[arin-ppml] ARIN-prop-174 Policies Apply to All Resources in the Registry

[William Herrin]

On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 4:13 PM, David Farmer <farmer at umn.edu> wrote:
> On 6/19/12 16:18 CDT, William Herrin wrote:
>> I have been satisfied with ARIN's practice of only recording transfers
>> of addresses if the new registration falls under then-current ARIN
>> policy and contracts.
>>
>> Given the way the court has ruled in the past half decade, I'm not
>> convinced ARIN actually has the right to refuse to record a change. To
>> my knowledge no judge has ever reached a declaration that they do
>> while several have reached declarations that more or less state that
>> they do not. Nevertheless, it would not upset me to discover that ARIN
>> does have that right.
>
> So are you saying that ARIN can apply no policy and has no authority to
> refuse changes to records for Legacy Registrations? Ok then I will
> happily put in a request to change on of the several /8 not currently
> covered under contract to my name then.

Hi David,

Obviously that's not a correct way to interpret what I said. For one
thing, I said that the question ARIN's authority and responsibilities
during legacy address transfers is not quite settled. For another, IF
it is true that ARIN lacks authority to refuse changes then that
applies to changes requested by the lawful owner of the asset. Who
that is would be a question of legal fact, not of ARIN policy. That
would also imply that ARIN has no authority to make changes unless
asked to by the lawful owner of the asset. That last is almost exactly
what ARIN President and CEO Ray Plzak told the Kremen court in 2006.


> Everyone has to realize ARIN has to have authority and the necessary
> policies to direct that authority

No, it doesn't have to, and no everyone doesn't. After the initial
allocation from the free pool, ARIN could function very effectively as
merely the recorder and reporter of fact with all other matters
settled under common law.

As a community we've asked ARIN to do more than that. We've asked them
to protect the BGP table. We've asked them to dissuade speculators
from treating IPv4 as a commodity. And we've asked them to requiring
detailed reporting from ISPs. Maybe that's wise. But never mistake the
way we do things for the only functional way to do things.


> I'm pleading with you, please stop asking me to divine meaning from the goat
> entrails call[ed] court orders.  I have a strong stomach but not that strong.
>  :-(*)

Sadly, you're out of luck. IPv4 addresses have value now. Real
monetary value. That means the courts are going to decide. And any
policy which is out of step with their decisions will tend to
malfunction.

Regards,
Bill Herrin



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William D. Herrin ................ herrin at dirtside.com  bill at herrin.us
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