[arin-discuss] SPAM-WARN:Re: ARIN Fee discussion

[Michael Thomas - Mathbox]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Owen DeLong [mailto:owen at delong.com] 
> Sent: Tuesday, October 09, 2007 1:55 PM
> To: Michael Thomas - Mathbox
> Cc: 'Howard, W. Lee'; 'Internet Partners, Inc. Tech Support'; 
> arin-discuss at arin.net
> Subject: Re: [arin-discuss] SPAM-WARN:Re: ARIN Fee discussion
> 
> 
> 		Should it be a bell curve distribution?  
> Half-bell?  Linear?
> 		In other words, if there are about 3000 
> members, should the 
> 		distribution be (for XXL/XL/L/M/S) 15/500/2000/500/15 or
> 		15/100/250/600/2000 or 15/300/600/900/1200?
> 
> 
> 	Why in the world should anyone in ARIN community accept 
> the current fee
> 	structure or a bell curve fee structure.
> 
> 	I would remind everyone of this excerpt from a message 
> from Stephen Sprunk
> 	on 5/31/07:
> 
> 	<Begin Excerpt>
> 	Current stats per ARIN Member Services:
> 	
> 	
> 	            # Members   % Members   % v4 space   % fees
> 	Xtra Small      390        14.8         0.29       5.7
> 	Small         1,571        59.8         4.64      42.6
> 	Medium          518        19.9         8.92      28.0
> 	Large            71         2.7         6.87       7.7
> 	Xtra Large       73         2.8        79.28      15.8
> 	
> 	
> 	(The last column didn't come from ARIN, but I 
> calculated it from the fee
> 	schedule.)
> 	<End Excerpt>
> 
> 
> Your calculation leaves out a couple of factors, and, if 
> you're going to
> put a % fees amount up, you should also put up a % costs column.
> Indeed, if it were possible for ARIN to develop those two columns,
> I think it would be interesting to see the data.  However, I suspect
> that ARIN does not track the exact time spent on each request, so, it
> would probably be hard to track that number.
> 
> I think that the argument for a flat fee structure based on 
> IP utilization
> is no more valid than the argument for a flat membership fee.
> After all, theoretically, people are paying for membership in the
> organization and for registration services, not for the 
> amount of space
> they receive.  Most membership organizations have a single annual
> membership fee.  The ones that do not, usually have something
> very close to a bell-curve similar to that of ARIN.  For example, they
> may have student, youth, individual, family, corporate, sponsor, and
> other membership categories at different prices.  Generally, 
> the higher
> you go on the pricing structure, the fewer members you find, although
> you also tend to find relatively few members in the very 
> bottom categories
> as well.  Most members tend to be found in the middle area, much
> like ARIN.
> 
> 
> 
> 	Note that 73 Xtra Large members control over 79 percent 
> of ARIN allocated IP
> 	space and they pay 15.8 percent of the allocation fees. 
> There are several
> 	obvious issues here, including conservation and 
> fair-play. I am surprised
> 	that 2300 victims do not have anything to say on the issue.
> 
> 
> Looking at this from a different perspective, why should 
> those 73 members
> have to subsidize so much of the cost of those other 2300 members?
> Why should 2.8% of the members pay 8 times as much as the other
> 97.2% of the membership?
> 
> The current fee structure is an effort to balance the 
> discrepancies on both
> sides of this equation.  It's a little bit a case of large+ members
> subsidizing the membership costs of the smaller ones based on 
> increasing
> prices for greater consumption, and, a little bit a case of 
> the largest
> consumers receiving some level of volume discount.
> 
> Lee, what would the fee per year look like if ARIN charged a 
> single flat
> fee to all subscriber members (LIR/ISP members)?
> 
> Also, Lee, is it possible to get some idea of what percentage 
> of ARIN's
> annual costs are fixed and what percentage are incremental per
> allocation.  Finally, would it be possible to get the average number
> of allocations and the average number of email/telephone interactions
> per year for each size category (I suspect the latter is more Leslie's
> domain).
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Owen

Owen,

          # Members    Fee Level      Fee $
Xtra Small   390     *      1250    487,500
Small       1571     *      2250  3,534,750
Medium       518     *      4500  2,331,000
Large         71     *      9000    639,000
Xtra Large    73     *     18000  1,314,000
                                  ---------
Total                             8,306,250
2007 Budget                      10,312,000


Based the numbers, 15.8% of the allocation income translates to 12.7% of
budgeted costs seems to refute that those 73 members are subsidizing
anything. It would appear that all of the other members are subsidizing
those 73.

Michael Thomas
Mathbox
978-683-6718
1-877-MATHBOX (Toll Free)