April 7th, 2023, Ohio IX Meeting

Attendees:  Nancy Tiemeier, Doug Payauys, Brent Beatty, Jason Gintert, Matt Moran, Luke Skidmore, Greg Dunn, Chris Cameron, Phil Maag, and Vonda Dilley

Roll call and Approval of Agenda – Completed

Secretary Report – Minutes Approved 

Governance – No updates.  Doug will provide changes to the code of regulations to review.

Next meeting – Friday, May 5th at 9:00 to 10:30 at Cologix 

Associate and Senior Member Applications – Application from Cyrus One.  They have an interest in being a remote switch in Cincinnati.  We have an NDA in place- still talking about what it would look like.  They will need to provide transport and will need to sign the remote switch agreement.  We moved to approve them as a Senior Member pending payment.  It was seconded and approved.

Government – Brent suggested talking to Paul and having a video played on the IX at their meetings.  

Broadband Ohio will conduct in-person listening sessions and live webinars to support updates to the state’s broadband strategy and the development of a comprehensive plan to close the digital divide.

Upcoming meetings: 

• April 4 – Toledo 
• April 5 – Nonprofits and Community Organizations Webinar 
• April 6 – Findlay 
• April 12 – Ohio Residents Webinar 
• April 13 – Cleveland 
• April 20 – Youngstown 
• More information here: 

Things Happening around the State of Ohio

1. Ohio TT: Building new towers to close the internet gap – Ohio TT of Zanesville is working on a $5 million broadband project with Coshocton County Commissioners to get service to 15,000 residents.
   
   2. NTIA awards $25.7M for tribal broadband, altafiber expands in Ohio – A new partnership between altafiber and Warren County, Ohio, will see Cincinnati Bell’s altafiber build a fiber network to roughly 52,000 residences, including 50,000 single-family homes and 2,000 multi-dwelling units. 
   
   3. AWS brings free fiber-optic training to Ohio – The certificate course is offered by AWS and Ohio’s Office of Workforce Transformation (OWT), local employers, and educational organizations. 
   
   4. AEP Ohio proposes rural broadband projects in eight southeast Ohio counties – AEP Ohio is proposing rural broadband projects in eight southeast Ohio counties that could have a dual purpose to lease excess capacity to internet service providers. Counties impacted would be Washington, Meigs, Athens, Hocking, Jefferson, Morgan, Perry, and Vincent.
   
   5. Canton Moving Forward on Major Broadband Fiber Initiative – There’s a plan that could bring high-speed internet to every household in the city. This ordinance builds the “backbone” to that system, running fiber up and down major streets.

Content Committee

• Had a call with a caching company and Cyrus One
• Brent applied for Google Cache to go through IX
• Discussed using open cache server for open content which we could approve or deny (Quilt, IFN, Egio)
• Want to explore new power options at Cologix.  There was a motion to look at additional power options at Cologix.  This was voted and approved.

Marketing

• Press Release sent on March 29^th.  Chris Tovar wrote the copy.  Want to check to see who picked it up.  The next one will be the end of May.
• Next Happy Hour around May 18^th in Athens.
• Website – should have something to look at in mid-April.  

Tech Committee 

Technical Committee

• New Tech Committee Members: Cal Cook from ARISTA & Phillip Schwartz from EVERSTREAM
  
• Will be ramping them up and getting them familiar with network
  
• Activated King Networks
  
• Built out Cato in IXP Manager, sent them LOA/CFA
  
• Scheduled upgrade/patch Arista switches & route servers on May 4th
  
• All hosts running Ubuntu 18.04 to upgraded throughout April 
  
• Moved all spare equipment into storage unit
  
• Need to put lock box on storage unit
  
  –

CTO Report

• 159Gbps peak on Wednesday 3/15
  
• Port Inventory
  
• Columbus
  
• 40/100G Ports -19 of 64 – 29% Utilization
  
• 1/10G Ports – 53 of 96 – 55% Utilization
  
• Cleveland
  
• 40/100G Ports – 3 of 32 – 9% Utilization
  
• 1/10G Ports – 1 of 116 – 1% Utilization
  
• Cincinnati
  
• 1/10G Ports – 2 of 32 – 6% Utilization
  
• Newsletter sent for review
  
• Started working with Slantics on new site
  
• Signed CyrusOne NDA
  
• Spoke with Netskrt on getting a cache
  
• Brent got a Google cache and will be exploring moving to us
  
• Brent also discovered deploying an Edge.io cache is self service like the Microsoft cache so we are exploring that
  
• Are SFN actually stil going to connect?
  
