[ARIN-consult] Community Consultation: Future Direction for the ARIN Fee Schedule

[William Herrin]

On Sat, Oct 11, 2014 at 9:13 AM, John Curran <jcurran at arin.net> wrote:
> On Oct 11, 2014, at 12:00 AM, William Herrin <bill at herrin.us> wrote:
>> I was very disappointed to see my 2012 campaign platform of no fees
>> for IPv6 in the short term completely ignored by the review panel.
>> Were you asleep? Seriously, I got half the votes I'd have needed to be
>> elected to the board on that platform. Is even that not enough for you
>> to evaluate the notion, even if only to state the reasons you think
>> it's a bad idea?
>
>   The panel had no obligation to respond to each idea that was
>   suggested for evolution of fees; they chose to work on set of
>   proposals which they felt were of interest to the community
>   and would aid discussion.

Hi John,

Apparently one that collected actual votes was of less interest to
them than their own pet theories. This disappoints me. What other
ideas were arbitrarily disregarded? Or do I have the pleasure of being
singly snubbed?


>> I'd like to see the cost of IPv6 reduced to $10/year or less for the
>> first assignment or allocation to an organization regardless of size
>> *until* IPv6 replaces IPv4 as the dominant protocol on the Internet.
>
>   For clarity, presently ISP's pay an annual fee based on the category
>   which accomodates their IPv4 and IPv6 address holdings.  This is
>   written in Appendix A1 in the document (as well as ARIN's web site)
>   Are you proposing that IPv6 holdings not be considered for purpose
>   of this calculation, or some other approach to determination of fees?
>   I would be happy to model your proposal if I can gain a clear
>   understanding of its characteristics.

I propose that the first or single IPv6 allocation/assignment
requested and held by an organization not be considered during the fee
calculation, period. At all. In any way, shape or form. If you need a
nominal fee to maintain the business relationship collect $10, but
leave IPv6 out of the fee calculation.

For now. Make it clear that when IPv6 overtakes IPv4, the fees will
change. If you're comfortable predicting it, state what those fees are
likely to become. But until IPv6 supercedes IPv4, support ARIN with
IPv4 fees where registrants' revenues and needs easily justify the
cost.

Free IPv6. As in no money. Free. Like IPv4 was 20 years ago during its
ramp-up to wide commercial deployment in North America.


>> In IPv4 I'd like to see a cost schedule tied to the number of IP
>> addresses allocated. Perhaps not linearly, but it should diverge by no
>> more than a single order of magnitude across the range of allocations.
>> So, if a /24 costs $100 per year (39 cents per address) then a /8
>> should cost *at least* $655,000 per year (3.9 cents per address). Or
>> turn it around: if a /8 costs $32,000 per year (0.2 cents per address)
>> then a /24 should cost no more than $5.12 (2 cents per address).
>
>   There are several proposals in the review document with similar
>   properties, including linear and algorithmic.

I saw. I honestly don't care about the exact formula. Pick one that's
convenient. I care that the per-address cost spread between
registrants be somewhat reasonable. The current three orders of
magnitude is not reasonable.

> Also, are you proposing that such fees should apply to
>   end-user IPv4 address holders as well?

Certainly. It has always bothered me that ISPs and End Users enjoy a
different set of requirements and privileges.

The only group I'd exclude is the legacy registrations, whether by
ISPs or end users. ARIN came to exist on the promise to leave those
registrations in peace. I wouldn't be comfortable leaving the legacy
registrations under ARIN's stewardship if it did not continue to honor
that promise.

>> When the cost per address diverges by not one or two, but three full
>> orders of magnitude (1000 times) between the largest address hoarders,
>> excuse me, address holders and the smallest, the system has a pretty
>> severe fairness problem.
>
>   To be clear, the fees we are referring to are not "for an allocation",
>   they are simply a share of ARIN's total costs recognizing the benefit
>   to the community in having a registry for the region.

The free pool is empty for some uses and will soon be empty for most.
Right now, today, stewarding IPv4 on behalf of the public is by far
the most important thing ARIN does. Everything else ARIN does today
finds priority at a distant, distant second. If you accept that
statement, how could it be -fair- to spread ARIN's cost based on some
other factor than the consumption of that scarce and valuable
resource?

When the IPv4 free pool was still large, this was not the case.
Hopefully it won't be the case for IPv6 within my lifetime -- I don't
want to see the end of the IPv6 free pool. Nevertheless, while IPv4
remains the driver and its free pool remains gone, I can imagine no
fairer way to spread ARIN's cost than by registrants' consumption of
IPv4.

I understand that ARIN's cost to steward an IPv4 address does not
reflect that address' market value. Nevertheless, the relative
consumption of those addresses is the proper way to spread ARIN's cost
at this particular point in time.

Hopefully this provides clarity about the kind of fee structure I'd like to see.

Regards,
Bill Herrin





-- 
William Herrin ................ herrin at dirtside.com  bill at herrin.us
Owner, Dirtside Systems ......... Web: <http://www.dirtside.com/>
May I solve your unusual networking challenges?