We’re switching our network provider. Before we did, we decided to do some speed tests, to find out which was faster. We did this by pinging [ireland.com](http://www.ireland.com). Strangely, we found that our old provider was _faster_, in spite of the fact they’re supposed to be a slower link, with antiquated technology.
So, we dug about a bit more. Using our old provider:
`[johnke@oasis johnke]$ traceroute www.ireland.com
traceroute to www.ireland.com (195.7.33.37), 30 hops max, 38 byte packets
1 www.ireland.com (195.7.33.37) 256.913 ms 4.886 ms 9.690 ms`
No wonder we it was faster. We’re on the same subnet.
Anyway, I was just amused by this. I’ve never seen a one-hop traceroute to a major site before.