[arin-ppml] 2008-6: Emergency Transfer Policy for IPv4 Addresses

[Paul Schopis]

It seems to me we keep going in circles on the arguments of for or  
against adopting the policy. I am currently reading "Hot, Flat and  
Crowded" Thomas Friedman's new book. In it he argues one of the major  
crisis facing America and the world is a phenomena he refers to as  
"dumb as we want to be". It basically says we have lost the ability to  
face the big challenges and offers as an example (among others) the  
mortgage bailout. He claims we are selling off our grandchildren's  
future because we cannot get our own house in order.  In other words,  
we literally live like there is no tomorrow finding only temporary  
fixes because we refuse to deal with real issues.

It seems to me we are trying to create an artificial market out of a  
public resource, in which some will make a couple of bucks. The life  
of the market will be very limited and very few will benefit in my  
estimation because at the end of the day, IPv4 will run out. Demand  
will outstrip supply no matter how much money is involved.

I think that if as a community, we spent half as much time addressing  
how we get IPv6 deployed and operational as we are debating this band  
aide approach we would all be considerably better off.