- ripe-list - mailman.ripe.net

Change in Direction on the Internet Atlas Project
by Carl Malamud 23 Sep '98

23 Sep '98

Dear RIPE Colleagues: In January, 1998 I briefed the RIPE membership on a project proposal called "the Internet Atlas." This project's aim was to develop tools for producing visual representations of the Internet topology for use in navigation, resource location, and other user functions. The nonprofit research foundation that I chair, the Internet Multicasting Service, had finished its last big project, the world's fair, and we managed to put the last nail in the coffin in our ongoing struggle with the U.S. Patent Office earlier this year by resolving the question of online trademark and patent documents. My hope since mid-1996, when the fair's organizational work was winding down, was to revive the Internet Multicasting Service and have the new focus of the organization be this Atlas project. As part of that commitment to carry out the Atlas, I moved Internet Multicasting up to the MIT Media Lab where I spent a year as a visiting scientist. I then moved on to Japan's Keio University in 1997 and finally made a concerted effort throughout 1998 to make this project work in Amsterdam. After briefing the RIPE membership in January, I set to work trying to build a new institute in Amsterdam. We incorporated a Dutch foundation, rented office space, and spent a considerable amount of time trying to get enough momentum to get the project underway. The RIPE NCC was extremely helpful in this regard, assisting in procuring computers, getting health insurance, a work permit as a visiting scientist, and a myriad other details. The RIPE NCC was so supportive that the board pledged 100,000 ECU towards the Atlas project. I was hopeful that with such an initial commitment, I could drum up support from local government, local telecommunications companies, and others with an interest in seeing a fairly large-scale new Internet research effort based in Amsterdam. To show that we were serious, I went to many of my past sponsors and they indicated that they would be pleased to join up if the effort became solid. <flame on> Unfortunately, we just never got any local interest going. I was never able to get a dialogue started (indeed was not even received in many cases) with the city, the national government, or the EC. The concept of an "applied research effort" with a concrete, short-term goal seemed quite foreign to a group that I would charitably describe as Bangemann-challenged bureaucrats. The telcos were even worse. My experiences with the PTT were characterized by extremely high prices ($1600 per month for an E1 line is at least 500% higher than would qualify for the label expensive) and indifference (the lines I did get never did work properly). The brave new competition, characterized by cable companies such as A2000, all priced themselves at 90% of the PTT tariff, still an order of magnitude higher than what I would characterize as non-extortionate, particularly given the low ratio of clues to ego in these lifeless corporate bodies. <flame off> While I could go on at length over the overall climate for promoting major IT initiatives, I'll save this for my next book. The bottom line is we crashed and burned and I was unable to get the project going. We never touched the RIPE NCC's 100,000 ECU, since I had pledged that it would only be used if there was a reasonable chance that things would take off. I also made sure that the RIPE NCC was fully reimbursed for expenditures on items such as health insurance, Federal Express, and other essentials. I've not given up on the ideas behind the Atlas, but I've decided that the nonprofit institute is just not the right incubator for these ideas. While perhaps it could be done, it is clear after two years of trying that I'm certainly not going to be the one to do it. Rather than give up, we've come up with a plan B, a new for-profit corporation called Invisible Worlds, which will produce a mapping and visualization service for the Internet. Invisible Worlds is a spinoff from the Internet Multicasting Service, just as universities and other research institutes often help give birth to companies. As many of you know, the NLnet was formed in this way, as were several other significant groups on the net. Professional estimators are being used to determine the value of the previous development of the concept by the Internet Multicasting Service. The for-profit corporation will pay full market value for any such intellectual property, and the proceeds will be placed in a long-term trust for open-source community projects. We are being advised by the accounting firm of Ernst & Young and by the law firm of Baker & McKenzie to complete this transaction properly and file it with the relevant governmental authorities. As a company, we're still committed to concepts such as open source and community standards and hope that our efforts will result in something real that you'll be able to use. Invisible Worlds is just a startup, so there is no guarantee that this will be any more successful than past efforts to build the Atlas. However, I'm heartened by the progress made in the last month since I moved back to Silicon Valley. Marshall Rose has accepted a major development contract with the company as Chief of Protocol, Dr. David Clark has agreed to chair the technical advisory board, and Dr. Steve Wolff has joined our board of directors. An award-winning design team, Becky and Larry Pranger, join me as founders and our distinguished panel of advisors on content and design, known as Invisible Fellows, will be chaired by composer Tod Machover. Overall, it is a good start and I'm hoping we'll be able to get some real results out the door in good time. While I did not succeed at building an institute in Amsterdam, I must say it was an extremely rewarding sabbatical. Watching the RIPE NCC function at first hand gave me a new appreciation for what is without a doubt the best registry operation in the world. I only wish the U.S. system was half as rational as the European system for the management of registry functions. In addition to the registry, the RIPE NCC is playing a crucial role in keeping global functions such as the IANA structured in a manner that will actually work. In addition to the RIPE NCC, I saw many other top-notch operations. NIKHEF was extremely helpful and even volunteered to assist us in finding a facility for the institute should it get funded. NLnet corporation is a great ISP and NLnet the non-profit is going to make a huge, long-lasting contribution to the Internet infrastructure through their foundation. Special thanks are due to Rob Blokzijl and Daniel Karrenberg, whom I'm proud to say are both friends and colleagues. They were extremely supportive and gave unstintingly of their time. If the City of Amsterdam ever got serious about doing something real about the information highway, they should fire their platoons of consultants (who never seem to get beyond planning menus for program committee meetings) and ask Rob and Daniel what to do. RIPE is very lucky to have both of them. As always, I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues throughout Europe and I'd like to thank the membership of RIPE for giving me the chance to get to know you better and for your initial vote of confidence. Carl Malamud Invisible Worlds, Inc. http://not.invisible.net/

