ARIN IP6 policy for those with legacy IP4 Space

Sun Apr 11 16:17:17 UTC 2010

> > Put less tersely:
> > 
> > We were assigned space, under a policy whose purpose was primarily to
> > guarantee uniqueness in IPv4 numbering.  As with other legacy holders,
> > we obtained portable space to avoid the technical problems associated
> > with renumbering, problems with in-addr.arpa subdelegation, etc.
> 
> So far, correct.
> 
> > Part of that was an understanding that the space was ours (let's not
> > get distracted by any "ownership" debate, but just agree for the sake
> > of this point that it was definitely understood that we'd possess it).
> > This served the good of the Internet by promoting stability within an
> > AS and allowed us to spend engineering time on finer points (such as 
> > maintaining PTR's) rather than renumbering gear every time we changed
> > upstreams.
> > 
> This is fictitious unless you are claiming that your allocation predates:
> 
> RFC2050	November, 1996
> RFC1466	May, 1993
> RFC1174	August, 1990
> 
> Prior to that, it was less clear, but, the concept was still generally
> justified need so long as that need persisted.

Which ours does.

> > Eventually InterNIC was disbanded, and components went in various
> > directions.  ARIN landed the numbering assignment portion of InterNIC.
> > Along with that, maintenance of the legacy resources drifted along to
> > ARIN.
> 
> Actually, ARIN was spun off from InterNIC (containing most of the same
> staff that had been doing the job at InterNIC) well before InterNIC was
> disbanded.

Is there an effective difference or are you just quibbling?  For the
purposes of this discussion, I submit my description was suitable to
describe what happened.

> > ARIN might not have a contract with us, or with other legacy holders.
> > It wasn't our choice for ARIN to be tasked with holding up InterNIC's
> > end of things.  However, it's likely that they've concluded that they
> > better do so, because if they don't, it'll probably turn into a costly
> > legal battle on many fronts, and I doubt ARIN has the budget for that.
> 
> This is going to be one of those situations that could become a
> legal battle on many fronts either way.  On the one hand you have
> legacy holders who have no contractual right to services from
> anyone (If you want to pursue InterNIC for failing to live up to
> whatever agreement you have/had with them, I wish you the
> very best of luck in that endeavor, especially since you don't
> have a written contract from them, either).
> 
> On the other hand, in a relatively short timeframe, you are likely
> to have litigants asking why ARIN has failed to reclaim/reuse
> the underutilized IPv4 space sitting in so many legacy registrations.
> 
> Which of those two bodies of litigants is larger or better funded
> is left as an exercise for the reader. Nonetheless, ARIN is
> going to be in an interesting position between those two
> groups (which one is rock and which is hard place is also
> left as an exercise for the reader) going forward regardless
> of what action is taken by ARIN in this area.
> 
> That is why the legacy RSA is important. It represents ARIN
> trying very hard to codify and defend the rights of the legacy
> holders.

Yes, but according to the statistics provided by Mr. Curran, it looks
like few legacy space holders are actually adopting the LRSA. 

Like many tech people, you seem to believe that the absence of a 
"contract" means that there's no responsibility, and that InterNIC's
having been disbanded absolves ARIN from responsibility.  In the real
world, things are not so simple.  The courts have much experience at
looking at real world situations and determining what should happen.
These outcomes are not always predictable and frequently don't seem to
have obvious results, but they're generally expensive fights.

> > As a legacy holder, we don't really care who is currently "responsible"
> > for legacy maintenance/etc.  However, whoever it is, if they're not
> > going to take on those responsibilities, that's a problem.
> 
> You assume that anyone is currently responsible.  What documentation
> do you have that there is any such responsibility?
> 
> As a point in fact, ARIN has, for the good of the community, extended
> the courtesy of maintaining those records and providing services
> to legacy holders free of charge because it is perceived as being
> in the best interests of the community.

That's only one possible interpretation.  A court might well reach a more
general conclusion that ARIN is the successor to InterNIC, and has agreed 
to honor legacy registrations.  That'd be inconvenient for ARIN, but is a 
very reasonable possible outcome.

> > The previous poster asked, "If you don't have a contract with ARIN, 
> > why should ARIN provide you with anything?"
> > 
> > Well, the flip side to that is, "ARIN doesn't have a contract with us,
> > but we still have copies of the InterNIC policies under which we were
> > assigned space, and ARIN undertook those duties, so ARIN is actually 
> > the one with significant worries if they were to try to pull anything,
> > otherwise, we don't really care."
> 
> Could you please provide those to Steve Ryan, John Curran, and,
> ideally, I'd like to see them too.
> 
> > Is that a suitable defense of that statement (which might not have
> > been saying quite what you thought)?
> 
> I don't know.  I have yet to see the content of the documents which
> you claim are your defense.

I'd be pleased to pull them off our backups for our normal hourly rates.
Otherwise, you're encouraged to do your own research.

... JG
-- 
Joe Greco - sol.net Network Services - Milwaukee, WI - http://www.sol.net
"We call it the 'one bite at the apple' rule. Give me one chance [and] then I
won't contact you again." - Direct Marketing Ass'n position on e-mail spam(CNN)
With 24 million small businesses in the US alone, that's way too many apples.