oops! previous assignment history

[Jim Fleming]

On Thursday, June 26, 1997 1:38 PM, Gordon Cook[SMTP:cook at NETAXS.COM] wrote:
@ looks like I missed  section 3.3 previous assignment history
@ 
@ The rfc says:  To promote increased usage of address space, the registries
@ will
@    require an accounting of address space previously assigned to the
@    enterprise, if any.
@ 
@ Cook:  i do detect some ambiguity here. assigned by the upstream provider
@ or assigned directly by internic?
@ 

The RFC you are reading was written to match the
arbitrary actions that were used to allocate IP addresses.
It is like drawing the blueprint of a house that is already
built. You can not expect things to match.

The RFC was written to provide justification to people
that questioned the arbitrary policies. ISPs that casually
asked for addresses or who did not have 20 years of
networking could be easily blown off by being told to
read that RFC, which as you point out has ambiguities.

As a student of Russian History, I am sure that you have
seen such tools used in the old Soviet Union. When people
asked why they were still waiting for an apartment they
could be told to read some obscur rule, as others passed
by and moved to the head of the line.

--
Jim Fleming
Unir Corporation