[ARIN-consult] ACSP Consultation: ARIN Internet Routing Registry (IRR) Roadmap

[Ronald F. Guilmette]

An acquaintance of mine just called my attention to this thread, due to
the possible relevance of some comments I just made the other day to a
couple of the RIPE mailing lists.

I don't think that I have terribly much to add, but I did just want
to make two quick points.

Firstly, having read the message from John Curran that began this
thread, I just wanted to compliment John for that very clear,
detailed and workman-like product.  It is certainly nice for someone,
such as myself, who hasn't been following these issues to be able to
read a good capsule summary of the current state of play, and its
historical genesis.

Second, I just wanted to highlight this one bullet point that John already
has in the RoadMap:

         * Collaborate on Cross-RIR Authentication: ARIN will work with the 
    other RIRs engineering coordination activities to create an appropriate 
    mechanism for authentication and authorization of routing registry 
    objects for which the resources cross regional boundaries.

For whetever it's worth, I'd just like to add my two cents by saying that
my hope is that this goal/task will be expedited to the maximum extent
possible.

Although I'm a firm and ardent believer in democratic processes, I am
far from the first to observe that such processes are often both messy
and slow.  For that reason, and despite my strong democratic leanings,
in this specific case I personally would like nothing better than to
see all of the heads of the Five Families meet, perhaps in wood paneled
conference room in New York, and simply agree to "make it happen", i.e.
to set up some sort of routine automated exchange of data so that any
RIR could easily know if party `X' is or is not, at the very least, a
registered dues-paying member of at least one RIR somewhere on planet
Earth.


Regards,
rfg