Understanding the characteristics of the Internet delay space is important for the design of global-scale distributed systems. For instance, algorithms used in overlay networks are often sensitive to violations of the triangle inequality and to the growth properties within the Internet delay space. Since designers of distributed systems often rely on simulation to study design alternatives, they need a realistic model of the Internet delay space. We analyze measured delay spaces and identify key properties that are important for distributed system design. Our analysis shows that existing models do not adequately capture important properties of the Internet delay space. Furthermore, we derive a simple model of the Internet delay space, which preserves the relevant metrics far better than existing models, allows for a compact representation, and can be used to synthesize delay data for simulations and emulations at a scale where direct measurement and storage are impractical.