Subject: RE: IPv4

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 14:54:23 -0700

What you call extortion others call capitalism.

Either an ip address allocation is property or it isn't. If it is the owner has no duty to give the property away just because someone else might want it. In the second case the only possible cause of action would be against the registrar.

I don't see a duty of care here. There is no general obligation in law to give up an economic interest just to help others. None of the parties involved here are communists.

As for your repeated appeals to senior management, who do you think is more likely to share our values, engineers or managers?

Sent from my GoodLink Wireless Handheld (www.good.com)

 -----Original Message-----
From: 	[email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
Sent:	Friday, August 03, 2007 05:54 AM Pacific Standard Time
To:	[email-masked]
Subject:	RE: IPv4

> If I was the isp in that situation hp has something I want and many
others want. There is absolutely nothing to be achieved by threatening
hp and much to be lost. Even if the threat worked the party that brought
the case and paid for the costs would most likely not get the allocation
anyway.

When one company sues another, they often ask for damages. I am saying
that if, as a result of legacy holders hoarding addresses, ARIN is
unable to allocate addresses to an ISP, then the ISP could claim that
the legacy holder has damaged the ISP and sue for damages.
	
> Rather than lay out ten million plus on a lawsuit that is unlikely to
achieve the desired result the isp is going to pay hp. The risk of
losing the allocation while it still has relevance is nil.

Now you are claiming that HP will engage in extortion. Seriously, I do
not believe that senior management at HP is aware of this issue. When
they do become aware of it, I strongly doubt that they will plan to
engage in extortion. And when it comes to pricing those addresses that
HP holds, a large ISP currently pays ARIN $18,000 per year for all the
addresses that it needs.
	
> Do not expect the courts to be as willing to step into this situation
and decide it the way you think it should be decided. US judges are
political appointments. Most are ideologically committed to free market
arguments.

First of all, the courts will only get involved if a lawsuit is
initiated. When I look at all the possible players that might initiate
such a lawsuit, I think that the ISP who fails to get the needed
addresses is most likely. And when I look at all the possible parties
that might be sued, I see that the legacy address holders are in the
weakest position. In fact, HP and other legacy address holders are not
playing by the rules, and people who are committed to free market
arguments are also ususally strongly in favor of playing by the rules.
That's why Enron was not allowed to fade quietly into the sunset.

By the way, the IETF is probably the wrong venue to discuss this issue.
ICANN or ARIN would be a better place to move the discussion to.

--Michael Dillon

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---

From: Iljitsch van Beijnum <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2007 00:02:04 +0200

> Either an ip address allocation is property or it isn't.
>

Right. And the people who've been in charge of IP addresses for the  
last decade and a half or so, have always maintained that it isn't.  
So capitalism doesn't apply here.

I can't sell my phone number or address, either.

---

From: "Clint Chaplin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 16:15:43 -0700

I don't see whay you can't sell your phone number.

If you have a good number (lucky digits, etc.) I bet you could sell it
off.  I wonder if there is a market for good 800 numbers....

-- 
Clint (JOATMON) Chaplin
Principal Engineer
Corporate Standardization (US)
SISA

---

From: Douglas Otis <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 16:40:10 -0700

On Aug 3, 2007, at 2:54 PM, Hallam-Baker, Phillip wrote:

> I don't see a duty of care here. There is no general obligation in  
> law to give up an economic interest just to help others.

Rather than allowing IP addresses to be traded, an annual per IP  
address use fee could be imposed.  This fee could provide the  
economic incentive for returning IP addresses not generating revenues  
that justify paying the fee.  Rather than increasing various  
membership fees which tend to benefit larger interests, flat use fees  
could be more democratic.  Initially setting fees to levels  
comparable to current revenues should not be disruptive.  Of course  
fees would be justified by covering just the expenses related to  
services being offered.

When sourcing revenue from either a name or IP address use fee, this  
might also cover some services offered by ISOC.  These organizations  
share duties related to supporting the Internet.  As with any  
democracy, funding mechanisms potentially impair equity.  The goal  
would be to find a balance that insures availability of information  
and resources needed for interchange and interoperability.

This could be seen as analogous to a TV or radio station who license  
their frequencies.  License fees are based upon annual costs of  
enforcement, policy and rulemaking, user information, and  
international activities.

-Doug

---

From: John Levine <[email-masked]>
Date: 3 Aug 2007 23:42:29 -0000

>I don't see whay you can't sell your phone number.

You can sell your 800/888/877/866 number, but not your POTS number.

Toll free numbers are more like domain names, in that you have to find
a provider to host it and to put an entry into the DNS-like database
that phone switches consult to decide how to route the call.  Ordinary
phone numbers are more like IP addresses in that the first part of the
number is used to route calls (give or take some portability details
that don't really affect this argument.)  Your phone company owns your
phone number.

>If you have a good number (lucky digits, etc.) I bet you could sell
>it off.

If it's a toll free number, sure, there's a robust market.  If it's a
POTS number, forget it.

This isn't exactly analogous to IP addresses, but the routing
nightmares that would result if every phone number were separately
portable is similar to what would happen if people started taking
their /28's with them.

R's,
John

---

From: "Clint Chaplin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 16:54:50 -0700

And yet, you can indeed take your number with you when you change cell
phone providers. You can convert a fixed base land line to a cell
phone number, and then take it anywhere you want to, and to any cell
phone provider.

