As the term “hot potato” suggests, no sooner did a message block enter a node than it was tossed out the door again as quickly as possible. If the best outgoing path was busy—or blown to bits—the message block was automatically sent out over the next best route. If that link was busy or gone, it followed the next best route, and so forth. And if the choices ran out, the data could even be sent back to the node from which it originated.
