[arin-ppml] IPv4 is depleted today

[David Farmer]

On 29 Aug 2008 Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:

> There are a couple of phrases in this post I found most
> humorous:
> 
> "...return our current IPv4 address space it is to valuable
> internally...."
> 
> "...will be necessary to extend the life of 
>  IPv4 long enough for us to get IPv6 ramped up..."

Glad to be comic relief for you, but;

> What our esteemed colleague David is saying is in essence
> he wants a transfer policy because he has a lot of IPv4
> and he (understandably) wants to continue to use it.
> He labels IPv6 not ready, why not?  He already has
> plenty of IPv4, he doesn't need IPv6.  He has no incentive
> to deploy IPv6, really.

Wrong, we have plenty of incentive to deploy IPv6, we been working on it, 
have you?  We just have bigger incentives not to break IPv4, yet, and there 
are other projects, with higher priorities too.  But, we are making deliberate, 
all be it slow progress, are you?  Four years ago we had IPv6 as an 
equipment requirement for our new campus network RFP, we have been 
putting our money where our mouth is for IPv6 for a while.

But, IPv6 ain't ready for grandma today, with a lot of work it will be by IPv4 
exhaustion.

> He also won't give his network's IPv4 up to "sell" through a
> transfer policy, or course not.  He is just expecting every
> other legacy holder out there to sell off their IPv4.

Wrong, if the University of Minnesota were to stop using it's IPv4 address 
space we will return it to ARIN, and not sell it.  We have in the past, we 
returned a C to IANA when we got our original B, and we may return a 
couple other swamp C's in the future as a matter of principle, but that really 
won't make any difference to anything.  Nor, would returning all of our 
address space, it might delay IANA exhaustion by a whole day or two. 

I'm just trying to recognize that it will be easier and more effective to give 
people an incentive to return address space, then to only ask them return it, 
or to try to force them to return it.    

> The situation reminds me when my city, Portland OR, put
> in Light Rail.  Everyone driving cars in the city strongly
> supported light rail.  They all wanted it because the
> figured that "the OTHER guy" would stop driving his
> car, and take light rail, and get the heck off the freeway
> so that THEY could drive an uncongested freeway.
> 
> Needless to say, the freeway congestion did NOT go away.
> 
> I would ask our colleague that if he feels that it would
> be too much trouble for him to split his legacy block
> to be able to sell off part of it under a liberalized
> transfer policy, doesn't he think that everyone else with
> a legacy block is going to feel the same way?  Why is
> he special?  And if every other legacy holder feels this
> way, then where exactly are these IPv4 blocks going to
> come from that will be sold through a liberalized transfer
> policy, that will "extend the life of IPv4" as he puts it.
> 
> In short, he meticulously explains why a liberalized transfer
> policy would do absolutely nothing to help him return his
> unused IPv4 space to the free pool, then proceeds to
> claim that we need a liberalized transfer policy to enable
> more IPv4 to be returned to the free pool!!!
> 
> I can't think of a more damming example of why a liberalized
> transfer policy would be about as useful as teats on a boar.

You are right, we're not special, a liberalized transfer policy will probably not 
free up much space.  That was one of my points, that I obviously didn't 
hammer hard enough.  

But, it might free up a little, and we're going to need every hair-brained Wile 
E. Coyote idea we can come up with to get to keep IPv4 going long enough 
to get everyone on to IPv6.  Because unlike Wile E. Coyote, if the Internet 
falls off the cliff we not going to get up and walk away.

I'll put it back on you, are you sure we can get IPv6 fully deployed before 
IPv4 crashes into the wall, I'm not.  We (UMN) will be there but we've been 
working on it for a long time.  I don't think everyone will be.

If we have a transfer policy that might free up a little space, it is not going to 
save us in the long term, nor will NAT, only IPv6 can do that.  But it could 
help build a bridge, and if IPv4 addresses went for $1000 an address it sure 
would make a bigger incentive to move to IPv6 and hopefully push IPv6 up 
the priority list for IT departments everywhere.  So if only for that reason, it 
might help to have a transfer policy, to give that extra little push.

I also think the longer we debate a transfer policy, the more the message 
that IPv6 is the only true hope get diluted. 



=======================================================
David Farmer				     Email:	farmer at umn.edu
Office of Information Technology
Networking & Telecomunication Services
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