[arin-ppml] Legacy Space authority (fwd)

[Dean Anderson]

On Fri, 2 May 2008, Leo Bicknell wrote:

> In a message written on Fri, May 02, 2008 at 05:44:11PM -0400, Dean Anderson wrote:
> > Legacy's got their space from the government. So did the RIRs. Those 
> > blocks are intangible property, just exactly like domain names. 
> 
> There was a time when you could get a domain name by sending off
> an e-mail, much like early legacy assignments.  Somewhere along the
> line a contract was imposed, fees were established, and a UDRP was
> created.  As far as I know unless you agreed and started to pay the
> fees your domain name was dropped from the system.
> 
> If Legacy blocks are "just exactly like domain names" then I would
> assume you feel the same could happen with legacy blocks.  A contract
> could be imposed, fees established, and a dispute procedure created.

I think that every legacy would agree to pay a small fee for the record
services, especially when changes are made to the records. The local
county registrar of deeds also charges fees to change the records on
titles. I don't think anyone has ever had any objection to that. But
this isn't about money. BTW, ARIN is asking in the Legacy RSA to pay
$100 per year. This is a trivial amount, but still several times what
people pay for domain names, which consume exactly the same effort by
the registry maintaining the records.

The objection is to the coercion on the improper threat of withholding
infrastructure services and the improper transfer of ownership interest.  
The object of the coercion is not money or fair fees, but rather the
transfer of legacy ownership interest in that IP Address space to ARIN;
perhaps so that ARIN can give it to their NANOG pals in just 2 hours.




ARIN has sent 22 employees over 100 times to NANOG, up to NANOG 41. What
are the consequences of sending 22 employees, whose jobs have nothing to
with network operations, to NANOG over 100 times? (including the ARIN
executive secretary)

One consequence is that about $50,000 of ARIN funds is transferred to
NANOG, in addition to the $50,000 per year authorized by the
(conflicted) ARIN Board of Directors.  NANOG is a very small group of a
couple hundred core members, and ARIN is paying a third or more of its
annual budget.  Yet, somehow NANOG members have taken control of all the
ARIN directors slots with only about 2% of the membership voting for any
Board Member. Those board members have been improperly using that
influence to send large amounts of ARIN's money to NANOG. And they have
also improperly silenced dissent by interfering with membership rights
in ARIN.  It seems unlikely that an ARIN Board that wasn't controlled by
NANOG members would engage in activities that about 80% the ARIN
membership don't engage in.

Another consequence is that the ARIN employees make personal
relationships that can be exploited to make resource assignments
unfairly and unethically. At the last NANOG meeting (42), Sue Dobert,
Erika Goedrich, and Mark Kosters attended from ARIN.  Sue Dobert is a
resource analyst who shouldn't have personal relationships with the
persons applying for IP Address Space. Her job has nothing to do with
actual network operations.  She doesn't need to know how to configure
BGP. Resource analysts make resource allocation decisions based on ARIN
policy rules, and should be barred from attending such events because
they create personal relations with ethical conflicts. NANOG is a junket
for Erika Goedrich, membership coordinator: NANOG widely advertises and
exploits its association with ARIN.  One wonders just how many ARIN
members were signed up, since it seems that nearly all the NANOG members
are already voting for ARIN Board Members.  NANOG is a junket for Mark
Kosters, unless he was speaking, which according to the agenda, he
wasn't.

All 6 board members have conflicts of interest with NANOG; Even Scott
Bradner, whom I previously had a great deal of respect for, hasn't
responded to a question about whether he has was compensated in any way
for his 3 speaking engagements at NANOG and whether or not he has a
conflict of interest.

Incidentally, the people that are making the attacks on me, on legacy
space, and on the opposition to the Legacy RSA are also associated with
NANOG, rather than a representative sample of the ARIN membership. The
vast majority of ARIN members don't participate in NANOG. 

To be clear, I've got no problem with sending speakers to NANOG, or
anywhere that pays ARIN for the speaker to come.  I do have a problem
with the overly cozy breaking down of ethical barriers, particularly
with an organization that doesn't repudiate thugish threats of violence.
I've got a issue with NANOG (a small group of a couple hundred core
people) taking control of ARIN in dubious elections, and then taking
large amounts of ARIN money, then creating unethical conditions for
resource allocations, and then trying to take control of Legacy IP
Address space by improper threats.

		--Dean



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