[arin-ppml] ARIN-prop-136 Services Opt-out Allowed for Unaffiliated Address Blocks

[Owen DeLong]

On Feb 25, 2011, at 9:38 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote:

> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> You can't have it both ways.
>> 
>> Either:
>> 
>> 1) The USG had the authority to allocate addresses to legacy holders, and still
>> has the authority to delegate management of those address to ICANN ->
>> NRO -> ARIN, or
>> 
>> 2) The USG has no authority in the matter, and thus legacy holders have no
>> claim in the first place.
>> 
>> 
> 
> False dichotomy. If the USG has no authority and legacy holders are currently holding the resource, most legal precedents and norms of justice would continue to let them hold it and dispose of it as they see fit. At least in this country, people who occupy unowned resources get to continue occupying them in the absence of any higher claim. 
> 
This includes a number of false assumptions...

1.	IP Addresses are not property.
2.	ARIN does not grant license, title, lease, or other property rights in addresses.
3.	ARIN registers addresses and administers the registry for uniqueness.
4.	People who run routers control who can actually route a particular prefix. They are
	free to use the ARIN database as a reference or not as they see fit.
5.	As a registration service, absent a contract ARIN has the right to add, delete, or
	modify a registration as they see fit. Functioning within the terms of the ICANN
	MOU and within the combined RIR/ICANN/ASO/NRO structure makes things more
	convenient for everyone and makes the internet function more reliably than would
	a fragmented and disparate collection of registries with differing policies.
	However, nothing prevents such non-cooperating registries from acting as they
	wish. I do, however, tend to think that ISPs prefer a functional internet and are
	thus unlikely to give much credence to the data in such registries.

Arguing over property rights in 32-bit integers is like trying to get a royalty from people
for using the number 5. It might be amusing for a while, but, in the end, it's mostly pointless
and maybe a bit counter-productive.

Owen