little bit on there as far as access circuits both and ways to diversify it. I know I did and I\u2019ve been around access transport circuits for 16 years and you just taught me a couple of things. So that\u2019s awesome. I know people listening got a couple nuggets there.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nWell, I\u2019m glad to be of help.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, all right. So let\u2019s get a little less serious and let\u2019s talk about your experience in the workplace and let\u2019s hear a good story out of you about most interesting or funny, whatever moment that you\u2019ve seen in the workplace or one of them at least.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSure. Oh, wow. Boy, it actually brings to mind a whole bunch of things. I\u2019ll keep it funny and productive.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nI like it.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nSo IT folks generally know what they\u2019re doing and they do it well. But what I have seen out there is they do Layer 2 very well, Layer 3 very well and so on, but what I will say is I do notice a lot of challenges on Layer 1, your cabling. I\u2019ve been in scenarios where I\u2019ll go out and do a trouble call and do a test and I\u2019m able to test with pull throughput, let\u2019s say, a gig\u2019s worth of traffic, but the moment they connect, let\u2019s say, whatever they have the host, the PC or what have you, it back in and they\u2019ll try to test with their machine, they\u2019re not seeing in that throughput. So then I\u2019ll walk back with them to where they have their racks and I can honestly tell you without, I\u2019ll illustrate it for you, probably about five inches worth of RJ45 cables hanging in front of a multiple switches, not one cable is labeled, and there is no cable management going across, so you can\u2019t even tell what it\u2019s plugged into, number one, and you can\u2019t even get to it. So there\u2019s a huge value add there and lessons to be learned on that.<\/p>\n<p>And the second thing is I\u2019ve seen where on Layer 1 you\u2019ll have an interconnect between your Layer 3 switch and down into your access switches. And I\u2019ve seen it where they\u2019ll use a single-mode 15-kilometer optic or something along those lines for 10 feet worth of jumping. And again, going back to that attenuation thing, it\u2019s running too hot, it should be on multi-mode. So I\u2019ll go out there and see that and then just get an overview of how they have their networks setup. I\u2019ve literally been in that scenario where you go up to and go, they will show you where the cross is connected and you just bend it, everything comes back on. Or you\u2019ll have CRC errors, you\u2019ll be logging all kinds of errors on the port and no one will know why, they\u2019ll blame the carrier. But if you look at the optics or even a dirty cable will cause that too. I\u2019ve seen that too. You got to clean them.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nOh, my gosh. I have been thinking about that. Obviously I\u2019m not even an IT guy, let alone start going to the cable, but I have been thinking about cables being dirty. Because in our own office, it\u2019s like officers we\u2019ve had, I\u2019ve had no clue how those cables were ran and a lot of them, they\u2019re just through ceiling tiles and everything like that. And whenever we\u2019ve had outages, the provider is always going, \u201cWell, what about your cabling?\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cI don\u2019t want to talk about my cabling. Let\u2019s not go there, it\u2019s not that I guarantee you, it\u2019s not my cabling.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nI\u2019ve seen that. And the fiber is what a fiber jumper between switches, usually people just pull it out of the bag, pop the things off and take them and touching the fiber tips with their fingers, and that right there could cause you all kinds of problems. And I\u2019ve seen it happen.<\/p>\n<p>Now, another time I went to do a trouble call, kind of customer that was down and we had our construction folks who shot the cable and it\u2019s like within feet of where it was supposed to be. I get onto the site, I don\u2019t have any light and I\u2019m inspecting around and go outside and sure enough, I guess outside there was a sewer plate that was just the loose enough that as people would go by you could hear it \u201cbloom, bloom\u201d as people going by driving on the street. Well somehow or another the cable came through the vault out onto the street. Now as they\u2019re driving by, they are just smashing the cable right in front of the building.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYou\u2019re like, \u201cNo, that can\u2019t be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nIt was just the cable I was going into there and you don\u2019t know how that could have happened, but somehow or another it made it through.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nProbably someone like me was cabling it.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nWell, just a vandalist or some sort probably just for whatever reason got bored and opened up the thing and pulled it through.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nJust pull something. Jeez. That\u2019s terrible. Well, cool, those are some good stories. Now tell us a little bit about Time Warner. You mentioned it before. Anything else going on exciting with you guys that you\u2019d like everybody to know or things that you guys do particularly well?<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. Well, first and foremost, you probably heard, it\u2019s been abuzz in the media is that we recently got acquired by Charter Communications or Spectrum. So as it stands right now, we\u2019re still working as two separate companies. So it\u2019s business as usual for now. But the plan as management team does tackle the task of putting the three networks together, I should say, it\u2019s Time Warner, Charter and Bright House as they put us all together, that will evolve and it\u2019ll be one footprint. But as of right now we\u2019re still working as three separate companies. So that is obviously on the road map, if you will.<\/p>\n<p>You\u2019ll hear a lot of discussions out there about getting, let\u2019s say, QoS on your circuits, more so on fiber you\u2019ll hear the requests. I have voice traffic, I need to get your bronze plan or your platinum plan for QoS. The good news with Time Warner Cable\u2019s on the fiber circuits is we don\u2019t oversubscribe so there is no need for QoS. Any time there\u2019s a QoS offering, that just smells of the provider oversubscribing their network and that\u2019s not something that Time Warner does on the fiber side. On the coax side it\u2019s different story, it\u2019s best effort. But on the fiber side it\u2019s just not the case, we don\u2019t do it.