1 0

RIPE NCC comments on new IANA drafts published on September 17th
by Daniel Karrenberg 20 Sep '98

20 Sep '98

RIPE NCC Statement on the Draft Articles and Bylaws for the new IANA as published on September 17th 1998 Amsterdam, September 18th 1998 The RIPE NCC executive board,representing the RIPE NCC membership, has considered the draft articles and bylaws for the new IANA published jointly by NSI and the IANA on September 17th. We note that there are a considerable number of substantive changes from those previous draft documents published by the IANA which we publicly supported as the basis for further development. Given the number and the substance of the changes there has been insufficient time for due consideration and consultation. Yet the authors of the latest drafts indicate that they wish to proceed 'within a day or two'. With this in mind we have to state now that at this time the RIPE NCC cannot support the current drafts or commit to participate in a new IANA constituted by them. We need sufficient time to consider all the changes and in particular: - Codifying in the bylaws that the new IANA will a-priori respect arrangements between third parties without any knowledge of them. This requires careful consideration because of the far reaching implications such arrangements may have on the new IANA. (IV/1d) - We need to understand and consider the material consequences of art IV/1e in order to determine whether it is acceptable. - We are still concerned about the room for interpretation in art V/6 and would like to see a stronger requirement of diversity than allowing 50% of the board to be from one region. - We need to understand and consider the far-reaching repercussions of codifying, at this stage, aspects of a possible membership structure that previously were left for the Initial Board to define and implement. In this context we also need to re-evaluate the fact that the board members nominated by the supporting organisations have no say at all in how it is implemented (V/4b/iv V/9c). - We need to understand the reasons and the material consequences of the weakening of the language in VI/c which now speaks of recommendations by the supporting organisations to the board. - We need to get clarification that the change in wording of art III/2 does not now imply that minutes of supporting organisation bodies have to be approved by the Board of the new IANA. - We need to fully understand and consider the consequences of the changes made to the requirements for supporting organisations, especially VI/2 and VI/3b. In the area of the address supporting organisation the participation of individuals and individual organisations currently happens at the local and regional levels. We need to understand whether the bylaws allow for this practice to continue or if they constrain the supporting organisations sufficiently to require changes in these structures. We stress that we have no issue with the added openness requirements. We will work to resolve the remaining issues with all parties concerned as soon as possible. The upcoming series of RIPE and related meetings in Edinburgh between September 21st and 25th will provide a good opportunity to make progress in our geographical area. We urge all concerned not to proceed with the current proposal before these concerns are addressed and we have had the opportunity to ensure that the RIPE NCC can participate fully in the new IANA. In the meantime the current IANA should continue to function and provide its services to us. We are willing to immediately and unilaterally contribute US$ 50k towards the operational costs of the current IANA after September 30th.

