IP4 Space - the lie

Saku Ytti saku at ytti.fi
Sun Mar 7 09:47:56 UTC 2010


On (2010-03-07 14:21 +0800), Owen DeLong wrote:

> While it is more complete than many other countries, there are still rural
> areas where it is not, and, the relatively high churn rate in competitive
> markets will actually still lead to a need for increasing address allocations
> and assignments as customers move from ISPs that already have space
> for them to ISPs that need more space.

My wording could have been better, by 'mostly complete' I was trying to be
in mindset of company offering products and service over Internet. I think
US is somewhere between 65-70& BB penetration? Companies might feel the
part of the country not having BB accesss are not potential customers,
perhaps due to lack of purchase power.
Interestingly enough, here local incumbent ex-monopoly started removing
DSLAM network from remote rural areas, quoting it being unprofitable.

> If you look at the ARIN consumption statistics, or, the RIPE consumption
> statistics, there is certainly no indication that the demand for addresses
> has been significantly reduced in EU+US.

But have these addresses been mostly delivered to new home users? Or have
they been to new companies offering products and services?

> It may not bring you new business, but, it may be necessary to avoid losing
> the business you have.  Most businesses that are built on an MRR model
> have to pay attention to that.  Generally speaking, customer retention is
> regarded as important in most such organizations.

I can't see end users currently having IPv4 connectivity changing to
provider who can't provide access to IPv4 sites. Which I believe would
translate that all existing users will continue to have access to the
service.

> I think at least the first several such startups will be able to get space out
> of the /10 reserved for transitional technologies to provide front-end
> proxies and such for their services.  Startup eye-ball ISPs may be at
> a greater disadvantage for a relatively short period of time as they will
> essentially have to deploy an IPv6 customer network along side a
> technology such as NAT64 or DS-LITE.  However, the more of these
> are created, the more pressure there is for content and service providers
> to provide native IPv6 availability of their content and services, so, I think
> it will rapidly solve itself on that level.

I really hope you are correct. But I fear only way to fix the situation is
to force IPv6 connectivity down the throat of every existing IPv4 end-user.
Some companies sellings products and services might even find the new
situation favourable, by not deploying IPv6, they make sure that users
won't change to IPv6 only service as they need to reach the site, and thus
they would be protecting themselves of new competition, who can only offer
the service over IPv6.

> > I would personally hope that EU+US would mandate that residential ISP add
> > IPv6 to their subscribers by default, without possibility to opt-out in
> > n years time. Hopefully n would be no more than 3.
> > 
> I wouldn't hold my breath on that. It simply doesn't map to the regulatory
> framework and culture prevalent in the US at this time.

Quite right, but EU has history requiring rather more silly things,
especially if it means getting free money with ridiculous monopoly claims.


-- 
  ++ytti




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