Search Engines/IP restrictions/policy changes

[Ted Pavlic]

> Webhosting companies were NOT hit first.  Several years ago a policy
> requiring dialup connections to use dynamic IP addresses was implemented.
> I was working for a fairly large dialup company at the time and we had
> been using static addresses for customers.  Yes, it was a painful
> conversion, not even so much because of the technology, but in educating
> users how to configure or re-configure their software.  We took a lot of
> tech support calls when we made the conversion.  We had to do a network
> wide software upgrade of our dial platforms to support it, but it got
> done, and I'm happy it was.

The reason why I said webhosting companies were hit first is because the
conversion for webhosting companies is a LOT more complex than the
conversion for ISPs in the situation you state.

I've only worked for ISPs for five years, but we've ALWAYS distributed
dynamic IP addresses to our customers unless they specifically wanted static
IP addresses. Using dynamic IP configurations allows for a great deal of
flexibility on the ISP end, and I'm sure even before ARIN made that mandate
plenty of ISPs were using dynamic IP addresses. Perhaps it was more than
five years ago when that policy was made, but I don't ever remember a
painful conversion to dynamic IP addresses. About the only thing painful
about dynamic IP addresses that I've ever worked with involved using RIP to
advertise on which new terminal server an IP address popped up on, and that
wasn't a very big issue.

Sure -- in the conversion from a static scheme to a dynamic scheme it
becomes complicated at the support level getting your customers to change...

But converting to name-based webhosting is much more complicated in that
certain technologies do not currently exist in web clients as well as
servers to support the type of name-based hosting ARIN suggests.

> Frankly, this thread just sounds like a bunch of excuses for why you don't
> feel like doing the work to convert over.  The policy clearly states that
> exceptions are available.  The policy says _nothing_ about ftp, so
> requesting addresses for ftp will still be allowed.  ARIN has not stated
> what the criteria of the exceptions are, but if you look at their track
> record, you fill find that they have been reasonably fair when it comes to
> implementing new policy, I see no reason they should deviate from that
> behavior now.

Alright -- so FTP isn't a good complaint...

* How about FrontPage Server Extensions?
* How about SSL?
* What about the damage this does to load balance infrastructures already in
place?
* What about non-HTTP/1.1 compliant browsers?

And, as you said, ARIN has been pretty vague about what "exceptions" are.

It's the principle of the thing -- ARIN has bit off more than they should be
allowed to chew. They're being influenced by the cable companies (which you
yourself speak of later on in your message) and other IP hogs that do not
deserve so much credit. Granted, webhosting providers need to have a bigger
voice in ARIN and it's their own fault for not having enough of a voice
already, but ARIN should not become an organization which greatly favors one
organization or another. ARIN should be an organization which supports the
better oganization of the Internet. The policy change that ARIN has made
hardly makes the Internet better for anyone except for those cable
companies.

> The only area that I see that is consuming addresses at an alarming rate
> without a good reason that should get attention first is cable modems.
> There still seems to be a perception that cable modem users need static
> addressing for some reason that escapes me.  I have to say that I would
> much rather see ARIN require dynamic addressing (whether that's
> dynamically assigned through a PPP or DHCP like mechanism, or a NAT
> solution doesn't matter to me) than pursue the web hosting consumption.

Every cable provider I have used and evaluated has used DHCP, but they are
giving out real Internet addresses which makes no sense to me.

In my opinion, they should be using NAT near their NAP and handing out 10./8
(or even 172.16./16! That'd be plenty!) addresses with DHCP to their
customers. It would be EASY to convert to this sort of configuration AND
would prevent customers from abusing their access by setting up servers.
People who want static IPs could request them and one-to-one NATs could be
setup.

Now the argument against that would be that NAT adds far too much latency...
But every cable provider I use already does such a poor job and managing the
HUGE bottleneck at their NAP that I think *I* wouldn't notice a difference.

And if that was a concern, setup multiple NAT devices and maybe even use
transparent load balancing and transparent proxying to make things faster.

The point is -- cable companies already **SHOULD** be doing at least half of
the things mentioned above in the last couple of paragraphs. If they did
that in the first place there would be FAR less of an IP problem on the
Internet today. EVERYTHING in the above mentioned paragraphs is already
being done in other organizations where efficiency and speed is something
important. None of the above changes would require ANY *NEW* technology to
be developed. It would be easy to implement ANY and ALL of the above
mentioned changes. It would probably INCREASE the performance of cable
Internet providers to try some of those changes. I just don't understand the
trouble with pursuing the regulation of the gratutious and gluttonous
allocation of IPs by cable companies rather than the NECESSARY allocation of
IPs by webhosting providers.

HTTP/1.1 was developed to make certain transactions easier and to help
lessen the IP load on the Internet... but HTTP/1.1 is still very new. We're
just not ready to use it yet.

All the best --
Ted