[arin-ppml] ARIN's Authority - One view (was: Re: LRSA concerns)

[John Curran]

On Aug 24, 2008, at 11:13 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>
> I disagree. ARIN should focus on efficient and appropriate  
> management of
> the scarcity of IPv4 resources. Neither you, nor I, nor ARIN knows  
> when
> or even if a migration will occur. All policies should be based on
> acceptance of that fact, and seek to manage both v4 and v6 resources  
> as
> effectively and efficiently as possible.

Personal opinion follows.

In a perfect world (with a perfectly informed global community),
I guess I would agree. The decision to deploy or not deploy IPv6
would be based on the unanimous consensus of overall worldwide
maximization of benefits to mankind, as well implications to our
flora & fauna cohabiters of this fine planet.

So, now back to reality...  It is questionable whether we can
keep the present Internet growing simply using IPv4.  To attempt
to do so represents (at best) a calculated gamble and (at worst)
an irresponsible act with global economic consequences.  Due to
the inherent nature of IPv4/IPv6 interoperability, it's going to
be necessary for many organizations to run both in parallel for
some period of time in order to effect the transition.

At a minimum, ARIN has an obligation to educate and inform the
community in its region that we will be very unlikely to be able to
provide access to IPv4 address space sometime in the foreseeable
future, and that organizations that were planning on IPv4 address
space availability need to take this reality into consideration.
We did make such an announcement last May to this effect, and it
made a real difference in the level of awareness of this issue.

The question remains whether ARIN should take more aggressive
measures to educate and inform user of IP numbering resources
of this upcoming change, and/or whether ARIN should actively
actively encourage migration to IPv6 via policy mechanisms...
 From the feedback at ARIN's most recent public policy meetings,
there has been a clear mandate to increase the outreach on
upcoming IPv4 depletion and the need to deploy IPv6.  We have
not had that level of agreement on using policy mechanisms to
encourage IPv6 transition.

/John