IP addresses are now assets

Henry Yen henry at AegisInfoSys.com
Fri Dec 2 20:01:31 UTC 2011


On Fri, Dec 02, 2011 at 12:37:29PM -0700, joshua sahala wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 10:20 PM, John Curran <jcurran at arin.net> wrote:[cut]
> > Your subject line (IP addresses are now assets) could mislead folks,
> [cut]
> ianal, but the treatment of ip addresses by the bankruptcy court would
> tend to agree with the definition of an asset from webster's new world
> law dictionary (http://law.yourdictionary.com/asset):
> 
>    Any property or right that is owned by a person or entity and has
>    monetary value. See also liability.
> 
>    All of the property of a person or entity or its total value;
>    entries on a balance sheet listing such property.
> 
>    intangible asset
>       An asset that is not a physical thing and only evidenced by a
>       written document.
> 
> 
> the addresses are being exchanged for money, in order to pay a
> debt...how is this not a sale of an asset?

I guess I'm in the same minority in that I agree with you.

Note that "Asset" !== "Property".

The IP addresses in question are unquestionably "Assets" (albeit
"Restricted assets" or hard-to-value assets), but not so evidently
"Property".  So, the original subject line "IP addresses are now assets"
seems accurate; it does not say "IP addresses are now property".
Conflation of the two terms is in the mind of the reader, and perhaps
that's what John Curran was seeking to clarify.

-- 
Henry Yen                                       Aegis Information Systems, Inc.
Senior Systems Programmer                       Hicksville, New York




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