[arin-ppml] Policy Proposal: IPv4 Recovery Fund

[Hawkes, Dave]

Thanks for the clarification.  I agree with you about averaging the cost somehow.. But as you mentioned it is more of an operational task.

I agree with this policy as it stands.

It is a shame that there needs to be a monetary compensation of some sort to create an initiative to return unused space, but in many cases it is justifiable.  Every organization incurs costs in cleaning up badly managed blocks, and for those that are unwilling/unable to incur those costs, this policy should help justify reorganizing existing IP space.  Personally, I feel it is an organization's responsibility to properly maintain their existing space, and clean it up as necessary/possible.  Of course, not every organization can/will take the proper steps to reorganize their IP space.

I feel this is the fairest way to offer an incentive to the community without completely commercializing existing space, or forcing organizations to return space they may or may not need.  This is the best middle of the road option that protects all involved.

-----Original Message-----
From: arin-ppml-bounces at arin.net [mailto:arin-ppml-bounces at arin.net] On Behalf Of Leo Bicknell
Sent: Friday, November 21, 2008 5:12 PM
To: arin-ppml at arin.net
Subject: Re: [arin-ppml] Policy Proposal: IPv4 Recovery Fund

In a message written on Fri, Nov 21, 2008 at 04:35:21PM -0700, Hawkes, Dave wrote:
> How do organizations that return IP blocks, but do not wish to receive 
> monetary compensation fit into this?  If an ORG returns a block of a 
> given size, would that effectively lower the amount others may need to 
> pay for that sized block, or would it satisfy requests without 
> requiring payment?

Space could continue to be returned with no compensation.  Under this system ARIN staff would treat that as a recovery price of $0, and simply give out the space to the first person in line waiting for space.

There are sort of two interesting effects of this:

- The policy self-sunsets.  When people are willing to return blocks for
  no compensation ARIN automatically returns to the existing model.

- Although I want to avoid too many in-depth details of pricing here so
  we can talk about the concept this was put forth with the simple
  version of pricing where it is passed through more or less directly.
  That is, if there are two /19's returned, and two people waiting,
  and the first one has a $100 compensation fee and the second is
  returned for no compensation then those in line will pay $100 and $0.

  Personally I'd actually prefer ARIN keep a sort of weighted moving
  average and while it's $100 to get one block back and $0 for the
  other, both parties would be charged approximately $50.  That is,
  ARIN would "smooth" the costs to make them more predictable.  Trying
  to write that in policy ends up with 5 paragraphs just on that topic,
  so I left it out.  If we want to go that way I'd strongly suggest we
  make that an operational detail for staff.

> Also, instead of receiving payment from ARIN, could an ORG use the 
> funds to offset future fees, effectively keeping a balance with ARIN?

Not as written, and such a thing may be outside the policy area.
I suspect most companies would rather have the money back than extend an interest free loan to ARIN.  I wouldn't be opposed to such an idea provided that we maintained yearly contact, so perhaps the money could pay all but $1 of forward yearly fees so there is still a bill and a check written to keep the two-way touch in place yearly.

But, let me stress, as written the policy would not enable this concept.

-- 
       Leo Bicknell - bicknell at ufp.org - CCIE 3440
        PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/