Lightly used IP addresses

David Conrad drc at virtualized.org
Sat Aug 14 05:00:24 UTC 2010


On Aug 13, 2010, at 9:12 PM, Jeffrey Lyon wrote:
> Vendors are neglecting to support IPv6 because there is "no demand."

It would probably be useful to be public about which vendors are still saying there is no demand for IPv6.

> Meanwhile, there are hosting companies, dedicated server companies,
> etc. with /17 and /18 allocations who are either forging justification
> or wildly abusing the use of that space outside of the declared need.

It is and always has been trivial to come up with justifications for pretty much anything, regardless of reality.  The RIRs do not have the staff or resources to go into requesters and audit them to verify they aren't lying through their teeth.  The RIR system fundamentally relies on trust. Always has and always will. Customers of the RIRs must trust that the RIRs are "doing the right thing" and the RIRs must trust that their customers are not "abusing the system".  In a world of plentiful resources, this works fine since the costs of abusing the system (on either side) generally outweigh the benefits.

To state the obvious, we're (very) soon no longer going to be in a world of plentiful resources. I would be very surprised if the outcome in the addressing world is any different than any other situation where you have a scarce resource and lots of folks with need of that resource.

You seem to be suggesting that ARIN (and presumably the other RIRs) invest more in policing the address space and otherwise regulating the market.  How much are you willing to pay for that service?

Regards,
-drc





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