“When envoys are sent with compliments in their mouths, it is a sign that the enemy wishes for a truce.”

The Transit with Peering Migration tactic leverages an internal advocate (the target ISP Sales Person) to lobby for peering on behalf of the Initiating Peering Coordinator. In this tactic, a transit contract is purchased from the target ISP with an explicit contractual migration of the relationship from a Transit relationship to a Peering relationship should the Peering Prerequisites at the target ISP be met.

The difficulty with this tactic is that Peering Prerequisites evolve.  The trick here is to specify the Peering Prerequisites to use at the end of the term of the transit contract. In one case study, Williams executed this tactic with Sprint, and by the end of the contract term, the Sprint Peering Prerequisites had changed. Understandably, this led to heated discussions between the parties. Sprint suggested that Williams re-up for another term and try again at the end of the next term. Perhaps a bit suspicious, Williams instead pursued the “End Run” tactic described next.