[arin-ppml] IPv4 Depletion as an ARIN policy concern

[Milton L Mueller]

> -----Original Message-----
> Long before it hits $1M per address, the US Congress will step in and
> smack us down for facilitating the hording of an economically critical
> resource.

Maybe, maybe not. I don't think good policy can be based on such speculation. Congress has no legal authority over the address space and the U.S. Congress won't do anything unless well-organized interest groups urge it to do something. Who might those groups be? How would they benefit politically or economically by "smacking ARIN down"? How would such an intervention make addresses any less expensive? 

> Besides, the past 24 months events in the world financial markets have
> pretty well put paid to the notion that there's no such thing as too
> much.

It's amazing how many different conclusions the "events in the world financial markets" confirm in the minds of nonspecialists with no special analytical insight into what happened and what caused it, but frankly I don't see the relevance of this comment. (The financial crisis btw was caused by LOW prices (low interest rates, easy credit)). Appeals to "what the financial crisis proves" are approaching the Hitler metaphor as a useless dead end in policy debates. 

> Would you prefer to see a measure of transactions per month instead of
> dollars per address so that the dollar value can float as long as the
> transfers still happen? Are there additional useful ways to measure
> liquidity in the presumed transfer market that we should consider?

Conceptually, that's a better approach. But I don't see the need for a specific metric or threshold (as you suggest with your carrots metaphor). If we run into severe IPv4 address shortages and we know that there are unused or underutilized v4 blocks around and nothing is changing hands then it will be clear that transfer markets aren't working. Then you need to analyze why and what to do about it. Are the conditions attached to them too stringent and constraining? Are there other problems? 

> If it's a useful measure then you can specify a number. For example,
> we could talk in terms of number of address transactions relative to
> the free pool assignments today. If the rate of addresses changing
> hands falls to 10% of the rate of free pool assignments now and if it
> isn't because IPv6 adoption has happened then the address transfer
> market has probably frozen up, recommending further action by ARIN to
> get things moving.

As I have always said, the worst thing that can happen with transfers is that they just don't happen. V4 markets are only one arrow in the quiver. So when I say this:

> > Just be aware of the complexity and interdependence with which one is
> dealing.

I am talking about: 
1) identifying what is causing the problems and 
2) defining WHAT to do about it. 
Poorly conceived interventions (e.g., price controls or dumb forms of rationing) can easily make things much worse.