• Cato Networks is using HE for transport and HE will be acquiring the cross connect to meet with us

Old / New Business 

• Geostar – additional 10G port request – There was a motion to grant a 2^nd port to Geostar to use.  This was voted and approved.
• Website Makeover – The are working on the website and are shooting to have something for us to review the week of April 24^th.  

• Cross Connect Pre-Pay option & Contract – This was tabled for a future meeting.
• Annual Meeting Planning and Date – Looking at July 27^th at Top Golf.  Brent checking with them to see if this date is available. 

Meeting adjourned.  

Respectfully submitted,

Nancy Tiemeier

February 3, 2023, Ohio IX Meeting

Attendees:  Nancy Tiemeier, Doug Payauys, Brent Beatty, Jason Gintert, Brian Riley, Rob Shema, Josh Rowe, Matt Moran, Aaron Holtz, Martin Hannigan, Luke Skidmore, Vonda Dilley

Roll call and Approval of Agenda – Completed

Secretary Report – Minutes Approved 

Governance – n/a

Next meeting – Friday, March 3^rd at 9:00  to 10:30 at Cologix 

Associate & Senior Member Applications – Cato Networks for senior membership.  They were discussed, voted and approved. They need to provide transport back to Cologix, will provide a list of fiber providers.

Government Committee Report – n/a

Content Committee

• Google – Not adding public peering at Cologix.  Trying to get in deeper discussions.

Marketing

• Happy Hour in Cincinnati on February 23^rd at Brew Works in Hamilton.  Need catering order for food by 2/10.  Aaron is checking to see if we can order other food instead of catering.  Will do a presentation on the IX.  Will bring sweatshirts and t-shirts to give out.
• Ryan Collings from Buckete Hills Regional Council sent introductions to us with several members.  Jason will also attend their next board meeting.  We have interest from their members in joining the IX including Nelsonville Cable.  
• Ohio Regional Council – having a summit this summer, we may want to participate in it.
• Discussed advertising in the OTA directory but decided it wouldn’t be beneficial.

Tech Committee / CTO Report

Technical Committee
-Apple cache is live as of January 19th!
-Made changes to replication, will be able to recover more quickly next time- will install at Fairlawn Gig
-Upgraded HE from 20G to 200G
-Akamai is down, no ETR
-Grabbing more hosts to use next thursday, likely putting one in cabinet in Cleveland
-Have 5 remote ARISTA 7280SE switches in stock. Checked, upgraded and ready to go!
–

CTO
-154Gbps on January 29th
-Avg over 100G at peak
–

Port Inventory
-Columbus
-40/100G Ports -19 of 64 – 29% Utilization
-1/10G Ports – 53 of 96 – 55% Utilization
–

 Cleveland
-40/100G Ports – 3 of 32 – 9% Utilization
-1/10G Ports – 1 of 116 – 1% Utilization
–

Cincinnati
-1/10G Ports – 2 of 32 – 6% Utilization
–

Getting more equipment on hand which is being kept at people’s houses.  Suggested we look into a public storage location near the data center.  Can get a unit for about $50 a month.  A motion was made to get a storage unit nearby for equipment inventory.  It was discussed and passed.

Old / New Business 

• ICS – modification to 10G connection – They plan to connect through We Connect and would like it to be a 10G port instead of the 100G port originally requested.  The billing will be adjusted to the 10G pricing.
• Website makeover – Discussed the website proposal from Slantics.  The original quote was $4400 to update and create the new site.  We had originally budgeted $4000 to redo the website so decided to have the marketing committee work with them to see if can be done for that cost.  A motion was made to approve up to $4,000 to get started and re-do the website.  It was voted and approved.

