Hi Niall, On 20 Jun 2007, at 10:30am, Niall O'Reilly wrote: [...]

I'm surprised at the account given of the impact analysis. If it is really "not anticipate[d] that any significant impact will be caused if this proposal is implemented", I wonder what the motivation for the proposal can be.

I should have expected that it would not be difficult to identify some _advantageous_ impact, and that such impact should have been clearly reported.

I see a clear advantage in having all five RIR communities review a proposal and agree a policy as there is no policy at the moment - just precedent. I for one am very much in favour of having a consensus policy to work to. Of course, this would be true of any global policy. This particular policy proposal doesn't really change very much and that could also be seen as an advantage by some, too. However, these points are made in the proposal's "Rationale" section. I suspect that Filiz limited her impact analysis to resource consumption and service impact because these are quantifiable and should help the community discuss the benefits and/or disadvantages of the proposal itself. Regards, -- Leo Vegoda IANA Numbers Liaison

On 20 Jun 2007, at 14:09, Leo Vegoda wrote:

I see a clear advantage in having all five RIR communities review a proposal and agree a policy as there is no policy at the moment - just precedent.

Me too.

I for one am very much in favour of having a consensus policy to work to. Of course, this would be true of any global policy. This particular policy proposal doesn't really change very much and that could also be seen as an advantage by some, too. However, these points are made in the proposal's "Rationale" section.

I see a kind of layering distinction between - on the one hand, rationale and arguments for or against (layer of principle, policy or even philosophy), and - on the other, operational impact. I believe it adds clarity to address these separately.

I suspect that Filiz limited her impact analysis to resource consumption and service impact because these are quantifiable and should help the community discuss the benefits and/or disadvantages of the proposal itself.

In her position, I'ld probably have done the same. There is a tendency to consider "impact" by assumption "negative". I'm suggesting that this is actually a prejudice which limits the usefulness of the impact analysis. I'm raising this now because On 14 Jun 2007, at 14:29, Filiz Yilmaz wrote:

The first impact analysis has been created for the proposal 2007-04

and it is opportune to give feedback on the new process. For simplicity, let's consider three cases: the impact of a proposed new policy may be assessed as "burdensome", "neutral", or "advantageous". The first case (burdensome) is easiest: there had better be a very strong rationale with clear benefits to the community in order to adopt such a proposal. The third case (advantageous) has (perhaps subtly hidden) consequences for RIR planning. For example, if the proposal is expected to result in significantly more efficient operations, in comparison with existing practices, it may be that forward resource requirement projections will have to be revised. The neutral case is where elegant, but sterile, proposals fall. If a proposal truly isn't expected to have any impact on operations, we should ask, "Why bother?" For clarity, I believe that proposal 2007-04 is not neutral, but advantageous in just the way Leo has put it. Working from documented policy rather than from precedent (or worse, corporate memory, degraded by natural amnesia and staff turnover) will surely be more efficient, less demanding for the staff involved, and clearer for the customers. I think that "good impact" is worth mentioning as well as "bad impact", and that choosing to do so will result in more useful impact analysis for future proposals. FWIW /Niall