Peering just means that two AS physically connect to each other directly. Whether this peering is paid or not is independent from the technical implementation.

Just nearly everybody except Telekom is doing this on a liberal and informal not-even-handshake basis. On ISP scale, you either invest in infrastructure, or pay rent for network ports or cross-links, and you generally want your traffic usage to be smooth without spikes, and also go to the destination without going through your expensive ports more than once. So general connectivity is more important than any kind of traffic metering.

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direwolf20 an hour ago | parent [-]

> peering just means that ...

This also describes transit and describes getting internet service at home. I wouldn't say my cellphone peers with my provider. My cellphone is very much subordinate to my provider, not a peer.

DT thinks it's important enough that it can extort everyone.

A good policy for ISPs is to peer as many places and networks as possible, and carry traffic between your peers and customers, and customers and customers, and transit and customers, but not between peers and peers, or peers and transit. This way one end is paying for all traffic you carry. If you are a bully, you can try to make both ends pay.

	▲	yayachiken 24 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> This also describes transit and describes getting internet service at home. Well no. Transit means that you use another AS (usually by a larger ISP) to get connectivity to a certain AS. And as for your internet service at home, unless you announce an AS, you are not peering with anyone.