1 0

RIPE 31 - Plenary agenda - version 2
by k13＠nikhef.nl 18 Sep '98

18 Sep '98

AGENDA RIPE 31 Plenary Session ------------------------------- Draft 2 1. Opening 2. Agenda 3. Minutes RIPE 30 4. From the Chair (R Blokzijl) 5. Report from the RIPE NCC (M Kuene) 6. RIPE NCC 1999 Activity Plan (D Karrenberg) 7. RIPE NCC 1998 Annual general Meeting (K Mitchel) 8. Some aspects of the new IANA (D Crocker) 9. New IANA: Progress reports (RIPR, RIPE NCC, CENTR) 10. European CERT Activities (B Gilmore) 11. Merit Post Routing Arbiter Activities (G Winters) 12. Reports from the Working Groups 13. Next meetings 14. AOB 15. Close

1 0

New Document available: RIPE-187
by RIPE NCC Document Annoucement Service 16 Sep '98

16 Sep '98

New RIPE Document Announcement -------------------------------------- A new document is available from the RIPE document store. Ref: ripe-187 Title: RIPE NCC Charging Scheme 1999 Author: Kees van Draanen, Daniel Karrenberg Date: 16 September 1998 Obsoletes: Obsoleted by: Updates: ripe-163 Updated by: Short content description ------------------------- This document defines the 1999 RIPE NCC charging scheme. The companion document 'RIPE NCC Activities & Expenditure 1999' describes the activities and the associated operational costs. The charging scheme is based on the model used in previous years. This model was approved at the 1996 contributors meeting and has met with success. Using the model we have developed the charging scheme presented in section two below. Section three details further steps to implement the scheme. Section four provides details of the reasoning behind this scheme both for the record and those interested. This document is presented for approval at the RIPE NCC 1998 Annual General Meeting on Octuber 15th 1998. Accessing the RIPE document store --------------------------------- The RIPE document store is available via anonymous FTP to ftp.ripe.net, in the directory ripe/docs. The URLs for the new documents on the FTP-server are: ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-187.ps PostScript version ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-187.txt plain text version You can also access the RIPE documents in HTML format via WWW. RIPE-187 is available at the following URL: http://www.ripe.net/docs/ripe-187.html Documents can also be retrieved from the RIPE document store using a mail server program. For more information on how to use the program, send email to <mail-server(a)ripe.net> with "send HELP" in the body text.

1 0

New Document available: RIPE-186
by RIPE NCC Document Annoucement Service 16 Sep '98

16 Sep '98

New/Revised RIPE Document Announcement -------------------------------------- A revised/new document is available from the RIPE document store. Ref: ripe-186 Title: RIPE NCC Activities & Expenditure 1999 Author: John Crain, Kees van Draanen, Daniel Karrenberg, Mirjam Kuehne Date: 16 September 1998 Obsoletes: Obsoleted by: Updates: ripe-162 Updated by: Short content description ------------------------- This memorandum describes the activities to be per- formed by the RIPE NCC and the associated expendi- ture during the year 1999. The companion document "RIPE NCC Charging Scheme 1999" (ripe-187) describes how the necessary revenue is generated. There are formally well defined stages in the cre- ation of this document: It is drafted by the RIPE NCC based on input from RIPE and the users of NCC services. Subsequently it is proposed to the mem- bership by the executive board of the RIPE NCC. The membership discusses it and approves the final ver- sion. This version of the document has been produced by the RIPE NCC menagement. It is presented by the executive board for approval by the membership at the Annual General Meeting on October 15th 1998. Comments from the RIPE community to the authors and the board are encouraged. Accessing the RIPE document store --------------------------------- The RIPE document store is available via anonymous FTP to ftp.ripe.net, in the directory ripe/docs. The URLs for the new documents on the FTP-server are: ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-186.ps PostScript version ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-186.txt plain text version You can also access the RIPE documents in HTML format via WWW. RIPE-186 is not available from the WWW at this moment, but will be soon, at the following URL: http://www.ripe.net/docs/ripe-186.html Documents can also be retrieved from the RIPE document store using a mail server program. For more information on how to use the program, send email to <mail-server(a)ripe.net> with "send HELP" in the body text.

1 0

RIPE 31 - Agenda Plenary Session - Draft 1
by k13＠nikhef.nl 16 Sep '98

16 Sep '98

Dear Colleagues, please find below the first draft of the agenda for the plenary sessions of RIPE 31. As usual your comments/additions are welcomed. Rob Blokzijl AGENDA RIPE 31 Plenary Session ------------------------------- Draft 1 1. Opening 2. Agenda 3. Minutes RIPE 30 4. From the Chair (R Blokzijl) 5. Report from the RIPE NCC (M Kuene) 6. RIPE NCC 1999 Activity Plan (D Karrenberg) 7. RIPE NCC 1998 Annual general Meeting (K Mitchel) 8. Some aspects of the new IANA (D Crocker) 9. New IANA: Progress reports (RIPR, RIPE NCC, CENTR) 10. European CERT Activities (B Gilmore) 11. The Routing Arbiter Project: progress report (G Winters) 12. Reports from the WGs 13. Next meetings 14. AOB 15. Close

