[ppml] Proposal for the creation of a working group.

[John Curran]

At 10:00 AM -0400 10/10/07, Thomas Narten wrote:
>I also believe many of the policies that are being discussed really
>only make sense if done more globally. The fact is (as Raul said in
>his initial note) that many of the policies just don't make sense if
>done differently in different regions. The challenge is that address
>policies in practice often have global impact (e.g., on route table
>size, on long term consumption rates, etc.). Treating them as local
>policies significantly misses the point. Or, if there are significant
>differences in the details in practice, can lead to RIR shopping by
>entities looking for address space with the best terms.

If the particular global policy is important enough, shouldn't
the potential downside of the risk of significant differences
(and "RIR shopping") be considered a relatively small price
to pay?

>In my experience, the only way to get any significant (or contentious)
>globally-coordinated policy adopted in practice requires the help of a
>team of people (from multiple regions) to work together to help
>coordinate the activities and to help folk understand the nuances of
>how each individual RIR works. And to come up with specific proposals
>that have a chance of being adopted by each region.

I also believe that this is the most successful path.  In the
past,  it appears to have occurred on an ad-hoc basis.  

>Bottom line: how much time do the RIRs _really_ have to get any sort
>of IPv4 end game policy adopted before it is too late to matter?

Since the WG proposal has the output is to go through the
individual region policy development processes, it does not
appear intended to speed up the overall process, but instead
the goal appears to be to increase the probability of approval
of a common result.

/John