• Press Release – Purchased 8 – will work on putting one out every other month.  The marketing committee will discuss this at their next meeting.
• Code of Regulations – need to get a working document shared on Google Drive so we can get this updated.
• Remote Switch Operator – We need to rework the operator agreement.  Will put it on Google Drive so we can work on updates together.

Meeting adjourned.  

Respectfully submitted,

Nancy Tiemeier

December 1, 2022, Ohio IX Meeting

Attendees:  Nancy Tiemeier, Doug Payauys, Brent Beatty, Jason Gintert, Brian Riley, Luke Skidmore, Rob Shema, Josh Rowe, Vonda Dilley, Matt Moran, Lee Rutherford

Roll call and Approval of Agenda – Completed

Secretary Report – Minutes Approved

Governance – FCC mapping is out now, asking residents if they are getting speeds that have been reported.

Associate & Senior Member Applications – Omni Fiber for senior membership.  They were discussed, voted and approved.

Content Committee

• Breezeline – interested in offloading customer traffic.  Matt is working with them
  • MICE – Brent talked to them – wants to discuss connecting to the IX – have content. Looking at around 19ms between sites.  Brent would support 10G of transport.  Will discuss further with them after 1^st of the year
  • Apple cache should be here by end of the month
  • Facebook is up – starting to set up routes
  • Meta – they have a special form that takes peering.db information
  • Discussed sending out email to members on how to connect to Facebook, Cloudflare etc
  • Spectrum has peered with HE in Cleveland

Marketing

• Broadband Alliance meeting is Dec 13^th at State of Ohio Library at 274 E 1^st Ave from 1:00 to 3:00.  Have 15 minutes to discuss what the IX is in simple terms and benefits.  Need to submit slides by December 9^th.  We will meet next week to finalize slides/presentation.
• Marty from Deep Edge would join the committee
• If needed, Brent will meet with Jeff Waddell and prospective members prior to the Happy Hour in Cincinnati
• Marketing company, Brent provided information, will reach out. 

Tech Committee / CTO Report

• The committee meets every other Tuesday if anyone wants to join. 
• Replacing discs and working on maintenance.
• Jason recognized Matt for helping to monitor the network and traffic spikes and Josh Rowe for helping with the website.  Dustin Wright providing 100G transport and support and Aaron Slotness for his help
• Discussed moving the website to marketing firm at some point

CTO

Hit 149Gbps on November 16th!

Averaging 80-150G at peak
-Port Inventory
-Columbus
-40/100G Ports – 17 of 64 – 27% Utilization
-1/10G Ports – 55 of 96 – 57% Utilization – If 100G ports, 20% Utilization

Cleveland
-40/100G Ports – 3 of 32 – 9% Utilization
-1/10G Ports – 1 of 116 – 1% Utilization
–

Cincinnati
-40G – 0 of 2 – 0% Utilization
-1/10G Ports – 2 of 32 – 6% Utilization
-Gear to purchase
-4 x 100G FS.com Optics – $500/ea = $2000
-10 x Western Digital Red 1TB SSDs – $110/ea = $1100
-5 x Arista 7280SE-64 (48 x 10G, 4 x 40G) – $1500/ea = $7500
–

Facebook is up as of 11/17!
–

Interest from: CATO and WV-IX

There was a motion – Approve to purchase 5 switches, disc drives, and optics for $10,600 before the end of the year.  This was voted and approved.

10G optics, disc drives, DL360 servers – will allow us to control the equipment for remote switch locations.

Old / New Business

• Press releases related to growth, members, CDN’s etc.  We discussed buying a bundle (good deals for end of the year).   A motion was made to purchase a package of PR not to exceed the 2022 marketing budget.  It was voted and approved.  We will buy it this year and use next year.
• Website makeover and updates – the site needs revamped.  Nancy knows a company that could help – will schedule a call for the 1^st of the year.  Need to rebuild logo with vector graphics
• Government Committee – Discussed setting up a new committee to stay on top of new funds and opportunities as well as connecting with municipalities.  A motion was made to set up this new committee,  It was voted and approved.   Will work on getting someone to head the committee.
• Ohio IX Announce and Ohio IX Discuss mailing lists.  Announce – outgoing only; provides minutes and other outward information.  Discuss – encourages discussion.  They are integrated with IXP Manager. 
• We need a database with all contacts – merge accounting information to IXP Manager
• Audit of free cross connects – 10 free cc.   did audit, can remove some and reuse. A motion was made to allow Fairlawn Gig to have a free cc since they are providing transport the IX.  This was voted and approved.  They provide transport at no charge and want to separate their transport traffic and IX traffic.

