[arin-ppml] ARIN-prop-140 Business Failure Clarification

[Matthew Kaufman]

On May 2, 2011, at 11:43 AM, William Herrin wrote:

> On Mon, May 2, 2011 at 1:58 PM, ARIN <info at arin.net> wrote:
>> ARIN-prop-140 Business Failure Clarification
>> 
>> Add to end of Section 8.1: "Note that an entity which is reorganizing
>> under any section of the US bankruptcy code (or foreign equivalent) is
>> not 'out of business' for the purpose of interpreting this section"
>> 
>> Rationale:
>> 
>> Potential confusion exists over the requirement to return address space
>> from a bankrupt entity. This is a needed clarification to the policy manual.
> 
> Hi Matthew,
> 
> If I understand properly, the language you object to in section 8.1 is:
> 
> "Thus, if a company goes out of business, regardless of the reason,
> the point of contact (POC) listed for the number resource does not
> have the authority to sell, transfer, assign, or give the number
> resource to any other person or organization. The POC must notify ARIN
> if a business fails so the assigned number resources can be returned
> to the available pool of number resources if a transfer is not
> requested and justified."
> 
> The main point of that paragraph is that if your company's network is
> terminated (as part of a general company shutdown) you, as the POC,
> don't get to keep the addresses as some kind of severance pay. Your
> suggested text frankly just muddies the waters further.
> 
> I would suggest replacing "goes out of business" with "ceases
> operations" and just strike the last sentence entirely.

My problem with it is actually "The POC must notify ARIN if a business fails so the assigned number resources can be returned to the available pool of number resources".

Entering, for instance, US Chapter 7 bankruptcy is pretty clear evidence that "a business has failed" and yet there should be neither a requirement on the POC that they notify ARIN in such a case (well, actually, perhaps there should be... but usually the POC is long gone by then) nor a suggestion that ARIN will be returning addresses to the available pool any time soon.

Matthew Kaufman