[ppml] Re: Independent space from ARIN

Tue Apr 22 15:33:27 EDT 2003

The author was overestimating the numbers to make his point, I agree.
(I'm sure its not 99%, but its probably more then 75% - which is not much 
better in overall picture). Trying to say the problems do not exist is 
just not the way to deal with it. Based on responses on that NANOG thread 
and on previous threads on nanog & other mailing lists and my personal 
experiences and talking to my consulting clients, all that is mentioned 
is a problem with ARIN to various degree and my dealing with ARIN has 
shown it to be extremely resistant to any change or anybody who actually 
tries to propose something to fix one or more of these problems.

Part of this is that people do not see ARIN staff to do what is right, 
do it quickly, do it with resonable amount of documentation, etc. etc. 
When some say "education" is they key, perhaps it is, but the target 
maybe wrong, its not ARIN that needs to educate users but the other way 
around and any attempts to do it have generally failed and led to lower 
then expected participation of ARIN memebers in its activities.

P.S.  Just to add to everything, I'v been trying to transfer (change company
name) for my ip blocks for 3 years now. Tried hardest last year when it 
seemed like ARIN was actually interested in cleaning up its database. Same
old wall of we'll get back to you - and that is after I actually sent 
entire package of documentation by fedex. Oh well, at least I tried...

On Tue, 22 Apr 2003, Sweeting, John wrote:

> First off I totally disagree with the percentages; they are made up numbers
> by the author to make his case. Second, the percentage that understand ARIN
> policies do so because it is thier job to do so and so they take the time to
> read, learn and understand. It is much easier to say.....ARIN doesn't know
> what it is doing and that is why I cannot get my request approved.....then
> it is to take the time to understand the requirements and meet them. This is
> my personal opinion only.
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael.Dillon at radianz.com [mailto:Michael.Dillon at radianz.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2003 10:44 AM
> To: ppml at arin.net
> Subject: [ppml] Re: Independent space from ARIN
> 
> 
> This NANOG thread is bringing up some stuff that we really do need to deal 
> with...
> 
> On Sun, Apr 13, 2003 at 08:58:09PM -0400, Jeff McAdams wrote:
> > 
> > Either ARIN's policies are screwed up beyond even what I thought to
> > begin with, or their communications with customers/ISPs/whatever is
> > absolutely pitiful.  Most likely, both.
> 
> >From what I've seen, 1% of the ARIN using population knows how ARIN works 
> and how to get what they want, and 99% of the ARIN using population lives 
> in either a) fear of dealing with ARIN for things that they technically 
> qualify for, and/or b) utter loathing and hatred from past experiences.
> 
> Unfortunately, the people who are capable of changing things are the ones
> who fall into the 1% category, hence they never see the problem or need. 
> The "public policy" forums like ARIN-PPML don't help matters either, as
> any form of common sense seems to be drowned out amongst the net kooks and
> other wackjobs.
> 
> Meanwhile, the 99% category sits around wondering about things like:
> 
> * Why does the ARIN email system takes an hour just to generate an
>   auto-acknowledgment?
> 
> * Why does it take days, and sometimes many days, to process a form and at
>   the very least get a simple YAY or NAY on the syntax so you can continue
>   submitting without finding out 99 forms later that your first form had a
>   typo and invalidated all the rest.
> 
> * Why does it seem like no human touches a form until after 4PM Eastern?
> 
> * Why does the theoretically automated form processing for things like 
>   SWIPs still take over an hour to get a YAY or NAY email through.
> 
> * Why does it take a week to process a payment?
> 
> * Why have I NEVER been able to submit an ARIN request without receiving
>   a response asking for information I included in the original request.
> 
> * Why do we have to submit to the equivalent of an IP anal probe, and 
>   cough up extremely detailed documentation on network architectures and
>   the use of every IP address.
> 
> * Why any of this "police state" is necessary given that the shortage of
>   IPv4 addresses seems to be artifically created. There are still tons of
>   IP addresses that are either unallocated, unreasonably allocated (hey
>   Merit, lets see your documentation on 35.0.0.0/8 :P), or long dead and
>   never reclaimed. Only 32% of the available IPv4 space is being 
>   announced, where is the shortage?
> 
> * Why do we have to pay very large sums of money ($2500+ per year at a 
>   minimum) for this wonderful IP policing service. Where in the heck does
>   all that money go?
> 
> * Why are we expected to continue the status quo of paying thousands of
>   dollars for addresses in IPv6? Without the threat of an artifical 
>   shortage to "manage", what possible reason is there to justify ARIN's
>   existance or fees? Why do we all get the feeling IPv6 isn't an end to
>   the expenses, but rather a vast new market of registration and renewal
>   fees?
> 
> * http://www.arin.net/library/corp_docs/budget.html - Where does the $1M
>   in "fringe benefits" go? Where does the extra $1.5M in revenue go? Why
>   does ARIN need to spend so much in travel, etc?
> 
> * Why does ARIN have no problem assigning large blocks of unallocated 
>   space (usually 2x or more) around a new "customer" to accomodate for
>   future growth, but have policies preventing ISPs from doing the same
>   (aka 80% utilization for more space).
> 
> * Etc etc etc, not counting the problems that have already been mentioned.
> 
> Yes, if you take the time to try and figure out what goes on inside the
> minds of ARIN, you'll find that some of the people actually do try to be
> useful human beings. But most of us don't have the time or desire to do
> that, we just want a system that works. I don't think the current system 
> meets anyone's standard for useful, efficient, or cost effective.