IP addresses are now assets

Mike Jones mike at mikejones.in
Fri Dec 2 20:14:58 UTC 2011


On 2 December 2011 20:01, Henry Yen <henry at aegisinfosys.com> wrote:
> 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.
>

What about land? it's a public resource that you've paid money to
someone in exchange for transferring their rights over that public
resource to you.

That said, I think in the case of land shortages there is an argument
that land no longer being used by someone should be freed up for use
by new people. Although i'm not entirely sure how to justify a
"instead of selling it you have to return it so it can be allocated to
whoever has a need for it" policy without also justifying the same for
my house, which has spare rooms that I don't need.

- Mike




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