[arin-ppml] Creating a market for IPv4 address space inabsenceof routing table entry market

[David Schwartz]

> Yes, if you still feel it necessary, you may quote me in public.
>
> However, my intent was to point out that ARIN is not conveying
> any rights.  I made no statement about what rights may or may
> not exist.  I merely stated that ARIN does exactly this:
>
> ARIN guarantees you that ARIN will not issue the same addresses
> to another party while you maintain your account in good standing
> with ARIN and your resources have not been reclaimed for other
> reasons.
>
> You are also reasonably assured that the other RIRs and the IANA
> will not issue the same addresses to someone else.
>
> This does not convey any rights with respect to the internet or any
> organization outside of ARIN.  It's just a contract between you
> and ARIN.  Nothing more.
>
> The fact that most (if not all) ISPs agree and cooperate with ARIN
> and the other RIRs as authoritative registries for uniqueness
> is what makes the internet possible and keeps it working.  However,
> if ISPs choose to believe someone else besides ARIN and let them
> route addresses ARIN assigned to you, there's not really any
> right on the part of ARIN to do anything about that.  Nor will
> any government likely listen to you about ARIN having conveyed
> such a right to you.

This may be a convenient legal fiction, but to actually believe this, you
would have to believe that ARIN is not responsible for the predictable
consequences of its actions based on other people's rational actions. ARIN
knows that its unique delegations are the gateways to Internet routability,
and that this is so for good and rational reasons. It makes its decisions
with this knowledge and cannot say it is not responsible for the results
because it does not directly control those gateways.

This would be like a credit-reporting agency saying that it has no
responsibility for denials of credit rationally made on the basis of its
ratings because it wasn't the entity that denied the credit.

That's absurd.

DS