[arin-ppml] Policy Proposal 110: Preservation of minimal IPv4 Resources for New and Small Organizations and for IPv6 Transition

[Joe Maimon]

Owen DeLong wrote:
> On Apr 23, 2010, at 2:53 PM, Joe Maimon wrote:
>> Michael, George,
>>
>> 4.10 does not provide space to be used for addressing your customers 
>> if the reality happens to be that you cannot get or keep any 
>> customers without giving them some IPv4 addresses.
> Thanks for that clarification Joe.
>
> Nor was it intended to.  I now oppose this proposal.
>
> If we're going to give IPv4 out to people just to give it to their 
> customers, it should be given based on current allocation/assignment 
> rules.  The purpose of reserving the /10 was so that ANYONE who was 
> implementing
> new transitional services (such as new NAT-PT infrastructure, etc.) 
> would be able to get small pieces of
> IPv4 to make deployment of those transitional technologies possible.
This is preserved, but halved into two /12's with slightly different 
requirements and purposes.

> It _IS_ not intended to extend the
> useful life of IPv4 for anyone.
No matter what is done with the last /8, it wont be a significant 
contributor towards extension of the useful life of IPv4. IPv4 as a 
continuing real world requirement will live or die on its own schedule 
regardless of what is done to the last /8. The fact of the matter is 
that there is enough inefficiently used IPv4 already out there (anywhere 
from 25% - 75% depending on how you look at it) that with sufficiently 
bad conditions, contortions and extortions, it can continue to be used 
and reused for much longer than most of us would want.

Allowing the /8 drain into the same inefficiencies as all the prior /8's 
gains nothing.

The best case scenario is that mass IPv6 adoptions occur quickly and 
seamlessly. While we have seen upticks and many successful technical 
proof of concepts, it has not happened yet. If the chances of it 
happening by depletion are so fragile that proposals such as this one 
threaten it, things are already slated to go badly.

For the not best case scenario, if practical reality dictates that IPv4 
continues to be required to turn up new customers and services, those 
who have been around for a while, who have consumed the bulk of the ~40 
arin /8 and ~70 legacy /8, will have options. New and small orgs will 
not have the quite the same.
>
> In my opinion, this space absolutely should not be used to simply add 
> more IPv4 customers to any provider.

What do you think will happen to the other three /10 in the /8 absent 
this proposal?

>>
>> The possibility exists that it may still be impractical to build a 
>> small business or start a new one with ipv6 even when no ipv4 is 
>> available except from preexisting holders who may be viewed 
>> unfavorably as monopolistic cartels and may even behave in such a manner.
>>
> If that is the case, it will be a bad time to start an ISP. There are 
> lots of factors that can make it a bad time to start an ISP. We've 
> been through that before and we'll go through that again.
>
In this instance it might be demonstrable that the community contributed 
to those factors and failed to attempt to mitigate them. That carries 
its own set of risks.

>> I believe failing to prepare adequately for that scenario is not only 
>> irresponsible but that it can be widely viewed and seized upon as 
>> evidence that we have acted irresponsibly.
>>
> I believe that locking up usable addresses for theoretical businesses 
> that may not ever exist at a time when actual running businesses have 
> a demonstrated need is a bigger example of acting irresponsibly.

The grasshopper and the ant. Years of plenty, years of famine.

(strangely enough both apply at the same time with ipv6 and ipv4 and to 
the same entities)

I consider socking away addresses during time of plenty in the face of 
potential oncoming famine, when the alternative is their near immediate 
consumption at the same rate as the last 95% the bare minimum of 
responsibility.

In fact, I would support the entire /8  held in reserve for specific 
purposes to be dictated by policy.

IPv6 will either be where the action is at or not. Three months of 
/8 at CBR wont make or break.

If it has mass adoption, than nobody should miss it. If it does not has 
mass adoption, we may greatly miss squandering that last rir /8.

>> I do not consider the existence of transfers, waiting lists and the 
>> current 4.10 to go far enough as to be adequate.
>>
>> The existence of minimal resources could do much to temper negative 
>> tendencies inherent in markets for limited resources.
>>
> As I now understand the intent of your policy, it would not accomplish 
> what you intend.  It would, instead, either create a situation where 
> various existing organizations found ways to get in under the policy 
> and get the space, or, it would get ARIN sued for squatting on address 
> space that should be otherwise issued to organizations with 
> demonstrated need.
>
> Also, what you call "negative tendencies of a market", I am starting 
> to call "incentive to move to IPv6."
I believe the proposal adequately prevents abuse - ARIN staff may even 
object to the extra work it imposes on them to prevent abuse.

If conditions are such that only the small and new orgs are punished by 
market conditions, it can actually create an incentive for the 
established larger players to drag their feet towards enabling everyone 
to be on equal footing again with ipv6 as the predominant opportunity 
model. On the other hand, if  the new and small can turn up handfuls 
each of customers demanding/requiring ipv4, its quite the incentive for 
all the rest to convert customer ipv4 needs into ipv6. And they have the 
clout to do it.

Everyone wins.

If ARIN is going to get sued, this proposal is not likely to add to the 
set of risks, even as it may alter them, trading one for the other. 
Legal counsel would probably interject their opinion on that at some point.

>> If IPv6 is not completely satisfactory in the common case for new or 
>> small growing entities that would be our failure.
>>
> I disagree.

Whose then?

>> It certainly would not be their fault. They werent even around.
>>
> Then it is a risk they should consider prior to launching a business 
> that is dependent on IPv4.

If IPv4 is what customers continue to want or require than you arent 
going to be very successful launching IPv6 businesses either.

Attitudes that are variations of "Tough, sucks to be you" are not going 
to go far towards helping to win friends and influence people.

>
>> The goals of (the existing) 4.10 are specifically aimed towards those 
>> who have acute need of IPv4 even when there is none normally 
>> available from Arin. That is what this entire proposal is about, 
>> clarifying some needs and adding others.
>>
> The goals of 4.10 are, actually, not that.
>
> The goals of 4.10 were to ensure we didn't create a "can't get there 
> from here" problem where all IPv4 addresses were consumed for business 
> as usual and the sudden need to deploy something like NAT-PT to 
> provide for IPv4 services access by IPv6 clients would not be rendered 
> impossible to deploy for want of IPv4 addresses with which to deploy it.

That is an acute need. It is also one unlikely to be actually 
experienced by the organizations who have consumed the bulk of the 
resources in the time of plenty - do you really think they cant scare up 
a /24 from their existing holdings, let alone a /28?

Ergo, 4.10 is actually targeted towards those who wont have that ability.

> We actually started out trying to set aside the full /8. We tried 
> compromising to the /9. The community was actually pretty clear in 
> their desire to limit this reservation to a /10.
I think that is short sighted, considering:
>> That changes ARIN exhaustion dates by about a month, give or take a 
>> week, at current burn rates.
>>
> Yeah, that sounds like an accurate estimate.  Sorry I missed that in 
> my first read-through.
>
> Owen
>

Joe