yeah, we saw that earlier too. it won't change Level 3's mind... but customers who move there might be pretty disappointed given that Level 3 carries far more internet traffic than Cogent does. it will also be compounded when other backbone providers get wise, smell blood, and cancel their peering sessions with Cogent as well. as of right now, cogent is passing even MORE traffic over the other peers than before because it obviously hasn't come up with a fiber optic backbone of its own since this morning, and so is relying even more upon other carriers to pass their traffic back and forth.
that won't make AT&T, sprint, UUNET, or others very happy. they're already carrying cogent's water and just hadn't gotten the cajones to do what Level 3 decided to do.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1497398/posts
I can log onto Level 3 but not Cogent. Several of the sites I need for work aren't accessible right now either. ggrrrr.
All due respect to you, I am just a consumer caught in this web, but you said it yourself, you do have a dog in this fight. You will understand if I take other perspectives into consideration.