Let's try to keep the symbolism and virtue signaling away from technical matters. The portal (etc.) needs to work for people who deal with matters related to addressing, RPKI, whatever. Disabling the primary method (I assume, no data) of access won't help at all. It'll be a nuisance. Most of us don't like nuisances.

I draw many similarities with the idea of paying for unused assignments and the goals that state monopolies tend to have in some countries. Like selling alcohol but at the same time being responsible for cutting down on consumption. Or overseeing gambling and lotteries but at the same time being responsible for gambling addicts. You get the idea. For IPv4 addresses the train left the station a long time ago. The addresses got assigned with the rules and policies that were in force at the time. That's it. I don't think RIPE's goals are to be punitive or at least I didn't read about it in the bylaws. Is it unfair that someone got addresses years ago for free or nearly free? Arguably... no since anyone at the time could get them given proper justification. That was then and complaining about it 10-30 years later won't help anyone.

I'll skip discussing pros and cons of various charging models for now. Models exist to collect (and justify, really) the fees one pays for services. Arguably, the fairest is everyone pays a flat fee as one cannot choose "a la carte" but instead need to pay a share of what I'd call a fixed common service pool. Is it fair that smaller orgs pay the same as the largest pan-Europeans? It both is and isn't simultaneously. It is because everyone pays the same. It isn't if larger orgs utilize services or cause more effort.

Finally, if your business model isn't able to sustain the purchase or lease of IPv4 addresses it might need some fine-tuning. Perhaps that super low-end web hosting or shell business and the race towards zero is not the paradise and road to IPO you think it is. Perhaps your competition thinks the same but is willing to sell below cost or has higher margin products where they (hope to?) recoup the extra costs. Perhaps the blue ocean really is elsewhere.



Kaj

Sent from my iPad

From: Mikhail Mayorov <mm@webrocket.am>
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2025 8:11 PM
To: members-discuss@ripe.net <members-discuss@ripe.net>
Subject: [members-discuss] Re: Reminder that Charging Scheme Task Force comments are open until the end of the month
 
[You don't often get email from mm@webrocket.am. Learn why this is important at https://aka.ms/LearnAboutSenderIdentification ]

Hi all!

I support Brett's suggestions! Very symbolic - access to sites and APIs
only on IPv6 sockets!

I would like to draw the community's attention to the goals of revising
the current funding scheme. The main goal is to efficiently utilize IPv4
address space when it is scarce. If there are really no “free”
addresses, there is no point in changing anything. We will invent 15
categories, introduce thresholds, but it will be of no use. The
addresses have never existed and will never appear.

With frantic demand and such prices for rent and purchase of IPv4, we
can hardly economically force organizations that do not use addresses to
give them up and return them to the pool for distribution. What is even
scarier is that these owners may not make any money on their /16 unused
blocks.
If the entire membership fee is determined by the number of resources,
it would be more like RIPE NCC's commercial activities.
But on the other hand, we could fund part of the RIPE NCC budget with a
fee that would be based on the number of /24 IP networks managed by a
single RIPE member. It would be linear and simple.

According to the provided report we are 21248 and we manage 3081702
subnets /24 IPv4. If 10% of the RIPE NCC budget is formed from these
contributions calculated on IPv4 networks, it turns out:
21248*1500*0.1/3081702 - 1 EURO per network /24 per year.
If you have an insane number of networks that you don't use, it will be
very uncomfortable.... But as I understand it that is our main goal, to
get the network holders who don't use them to return IPv4 in pool. They
will either saturate the market and the value of the networks will fall
or simply return them to the pool of unused ones.
It would be very interesting to hear the opinion of these first members
of RIPE.

Best regards,
Mikhail Mayorov,
LIR with 146 /24 IPv4 total allocated

On 28.05.2025 11:21, Brett Sheffield wrote:
> If RIPE is serious about encouraging IPv6 adoption (and I think we are), we need
> to deprecate and remove support for IPv4.
>
> RIPE doesn't have the power to do that for the whole Internet, but it can send a
> clear message by removing IPv4 access to all RIPE services (API, control panel
> etc.).
>
> There's no reason not to do this. All RIPE members have IPv6, and those that
> haven't got themselves sorted can be given 12 months to do so.
>
> Taking a (mostly symbolic) action like this sends a clear signal and will likely
> be picked up by tech media outlets. It's something we *can* do as an
> organisation.
>
> Any objections?
>
> Cheers,
>
>
> Brett

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