Hi Sander! On Fri, 2015-02-20 at 01:15 +0100, Sander Steffann wrote:
Hello Martin,
I'm generally in favour of any proposal that hastens the run-out of the final /8.
The main design goal for the final /8 policy was to make sure that newcomers still had the possibility of participating on the IPv4 internet.
Indeed. Participate with a major handicap however. One could even argue that it is in fact anti-competitive compared with the rules pre final-/8 policy. The major architectural reason for and result of it was and is to buy RIPE NCC time to adjust to the post-depletion Internet world order.
It is unfortunately still not possible to run an ISP, hoster etc. with only IPv6.
Indeed it is not. It is likewise pretty futile to launch a new business as an ISP or hoster on a total of 1024 addresses. Any 'relevant' business plan for either will necessarily have to contain plans for acquiring much more than 1024 IPv4 addresses, since the availability of addresses, especially for hosters, is basically proportional to the growth possibility of the business.
Without the final /8 policy every new company would have to get (borrow, buy, rent, ...) IPv4 addresses from existing companies that already got IPv4 addresses before we ran out of addresses to distribute using our needs-based allocation policies.
Yes. Why is this worse than getting addresses from RIPE NCC's free pool, other than the fact that RIPE NCC sells pretty cheap addresses?
With the final /8 policy they don't get much but at least they are able to participate on the internet. There is still an imbalance because of the low amount of addresses they get but at least they have *something* to work with.
I've found size /22 sufficiently large to connect your average random SMB to the DFZ.
I do feel that as a community we should take this into account. Although I am sure there are many governments who want to take control over the internet we still are in a position that we can (are allowed to?) self-regulate the distribution of number resources.
I'll respond to this paragraph with four points: 1) Controlling Internet is much less about deciding who can have what address space uniquely, from a pool of unallocated space, than it is about deciding who gets to keep the address space. Secondary to this is the right of actually using the routing policy without interference. Many so-called democratic countries already implement filtering by hijacking via more-specifics, often based on actual laws, laws that won't change regardless of what this community self-regulates. 2) Since the final /8 will run out sooner (but IMO not soon enough) rather than later, this community's ability to self-regulate the distribution of IPv4 addresses is completely dead-end. 3) Once v4 address space is depleted and there is no more free pool to distribute from, the requirement for a needs based distribution model vanishes. If there is no more scarce resource, there is no more need to regulate it. Therefore it could be hypothesized that depleting the final /8 would *reduce* the need for governments to absorb regulatory work from the RIPE NCC. Address space becomes increasingly indistinguishable from radio frequencies - a right to transmit - however with typically global reach. 4) Also, once RIPE NCC's pools are depleted, some non-trivial amount of bureaucracy will basically go into the shredder, to my and Douglas Adams delight, saving on the environment. The green choice is therefore to accelerate the run-out.
If we only think about ourselves (the existing participants on the internet) and block new entrants from getting even that tiny fraction of the addresses that most of us got for free in the past then I am afraid that this won't last very long.
You bring up blocking of new entrants. To paraphrase Bill Gates, "1024 addresses are enough for everybody". If you were truly honest about welcoming new entrants to compete on equal terms, a /22 is not enough. Your fear for post-depletion is irrational in my opinion. You need to start entertaining the idea of the fact that it will happen. Post-depletion, what do you think governments will need to regulate and why do you fear it? Are you afraid some country with more military than address space compared to its neighbour will use the former to get more of the latter, from one that "got lucky"? Or are you afraid that governments will apply needs-based logic on already allocated address space? --> "No ISPs with blue in the logo may exist any more, now return the space to our national regulatory body, thanks" The best way of mitigating those examples is to empower people to themselves value their need of address space vs the need of the goods that it can be traded for. I am convinced that world order will be very healthy. If there's any worry about job security, the stock markets of today do employ people, and keep track of who has what. It's not very different from what's required from a regional registrar in the future. And you seldom see governments walking around redistributing stock between owners by force.
Comments from the working group on this are highly appreciated :)
Cheers, Sander
PS: I don't have a strong opinion on the policy proposal under discussion, sorry for drifting a bit from this thread's subject
I think this discussion is more relevant to APWG than the policy proposal at hand. :-) /M - Pondering the merits of a "reverse the final /8 policy" proposal.