[arin-discuss] [ppml] Counsel statement on Legacy assignments?

On Wed, 10 Oct 2007, Keith W. Hare wrote:

> My viewpoint is that as an IPv4 legacy address holder, ARIN has never
> asked me to pay fees and so I haven't paid any fees for my IPv4
> addresses.  When ARIN comes up with a reasonable RSA and reasonable
> fees for IPv4 legacy address holders, I don't expect to have an issue
> with signing and paying. 

I Agree. I don't think most Legacy's have an issue with the money per
se.  But for most proposals, the RSA has been the means to get legacy's
to give up all the unencumbered rights that make Legacy space special.  
ARIN's (or rather a certain group) issue is not really about the money.  
Its about something else. As ARIN's lawyer pointed out:

  "Because there's a window coming that intersects with the IPv4
   exhaustion issue, where for a brief time, these resources will
   actually become financially more valuable if they were unencumbered,
   and where that value will only be for a limited period."

I think above is the real issue, for them.

Money is a significant issue despite the seemingly trivial amounts.
Money (that is, that service fees are only charged to non-legacy's) is a
part of the deal that ARIN made and has to obey. If ARIN can get out of
one part, they strengthen the legal argument that there is no deal, or
that somehow it was changed. That's why the money issue is important
here, even though the amounts are trivial, and Legacy's are willing to
pay.  If we just pay even a trivial amount for an improper bill, we
could forfeit rights in the whole agreement.

My position is just this:

1. Legacy's have unencumbered rights through agreement with the
government.  Those rights are very special and very valuable. If you
give them up, you can never get them back.

2. ARIN entered into a bargain with the government that requires ARIN to
provide services to Legacy's for free, in return for opportunities on
future assignments and other privileges.

3. Legacy's cannot be forced to give up these rights, by ARIN or even by
the government.  The government can't break the agreement, either, and 
can't pass an ex-post-facto law modifying the agreement unilaterally.

4. Legacy's should act as a group to protect these rights.  They should
work together to oppose ARIN legal claims that there are no rules or
that Legacy have no legal rights, and to oppose in Court efforts to
deprive Legacy's of these rights.  A Legacy Registry ensures that we
only have to do this once and won't repeat it every six months.

5. Don't sign an RSA on your Legacy space.


As you pointed out, no one has asked for donations. But the reason for
that is because they agreed in the beginning that these Legacies would
be free.  _All_ they can ask for are donations. But they don't _want_ to
ask for donations; they _want_ you to sign the RSA; they _want_ to
remove rights; What good is that to them?

If they remove your rights, they can take space from you and give that
space to other people (their cronies).  How does that work?  For
example, Owen Delong told me a while back that he just then recently got
an allocation from ARIN in a few hours, start to finish. For others, its
a long tedious process that takes months and months.  ARIN doesn't need
the money. Its about transfering Legacy blocks to other people; people
who can get through the process in a few hours.

We've already seen that 1) ARIN doesn't need more money. 2) ARIN is
going on 'outreach' junkets and giving money to cronies of several of
the board members. We've seen this kind of activity before, from the
same group of people.  I've documented some of it.


> Another viewpoint is that there may be enough unused IPv4 space in
> some of the large IPv4 legacy address holders to ward off the IPv4
> runout for a couple of months, in which case it might be worth
> attempting to reclaim some of the unused address space.

I think Legacy's will use it on their own initiative, when the time
comes.  If not, that's their right, too. One can only ask nicely. One
cannot demand or 'take' Legacy space.

> Then there is Dean Anderson's position, which seems to be based on
> past injustices.  Typically, I don't understand Dean's positions or
> the 20 years of history behind those positions.

I'll try to be clearer in stating my positions. My position isn't based
on past injustices. I cite past injustices to demonstrate the objective
facts that illuminate the history of certain issues and certain groups
(or maybe just group) of people.  That past history helps other people
understand how we got to where we are, and helps other people to
evaluate the trustworthiness of the people making assertions with thin
or no evidence. Past misconduct has an independent status as an
objective fact, and is critical when evaluating a person's integrity,
honesty, trustworthiness, and credibility. Dissembling in the present is
often indicated and uncovered by the past history of such actions.

When you see that people have conducted injustices in the past, that
should signal something about them.  As Howard Lee said some months ago,
"did you tell them 'don't commit fraud'?"  Well, did you? Did anyone?  
Ok, many people didn't know. Now they do know.

> As far as I can tell, the people who have the most influence are the
> people who put together coherent, well written proposals, regardless
> of the size of their employer.

I think your statement is true in most situations.

For example, both FSF(GNU) and the LPF also started off as longshots,
both founded by Richard Stallman.  But both have changed the industry
and the world. (I'm the President of the LPF). The LPF eliminated user
interface copyright, in part through legal briefs that I organized, and
I notice now that the proponents of the new patent law have at least
attempted to adopt our position in selling the law as 'solving the
patent problem'. Changing patent law is a _long_ term project, involving
many constituencies.  You all know of FSF/GNU, I'm sure.  At the outset,
everything is a longshot. Experience with longshots helps, though.

Now, I'm getting Legacy people together offlist to work on a proposal to
solve Legacy problems at ARIN without compromising Legacy rights. You've
got nothing to lose by working together with other Legacy's to preserve
your rights in unencumbered IP space, and everything to lose by not.

Email me offlist for details if you are interested. There are already a
number who are interested.

		--Dean

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