2013-03: Remove "non-approved" transfer statistics?
Quick question for the WG: What do you feel 2013-03 should do about the current policy's requirement to publish aggregate statistics about "non-approved" transfers? a) Keep it, or b) Remove it? (This is independent of what you feel about 2013-03 overall, BTW.) Background: Current IPv4 policy states that the NCC should publish aggregate statistics on "non-approved" transfers: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-582#Transfers-of-Allocations https://www.ripe.net/lir-services/resource-management/ipv4-transfers/table-o... (bottom of page) I believe that 2013-03 will cause this part of the policy to lose its usefulness. The way I see it, a failed need evaluation is the principal reason why the NCC would refuse a transfer, and since 2013-03 takes away the need evaluation entirely, there's not going to be a lot of refused transfers. Furthermore, 2012-05 states explicitly in its rationale that the intention of the statistics is to record «transfers [that] were denied on the basis of needs evaluation»: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/policies/proposals/2012-05 However, this is not written down in the resulting policy (it refers only generally to "non-approved transfers"), and there are some other theoretical reasons why a transfer may fail apart from need evaluation, e.g., procedural violations such as attempts to transfer PI space or de-aggregate beyond the minimum allocation size. So I think that the right thing for 2013-03 to do here, given its ambition to remove old and defunct policy text, is to also remove the policy provisions relating to non-approved transfer statistics. However, since it is possible to argue it's still relevant, I wanted to ask the WG's opinion first. (I'd prefer to leave it as-is, rather than end up having the entire proposal be ratholed over it.) If enough people answers "remove" and none "keep", I'll incorporate the removal into version 2 of 2013-03. Best regards, -- Tore Anderson
On Tue, Apr 2, 2013 at 7:02 AM, Tore Anderson <tore@fud.no> wrote:
However, this is not written down in the resulting policy (it refers only generally to "non-approved transfers"), and there are some other theoretical reasons why a transfer may fail apart from need evaluation, e.g., procedural violations such as attempts to transfer PI space or de-aggregate beyond the minimum allocation size.
Unless there is a valid reason to know of those other failed attempts, there's no harm in removing it. On the other hand, it may be interesting to see a potential sharp increase of failed attempts for whatever reason and a statement of "nothing got rejected either way" may be interesting to some. But not that interesting to force this statistic by means of policy. All in all, I think it's better to weak remove unless someone comes up with a compelling reason. Richard
Approaching this issue from the standpoint of transparency, statistical accuracy and statistical consistency, which are dear to us social scientists, I would argue to keep it in there. First, there may be a half year or more before 2013-3 goes into effect, if it eventually is passed. So we should during that period gain a statistical read on how many transfers are not approved. Now suppose that 2013-3 is passed and implemented. At worst, the number of non-approved transfers drops to 0. That is not a costly or troublesome thing. If it stays at 0 for a year or two, we can remove that reporting requirement later, and easily. OTOH, there is a chance that there are other reasons they are not approved, which Tore mentioned. In that case the current policy is generating potentially useful information. In short, I see no real gain in removing it now, and a possibility of lost information. We should just wait. --MM
-----Original Message----- From: address-policy-wg-bounces@ripe.net [mailto:address-policy-wg- bounces@ripe.net] On Behalf Of Tore Anderson Sent: Tuesday, April 02, 2013 1:02 AM To: address-policy-wg@ripe.net Subject: [address-policy-wg] 2013-03: Remove "non-approved" transfer statistics?
Quick question for the WG:
What do you feel 2013-03 should do about the current policy's requirement to publish aggregate statistics about "non-approved" transfers?
a) Keep it, or b) Remove it?
(This is independent of what you feel about 2013-03 overall, BTW.)
Background: Current IPv4 policy states that the NCC should publish aggregate statistics on "non-approved" transfers:
http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-582#Transfers-of-Allocations https://www.ripe.net/lir-services/resource-management/ipv4- transfers/table-of-transfers (bottom of page)
I believe that 2013-03 will cause this part of the policy to lose its usefulness. The way I see it, a failed need evaluation is the principal reason why the NCC would refuse a transfer, and since 2013-03 takes away the need evaluation entirely, there's not going to be a lot of refused transfers.
Furthermore, 2012-05 states explicitly in its rationale that the intention of the statistics is to record <transfers [that] were denied on the basis of needs evaluation>:
http://www.ripe.net/ripe/policies/proposals/2012-05
However, this is not written down in the resulting policy (it refers only generally to "non-approved transfers"), and there are some other theoretical reasons why a transfer may fail apart from need evaluation, e.g., procedural violations such as attempts to transfer PI space or de- aggregate beyond the minimum allocation size.
So I think that the right thing for 2013-03 to do here, given its ambition to remove old and defunct policy text, is to also remove the policy provisions relating to non-approved transfer statistics. However, since it is possible to argue it's still relevant, I wanted to ask the WG's opinion first. (I'd prefer to leave it as-is, rather than end up having the entire proposal be ratholed over it.) If enough people answers "remove" and none "keep", I'll incorporate the removal into version 2 of 2013-03.
Best regards, -- Tore Anderson
participants (3)
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Milton L Mueller -
Richard Hartmann -
Tore Anderson