1 0

Announcement: ISPF Conference (Got Clue?)
by Ray Davis 15 Sep '98

15 Sep '98

ISPF Conference For ISPs By ISPs October 26-28, 1998 Atlanta, Georgia, USA The first ISPF will be held October 26th through the 28th, 1998 in the beautiful, historic Olympic city of Atlanta, Georgia. The ISP/C, the industry's largest trade association for small to mid-size ISPs, is the lead organizer of this trade show and conference. Conference Dates * October 24 and 25: Pre-conference "Hands-on" Workshops * October 26 through 28: Conference and Trade Show Venue The beautiful Georgia World Congress Center in downtown Atlanta, Georgia will be our host venue. Conviently located next to the OMNI Hotel (the host hotel) and CNN Plaza, the GWCC is where all conference sessions, exhibits and sponsor hospitality suites will be located. See http://www.ispf.com/ or email info(a)ispf.com for more info. A pdf version of the glossy brochure is available from me (ray(a)ispc.org) or at http://www.ispf.com/pdf/mailer1.pdf . Cheers, Ray

1 0

RIPE NCC Statement on New IANA
by Daniel Karrenberg 10 Sep '98

10 Sep '98

RIPE NCC statement on New IANA In June 1998, the RIPE NCC Executive Board reviewed the US Government White Paper at http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/domainname/6_5_98dns.htm and welcomed it, especially the emphasis on self-administration for the Internet. In particular, the RIPE NCC believed then and believes now that for stability of operation, the technical work of the new IANA corporation must be initially built out from the existing IANA technical team hosted by the Information Sciences Institute of the University of Southern California under the direction of Jon Postel. The RIPE NCC has considered the draft bylaws of the new IANA corporation as most recently revised and posted at http://www.iana.org/bylaws3.html. While we recognize deficiencies in the present draft and wish that they be remedied, the RIPE NCC endorses the draft as the basis for the final bylaws and encourages all parties to continue discussions to achieve consensus on such a final version. The RIPE NCC repeats its earlier commitments to provide its fair share of the operational costs of the new IANA. As a first step the RIPE NCC provides US$25,000 to the University of Southern California to help cover costs associated with the establishment of the new IANA and as an initial contribution to the operational costs. These monies have already been made available in April 1997 when the continuation of IANA operational funding from the US government for FY98 had not yet been secured. The RIPE NCC commits to work with the existing Regional Registries and others to establish the "Address Supporting Organisation" and have it recognised by the new IANA as soon as practical.