You can't convert a cell phone number to land line.  Yet.

---

From: David Morris <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 17:04:12 -0700 (PDT)

I believe every POTS phone number is separately portable, at least within
the geographic area ... you can switch your POTS number between providers and
to cellular or VoIP providers. Business numbers are transferable (and have
been for longer than general portability) ... in the case I was associated
with, my principals chose not to take over the failing business' numbers only
because to do so would have meant paying significant delinquint bills.

Not that I believe there is a large market for the sale of POTS numbers,
just that at some level, exchange is possible.

You can also purchase a virtual phone number having the phone company
place a permenant forward in the switch to some other location. Then you
pay call charges based on the distance between the virtual number's switch
and the forwarded to number.

> portable is similar to what would happen if people started taking

I expect you'll find that each local phone as a switch based physical
address. There has to be a DNS-like lookup or ICMP-like redirect which
maps POTS numbers to physical phones.

---

From: John L <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2007 09:11:32 -0700 (PDT)

> phone number, and then take it anywhere you want to, and to any cell

I didn't really want to get into the nits of LNP, but your number is yours 
to take with you, not yours to sell.  You also can't port it outside your 
local calling area, although cell carriers generally provide unlimited 
forwarding within their own networks.  This means that, e.g., you can port 
your New York landline to mobile, move to California, keep the number on 
the same mobile carrier, but then you can't port it back to a California 
landline, only to a New York landline.  And you can't sell the number at 
all.

R's,
John

---

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 06:59:15 -0700

Quite, I don't see the relevance of the analogy. If there was actual demand for a market in telephone numbers the technology could be established to make this possible. Today the demand is only there in the business space where numbers are very definitely traded.

Sanctions have to be credible. Telling people that they are required to give away an asset that has become a scarce resource is not credible. Telling people 'oh dear no more IPv4 addresses left' is not credible. The authority of the registries only lasts as long as they have product left in inventory to sell.

We cannot afford to indulge in faith based planning here.

> From: David Morris [mailto:[email-masked]] 
> Sent: Friday, August 03, 2007 8:04 PM
> Cc: [email-masked]
> Subject: Re: selling IPv4 addresses vs. the POTS number model
> 
> 
> I believe every POTS phone number is separately portable, at 
> least within the geographic area ... you can switch your POTS 
> number between providers and to cellular or VoIP providers. 
> Business numbers are transferable (and have been for longer 
> than general portability) ... in the case I was associated 
> with, my principals chose not to take over the failing 
> business' numbers only because to do so would have meant 
> paying significant delinquint bills.
> 
> Not that I believe there is a large market for the sale of 
> POTS numbers, just that at some level, exchange is possible.
> 
> You can also purchase a virtual phone number having the phone 
> company place a permenant forward in the switch to some other 
> location. Then you pay call charges based on the distance 
> between the virtual number's switch and the forwarded to number.
> 
> I expect you'll find that each local phone as a switch based 
> physical address. There has to be a DNS-like lookup or 
> ICMP-like redirect which maps POTS numbers to physical phones.
>

---

From: Arnt Gulbrandsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 16:35:54 +0200

> We cannot afford to indulge in faith based planning here.

A question. Is anyone trying to mitigate effects of the End of Time in 
any other way than by working on IPv6?

Arnt

---

From: Arnt Gulbrandsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 17:10:34 +0200

Roger Jorgensen writes:
> On Mon, 6 Aug 2007, Arnt Gulbrandsen wrote:
>> A question. Is anyone trying to mitigate effects of the End of Time 
>> in any other way than by working on IPv6?
>
> why bother when IPv6 are ready and can be used? :)

Well, some people obviously don't like the transition to IPv6, so I'm 
wondering what sort of alternative approaches these people are working 
on.

Arnt

---

From: "Roger Jørgensen" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 17:11:11 +0200

why bother when IPv6 are ready and can be used? :)
use the time wisely and we'll have enough time to prepare.

-- 

Roger Jorgensen           |
[email-masked]          | - IPv6 is The Key!
http://www.jorgensen.no   | [email-masked]

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 20:13:17 +0100

>  As for your repeated appeals to senior management, who do you think
is more likely to share our values, engineers or managers?

 To date, the debate has been dominated by engineering concerns. However
I think the concerns of senior managers are more relevant and, in
general, support the current regime. The risk of losing ones IP
addresses because one has not signed a Registration Services Agreement
with an RIR is a very important risk. This is the kind of thing that can
destroy a business and avoiding such risks is what leads senior managers
to demand that services, software and hardware are purchased from
reputable vendors under contracts that are highly likely to be
enforceable.
 
In addition, I think that the whole idea of "SELLING IP ADDRESSES" is
driven by engineers who have been hoarding a /16 or so since the early
days of the Internet in hopes of getting rich some day. Senior
management is more likely to look at the situation and realise that
there is not sufficient liquidity for a stable market to form, even if
the RIRs were to take the position of market makers.
 
Fortunately,  the engineers in the IETF have provided an out in the form
of an abundant supply of virtually free IPv 6 addresses and a series of
interworking mechanisms that allow an IPv4 Internet and an IPv6 Internet
to interoperate with little pain.
 
--Michael Dillon