[arin-ppml] Microsoft receives court approval for transfer asagreed with ARIN

[Scott Leibrand]

On Apr 28, 2011, at 2:32 PM, "Mike Burns" <mike at sum.net> wrote:

> If ARIN wants to change policy, may I suggest removing the justification requirements for ALL transfers, legacy and non-legacy?
>
> This would have the effect of removing the disincentive of legacy holders to sign an LRSA, would align ARIN with APNIC policy in advance of a global transfer policy, and would prevent ARIN from having to fudge a needs analysis in order to comply with policy, as I firmly believe happened with MS/Nortel.
>
> It would also increase whois reliability, as those who currently hold ip address space as the result of prior transfers could be fearless in approaching ARIN to have these transfers reflected accurately in whois.
>
> And those with addresses under RSA would not be afraid to sell their unused addresses through STS. Currently there is the fear that ARIN can audit the organization and take back unused addresses, so only those who can plausibly deny their lack of need feel brave enough to advertise to ARIN that they are not using their entire allocation.
>
> This discussion will no doubt mirror those of the past, and may expose some emotional response from prior participants, but I ask those participants to evaluate their current positions in the face of current realities.
>
> Reality shows that legacy holders have the right to transfer and sell address space without ARIN approval. Evidence of that fact is that the addresses Nortel sold were not originally registered to them, they were the possessions of Nortel's "predecessors in interest", bankruptcy parlance for Nortels prior acquisitions, who where the original legacy registrants. The court held that Nortel had the exclusive right to transfer the addresses. How did they get that right, unless upon acquisition, Nortel and the acquired company processed an 8.2 transfer?  Can anybody point me to the existence of a relevant 8.2 transfer processed for Nortel?
>
> Reality today also includes the fact that the IPv6 transition failed, we have reached the IPv4 exhaust point without the option for an orderly transition, and other stakeholder communities like APNIC have decided that the best stewardship role going forward is to allow IPv4 addresses to be bought and sold without a justification restriction.
>
> With or without the Global Transfer Policy, this will be a worldwide market, and addresses will flow to where market restrictions are fewest. I noted this community's angst when the subject of returning addresses came up, and the proposal was to send them out of the region, back to IANA.  Don't you think the same effect will happen when the world compares the markets for IPv4 transfers? Addresses will flow to Asia, unless we change ARIN policies.
>
> ARIN's policies are impediments to good stewardship, preventing the open sales of IP address space and leaving unused address space on the sidelines that would otherwise be put to use. Paradoxically, ARIN's attempts at stewardship in the form of justification requirements serve to restrict the efficient use of these limited resources. What may have been appropriate in a time before exhaust, and before the legal precedents set in the MS/Nortel deal, is no longer appropriate.
>
> It's not so bad, free markets are designed to use scarce resources most efficiently, and freedom from regulation has been a major driver in the growth of the Internet. The market will be the best steward now, and ARIN's role should be the title agency whose overarching goal is to maintain accuracy in whois and uniqueness of registration.

Thanks for the feedback.  I think you're advocating moving
further/faster than most people in the ARIN community want to right
now, but it does seem there is support for relaxing some restrictions.
 I hope you'll stay tuned for more discussion of that after discussion
of the current slate of draft policies dies down a bit, and continue
contributing to those discussions.

> And as a point of clarification, can a legacy holder who is not a member of ARIN, but who is registered with the PPML post in support of a proposal, or not?

Yes.  The ARIN policy development process is open to anyone (not just
address holders) who wants to subscribe and post to PPML, and anyone
who would like to attend a public policy meeting (remote or in
person).

> If so, consider this a post in support of ALL of Benson's proposals.

Noted.

-Scott

>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Michel Py" <michel at arneill-py.sacramento.ca.us>
> To: "John Curran" <jcurran at arin.net>
> Cc: <ppml at arin.net>
> Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2011 2:27 AM
> Subject: Re: [arin-ppml] Microsoft receives court approval for transfer asagreed with ARIN
>
>
>> John,
>>
>>> If more than a handful actually feel that way to the point of
>>> participating, then the policies are easily enough to change.
>>> We have even made it so that remote participants in the Public
>>> Policy meetings can readily ask questions and be counted in
>>> the show of support for a given draft policy.
>>
>> Based on what data? You're taking the problem backwards. There is a
>> widespread feeling that the non-public agreement between ARIN and
>> Microsoft has some issues with the current policies. It is clear that
>> the parties did not feel the need to talk to ARIN before the deal was
>> done. How do you expect someone to write a draft policy based on
>> suspicion, not on facts?
>>
>> A precedent has been created. A court of law has ruled that legacy
>> prefixes were sellable assets (at least, in a bankruptcy context).
>> Unless ARIN plans to appeal the ruling (seems difficult to me), it is
>> necessary to implement new policies that take the new reality into
>> account. Part of designing these new policies requires a better
>> understanding of the problems that the current policies posed to the
>> current situation, which in turn requires a better understanding of what
>> legacy holders are willing to negotiate in return of staying within the
>> ARIN framework and what will trigger them to bypass ARIN.
>>
>> Unless some details are provided, I predict that no significant change
>> to policies will be made in time for the next large, public trade
>> occurs, which will put you in the hot seat again and that time you won't
>> be able to say that you did not see it coming.
>>
>> Michel.
>>
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