I am not implying that we will run out of addresses tomorrow, only that we will run out.
For the purposes of making policy, magnitude matters. I agree that we will eventually run out of IPv6 addresses. Will it be 1000 years from now? 500 years? 100 years? The magnitude of the time period matters because I do not believe that RIPE is making policy for 1000 years or 500 years or even 100 years. If RIPE can repair the IPv6 policy into something that will work for the next 5 years, then RIPE is doing a fine job. If that results in accelerated uptake of /32's which leads to a projected runout of 2000::/3 50 years from now, then I do not see any problem whatsoever from the point of view of IPv6 address space exhaustion. If that were the case, then the prudent way to deal with it is to run with the new relaxed policy for 5 years, 1/10th of the runout period, and then decide what to do with the benefits of hindsight. Anybody who claims that there is an issue with waste of addresses or with conservation of addresses, MUST demonstrate that issue with hard numbers and projected runout dates, otherwise we should ignore them because they do not know what they are talking about. IPv6 is not IPv4. Quantity changes into quality. It is like adding heat to water. At some point the quantity of heat causes the water to undergo a qualitative transformation and we no longer have water any more. The size of the IPv6 address space means that IPv6 is qualitatively different from IPv4 and our policies must recognize that reality. --Michael Dillon