<\/p>\n<p>Now on the flip side is, going back to what we had discussed earlier, all Time Warner\u2019s critical infrastructure is five years old or younger because in 2011 we completely upgraded the whole network at least for the LA market. Some other markets are newer, Texas, Carolinas, New York City and the Ohio\u2019s, in Ohio rather, they may be newer depending upon when they did their upgrade. But for California, 2011, we did every core router, every edge router, every legacy switches, it\u2019s gone, everything has been completely upgraded. And in 2012 Forklift upgraded the whole entire optical backbone. So all of our infrastructures, there\u2019s of plenty of bandwidth to be had. And it\u2019s nothing but good news for Time Warner on that level.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nYeah, that\u2019s cool. So all of you IT professionals listening, if you\u2019ve used Time Warner in the past and it\u2019s been over four years, three, four years since you\u2019ve used them, chances are this is a completely different network now than they had before. So it\u2019s really a double take at Time Warner is what I\u2019m taking from that because a brand new infrastructure on the backend is definitely going to lead to a super high quality of service to their customers.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nAnd versatility too. A fiber circuit is wonderful to have, but it doesn\u2019t mean a hill of beans if the infrastructure it\u2019s connecting to that piece of fiber is connecting to a router or a switch back at the CO that\u2019s from 2001, antiquated equipment. I guess that to me is a huge point of Time Warner. Our engineering team put a lot of time and blood, sweat and tears into designing a network that has the most versatility and has the best gear, and they\u2019re always changing. That\u2019s the thing too is they\u2019re getting ahead of the curve. Even on the DOCSIS side we\u2019ve been upgrading all of our CMTS gear put to the latest and the greatest to make sure we can launch new versions of DOCSIS to get more bandwidth. So really coming out of Time Warner\u2019s tent there\u2019s just nothing but good news.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nGood stuff. And now as the mergers are happening, it\u2019s just more and more network out there you guys have to play with.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nYeah. Yeah, it\u2019s true. It\u2019s true. Charter is great company. I\u2019ve worked alongside with them in the past in the carrier space. A great company, awesome leadership. So excited to work with them and our friends at Bright House too, that this should be an awesome opportunity for us to team up and help some folks out.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAwesome. Well, thanks for sharing and thanks for coming on the show and giving us a ton of new information that, I guess that I\u2019m sure that people who are listening got something today that they didn\u2019t know before, which is always to go and learn a little bit more every single day. So I know you helped us do that today for sure.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nI appreciate it. Any time.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nAnd I\u2019m sure that we will have another topic here in the near future. We\u2019ll ask you to come back on. But in the meantime, have a great day and thanks again.<\/p>\n<p>John Stephens:<br \/>\nNo problem. Thanks for having me on.<\/p>\n<p>Mike Smith:<br \/>\nWasn\u2019t John awesome? I loved the part about the collapse points. I think that made a lot of sense to me as well as taking a look at or actually calling your building management to learn about the entrance that the providers are taking into the building and where the lines are coming from. I thought there was some great tips that everybody listening could definitely learn from. And in my experience, I\u2019m telling you, nobody ask those questions. I\u2019ve sold a lot of internet connectivity to businesses and a lot of secondary internet connections and still no one\u2019s asking those questions. So you guys, great advice there, take note of it, ask those questions the next time you\u2019re getting a secondary internet connection for your company.<\/p>\n<p>All right. Before we go, I just wanted to give you a quick reminder about the free gift, it\u2019s a list of all the major Internet service providers\u2019 promotions that are going on right now for business internet access. All you have to do to get it is text the word \u201cISP Deals\u201d to the number 44222 and we will send you that free copy, that\u2019s a gift for you guys. Also, if you have any questions for John Stephens from Time Warner Cable, no big deal, just email us at podcast@aerocominc.com. We will be happy to accommodate answer any questions or even arrange a call with John if you\u2019d like.<\/p>\n<p>Last but not least, make sure you visit our website aerocominc.com\/info\/blog and look up this podcast in the search bar and you\u2019ll have a transcript of this entire podcast so you don\u2019t have to take notes.<\/p>\n<p>So, few quick reminders. Take advantage of those and have a fantastic day. I hope you learned just a little bit because that\u2019s the goal and we\u2019ll see you next time.<\/p>\n<p>IT Nation, thank you for joining us on Cloud Therapy with AeroComInc.com. Visit us at AeroComInc.com, that\u2019s A-E-R-O-C-O-M-I-N-C dot com and head on over to the blog section for notes on everything we talked about today as well as our blogs, provider reviews, and of course the best quotes for any technology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you ordered that back-up fiber Internet line for your company, did you ask your building management company for a map of how the cables are entering the building? Did you ask the ISP for a map of the collapse<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/cloud-therapy-ep-021-diversify-your-business-internet-paths\/\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\">Read more &#8250;<\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":9604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[371],"tags":[204,511,504,172,512,422,429,519,516,515,506,505,112,508,428,518,514,520,423,513,510,517,509],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9603"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aerocominc.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}