Next meeting – Friday, January 6^th at 9:00 at Cologix

Attendees: Nancy Tiemeier, Doug Payauys, Brent Beatty, Jason Gintert, Rob Shema, Kim Gerhart, Chris Cameron, Brian Riley

Roll call and Approval of Agenda – Completed

Secretary Report – Minutes Approved

Governance No updates

Associate & Senior Member Applications – No new applications

Content Committee
• Apple cache – agreement looks straightforward. Need to fill out forms. Only cost would be additional power. Benefits – deliver static apple content, IOS updates, music content and apps. It would not cover streaming at this point. Regarding marketing this new connection – there don’t seem to be any restrictions but will confirm with them. We moved to approve connecting to Apple cache. This was voted and approved.
• Facebook connection will land soon. This will be bilateral peering only. Will be 100G connection.
• Discussed pushing Gaming companies. May also look at service providers

Marketing
• Happy Hours – Dates needed to be pushed out, didn’t get the invite completed in time. New dates – November 10th for Cleveland at Thee Oak Barrel and November 17th for Cincinnati (Municipal Brew Works in Hamilton
• Discussed getting a banner done and some give aways
• Will look at new sources for clothware
• Website updates – Josh is working on FAQ section for the website. If things need to be updated, send to Josh and copy others on the board

Tech Committee / CTO Report
• Traffic averaging 50 to 100 Gbps. Peaked at 100Gbps with Thursday night football
• Port Inventory
Columbus
40/100G Ports – 17 of 64 – 27% Utilization
1/10G Ports – 55 of 96 – 57% Utilization – If 100G ports, 20% Utilization

   Cleveland
   40/100G Ports - 3 of 32 - 9% Utilization
   1/10G Ports - 1 of 116 - 1% Utilization

• First Communications almost done – has been a Zayo circuit issue
• IFN- switched to 100G connection a few weeks ago
• Amazon – 100G ports are completed – will upgrade to them
• Facebook getting 100G connection
• Path – We may recommission that port if no payment is received
• Fairlawn Gig – May need additional 100G port. There is an issue with transport and peering on the same circuit. It was moved to provide a second 100G port and optic to Fairlawn Gig to separate traffic since they are providing transport to the IX. The is was voted on and approved.
• Huntington disconnected their peering. Jason will confirm that they are permanently disconnecting
• Linear 1 – Hoping will reconnect, checking with Matt Moran (had been talking to them)

Old / New Business
• Remote Switch – Cyxtera at Green Meadows in Columbus. A discussion was had with Ben at Cyxterra. Wanted us to do the switch and transport since we can’t provide and SLA. Discussion on us owning the switches. We provided a switch in Cleveland and Cincinnati – it is hard to manage other people’s switches. Easier for us to manage but we would need additional resources for remote hands works and support. There if fiber into Cyxtera through CEC fiber (Horizon now). Could use a CWDM shelf instead of switch since so close. Will continue discussion.
• Broadband Ohio – need letters to support what we are asking for. Brian will check with OU. Will provide a template for what we need completed.
• Jason would like to move to a model that we own and operate the switch. Need to discuss economic feasibility – will need additional discussions. Would need budget to hire someone to help support. Continue to discuss
• Need to establish rate changes with 90 day notice if going to change. We are good with the current rate structure.
• If we need equipment, we should buy it now so we stay below the $50,000 threshold.
• Jason would like to attend the Fiber Broadband Regional Connect meeting. Requested to expense it. – This was approved. Discussed hosting a happy hour the day before the event from 5 to 7:00. Possible location – Barley’s

Next meeting will be November 4th at Cologix at 9:00

Meeting adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
Nancy Tiemeier