[arin-ppml] Use of "reserved" address space.

[Joe Maimon]

Leo Bicknell wrote:
>
> A year or two ago there was some discussion about "reserved" address
> space.  Specifically, Class E space, but in a CIDR world one has
> to wonder why we can't use most of 0/8, 127/8, and 240/4 as regular
> unicast space.  There were folks who were going off to discuss that
> at the IETF and with some vendors.

There are/were some Internet Drafts concerning some useful applications 
of this space.

>
> That's potentially ~18 /8's worth of address space "left on the
> table".  Early review suggested that most of this in several free
> operating systems could be enabled with simple "user interface"
> changes; that is there were some checks to make sure they weren't
> used improperly by tools that set addresses but if those were removed
> they would be forwarded and treated like unicast.  That is the cost
> of implementation was low.
>
> I realize "everything in the middle" must be upgraded to support this,
> but considering the level of effort and cost that may go into transfers
> folks may in fact find using this space cheaper.  I'm surprised there
> isn't more effort to look into this area.  Is there something going on
> I'm just not seeing?
>

I hope so, you and me both.

Apparently all attempts at something logical for this space are met with 
"Its too late to do any good", which is a self fulfilling prophecy.

Joe