1 0

European Hostcount for August 1998
by RIPE NCC Hostcount Maintainer 05 Sep '98

05 Sep '98

Dear All, below is the hostcount for August 1998. The table shows an increase since last month of over 260,000 (or 3.8%) to a total of approximately 7.25 million hosts in the DNS in Europe and surrounding areas. The dk domain shows the highest increase for August with approximately 75,000 hosts more than in July. - Annotations to this Hostcount - cz shows a zero increase. We were not able to arrange the transfer of the data in time. The numbers for cz are therefore identical to last month. Apologies for this. - Other Ways to Obtain the Hostcount - The hostcount can also be found under ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/hostcount. The graphical version of the hostcount can be found at ftp://ftp.ripe.net/ripe/hostcount/RIPE-Hostcount-{Mo,Qu}.eps The translation of the country codes can be found at ftp://ftp.ripe.net/iso3166-countrycodes All this data can also be found at http://www.ripe.net/statistics/hostcount.html If you are interested in the historic hostcount data, bunyip Information Services has hosted the complete set of data since 1994 under ftp://ftp.bunyip.com/pub/netstats/ripe - Credits - I would like to thank all people who help me to create the hostcount every month by counting hosts locally: at Gerhard Winkler <Gerhard.Winkler(a)univie.ac.at> be DNS-BE Registration Office <tech(a)dns.de> ch Marcel Schneider <schneider(a)switch.ch> cz Jiri Orsag <Jiri.Orsag(a)eunet.cz> de Peter Koch <pk(a)TechFak.Uni-Bielefeld.DE> dk Morten Christensen <morten(a)dk-hostmaster.dk> es Jose Sanchez-Seco <jose.sanchez(a)rediris.es> fr Annie Renard <Annie.Renard(a)inria.fr> gr Dimitris Zisiadis <zisiadis(a)forthnet.gr> hr Ivan Maric <Ivan.Maric(a)stribor.srce.hr> ie Mike Norris <mnorris(a)heanet.ie> il Shuki Kenan <shuki(a)netvision.net.il> it Maurizio Martinelli <M.Martinelli(a)cnuce.cnr.it> Daniele Vannozzi <D.Vannozzi(a)cnuce.cnr.it> li Marcel Schneider <schneider(a)switch.ch> no Havard Eidnes <Havard.Eidnes(a)runit.sintef.no> pl Mirek Luc <mirek(a)nask.pl> pt Armando Domingues <armando(a)rccn.net> ru Andrey Dobrotsvetov <adbr(a)ripn.net> sk Lubos Elias <Lubos.Elias(a)uakom.sk> sm Maurizio Martinelli <M.Martinelli(a)cnuce.cnr.it> Daniele Vannozzi <D.Vannozzi(a)cnuce.cnr.it> tr Yener Yigit <yener(a)knidos.cc.metu.edu.tr> uk Robert Stone <robert(a)nosc.ja.net> Kevin Hoadley <K.Hoadley(a)nosc.ja.net> If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me. Kind regards, Lee Wilmot RIPE NCC RIPE DNS Hostcount Previous Count : Thu Aug 6 1998 This Count : Sat Sep 5 1998 CY SOA COUNTED DUPL REAL CHANGE ============================================================== al 10 143 8 135 + 1 am 121 983 159 824 + 41 at 23776 193628 38842 154786 + 2452 az 52 394 20 374 - 16 ba 45 595 46 549 + 79 be 10379 203469 19575 183894 + 2998 bg 581 11311 1248 10063 + 1695 by 103 1024 176 848 + 91 ch 39362 258935 43919 215016 - 1325 cy 618 5164 145 5019 + 50 cz 14585 80846 9717 71129 0 de 151458 1664677 301737 1362940 + 54234 dk 54351 308199 33475 274724 + 74291 dz 6 21 1 20 - 31 ee 1920 22272 1382 20890 + 827 eg 650 2936 195 2741 + 920 es 11037 270986 11636 259350 + 1335 fi 7831 463400 14695 448705 + 9975 fo 119 555 21 534 + 3 fr 25938 488798 34702 454096 + 6943 gb 2 26 0 26 - 1 ge 47 718 37 681 + 83 gr 5354 44363 3549 40814 + 554 hr 1587 12288 2017 10271 + 4107 hu 5882 96091 9059 87032 + 1695 ie 5934 52725 4684 48041 - 775 il 6808 124160 21697 102463 + 6363 is 1350 23315 789 22526 + 806 it 39387 447151 49427 397724 + 39805 li 644 1646 610 1036 - 210 lt 1027 8791 549 8242 + 273 lu 1330 7858 1121 6737 + 18 lv 839 13269 2183 11086 + 1516 ma 221 2106 339 1767 + 22 md 59 631 114 517 + 98 mk 236 1014 105 909 + 221 mt 246 1972 257 1715 + 260 nl 41170 569007 50043 518964 - 14171 no 20289 325563 15630 309933 + 7413 pl 16682 144813 27745 117068 + 6615 pt 6667 58104 7727 50377 + 532 ro 1534 21856 2011 19845 + 252 ru 14363 180824 32610 148214 + 14692 se 28630 421929 25685 396244 + 28802 si 2817 23327 2436 20891 - 528 sk 5200 24247 4409 19838 + 1195 sm 45 237 2 235 + 5 su 1285 28143 1746 26397 - 16011 tn 13 183 103 80 - 28 tr 6793 43742 5073 38669 + 956 ua 1486 28533 8290 20243 + 1598 uk 116240 1573225 224772 1348453 + 26575 va 2 8 0 8 + 1 yu 1619 7655 604 7051 + 443 ============================================================== 678730 8267856 1017122 7250734 +267739

1 0

Internet Policing Seminar on Tue 22nd in Edinburgh
by Keith Mitchell 04 Sep '98

04 Sep '98

The UK Forum of the Association of Chief Police Officers, Internet Service Providers, and Government is presenting three one-day seminars entitled: "Policing the Internet" Working together to address issues and allay concerns These are being held to identify, discuss and address issues relating to policing of the Internet in the UK. In particular, we are developing a partnership process to ensure that criminal investigations involving the Internet are carried out quickly and efficiently with a minimum impact on the business of the industry. While the focus of the seminars is the situation in the UK, many of the issues will apply equally to other European countries, and we hope that you will find it interesting. In particular, one seminar is being held in Edinburgh on September 22nd, the day before RIPE 31 opens and at the same venue. Details are available at <http://www.linx.net/edinburgh/acposeminar.html> Keith Mitchell Executive Chairman London InterNet Exchange keith(a)linx.org Geneva House, 3 Park Road www.linx.net Peterborough PE1 2UX United Kingdom Phone: +44 1733 705000 (fax 353929)

1 0