[ARIN-consult] Consultation on ARIN Fees

[John Curran]

On 10 May 2021, at 5:47 AM, Glen A. Pearce <arin-consult at ve4.ca> wrote:
> 
> I think my previous suggestion of making the "ASN-only" category in the proposed new fee structure a "single resource only" category which would apply whether that single resource was an AS, a /24 of IPv4 or a /40 or smaller of IPv6 would be the best way to address organizations like Jeff's.
> 
> There are probably a lot of very tiny organizations that need their own /24 of IPv4 so they can go to a different ISP in future without that ISP's availability of IPv4 space being an issue.  
> 
> This would not necessarily dissuade these very tiny organizations from implementing IPv6 as the lack of scarcity in IPv6 means they could get IPv6 space anytime they are ready without a problem but still not saddling them with higher fees in the meanwhile.  In fact it may not even be an obstacle to them implementing IPv6 now as they may be fine with using provider assigned space for IPv6 and renumbering the IPv6 side of their network in the event they change ISPs in the future.

Glen - 

	Interesting perspective…   It’s clear that IPv6 has much better availability due to its vast address space, but I’m not certain that reinstating a fee schedule that would result in an increase in costs for receiving an ARIN-issued IPv6 block is going to help with IPv6 deployment.	 We presently have a fee structure that allows any organization to obtain their own IPv6 block and not have to worry about renumbering out of provider-supplied space in the future.   This was a fairly strong mandate from the community to help encourage IPv6 deployment, and the fee schedule change would bring that same benefit to all ARIN registration services customers. 

>   (After all these are very small networks.)  Just they have to have their own IPv4 space because that is something they may not be able to get from an ISP they move to in the future at all and as small organizations it's not like they have a lot of bargaining power when shopping for connectivity.  (If an ISP has enough space where they can only serve one of two prospective customers they are generally going to choose the one with the bigger monthly spend for bandwidth.)
>   
> In my case I made the choice to convert to the Registration Services Plan and get my own IPv6 space now as it maximizes my flexibility as part of a longer term plan.  Some others may have different priorities and possibly tighter budgets where the extra $100 a year will make a difference to them so it would be important to not put the squeeze on them.

	While there is a noticeable increase going from $150 to $250 per year when adding an IPv4 or IPv6 block to an ASN, the ability to add both for that single increase in cost allows organizations who have IPv4 to gain IPv6 experience internally (lab and/or test settings) without incurring additional fees specific to IPv6 deployment.

>      Though the flip side I would like to point out to the other small organizations when I was first looking at things prior to free pool depletion the smallest Registration Services Plan was $1200 per year whether you had a /22 or a /23 or a /24 so the implementation of the 2X-Small and 3X-Small as well as the price reduction for the X-Small category was a vast improvement for organizations of our size. 

	Thanks...  we’ve been moving aggressively to getting better alignment and in particular lowering costs for the smaller organizations. 

> (I somehow missed that there was the separate "end user" fee schedule back then...as I said having one fee schedule will be less confusing for new people.)  When it was $1200 a year for the smallest category I wouldn't have been able to afford it so as long as the categories down to 3X-Small are maintained things are at least manageable.  But I would still be in favor of the "single resource only" category at the $150/year level being made a thing so organizations like Jeff's don't get hit so hard before they are ready to move up. 

	Acknowledged. $250 per year isn’t $150, and your single-resource category would lower the annual costs for specific case of an IPv4 resource holder without ASN – but create a direct impediment of the same amount for such organizations exploring IPv6. Given the rather limited scope (i.e. organizations with IPv4 and no ASN at all) and resulting IPv6 downside, the overall upside seems rather elusive to me, but then again, this is a community consultation so it would be best for others to weigh in with their views on that potential change. 

> Really the important part of this move to consolidate everyone onto one fee schedule is about some very large "end users" having arbitrarily different fees from each other just because they are on different fee schedules.


Agreed (and thanks for taking the time to comment!) 
/John

John Curran
President and CEO
American Registry for Internet Numbers