ustomer equipment is usually considered to be relatively "stupid." Not only is the intelligence seen as being concentrated within the con- fines of the network, so too is the bulk of the bandwidth, because the legacy model indicates that traditional customer applications don't require much of it. Between central office switches, however, and between the offices themselves, enormous bandwidth is required. Today, this model is changing. Customer equipment has become remarkably intelligent, and many of the functions previously done within the network cloud are now performed at the edge. PBXs, comput- ers, and other devices are now capable of making discriminatory deci- sions about required service levels, eliminating any need for the massive intelligence embedded in the core. At the same time, the bandwidth is migrating from the core of the net- work toward the customer as applications evolve to require it. There is still massive bandwidth within the cloud, but the margins of the cloud are expanding toward the customer. The result of this evolution is a redefinition of the network's regions. Instead of a low-speed, low-intelligence access area and a high-speed, highly intelligent core, the intelligence has migrated outward to the mar- gins of the network, and the bandwidth-once exclusively a core resource-is now equally distributed at the edge. Thus, we see some- thing of a core and edge distinction evolving as customer requirements change. One reason for this steady migration is the well-known fact within sales and marketing circles that products sell best when they are located close to the buying customer. They are also easier to customize for indi- vidual customers when they are physically closest to the situation for which the customer is buying them. In "The Rise of the Stupid Network," David Isenberg makes the fol- lowing observation: The Intelligent Network is a straight-line extension of four assumptions- scarcity, voice, circuit switching, and control. Its primary design impetus was not customer service. Ra