Ars Technica on IPv4 exhaustion

Wed Jun 18 20:09:16 UTC 2014

> 
> However, I also don't think consumer education is the answer:
> http://www.wleecoyote.com/blog/consumeraction.htm
> Summary: Until it is perfectly clear why a consumer needs IPv6, and what
> they need to do about it, consumer education will only cause fear and
> frustration, which will not be helpful. This is a technology problem, not
> a feature problem, and consumers shouldn't have to select which Internet
> to be on.
> 
> Lee
> 

Short of consumer education, how do you expect to resolve the issue where $CONSUMER walks into $BIG_BOX_CE_STORE and says "I need a router, what's the cheapest one you have?"

Whereupon $TEENAGER_MAKING_MINIMUM_WAGE who likely doesn't know DOCSIS 2 from DOCSIS 3, has no idea what IP actually is, and thinks that Data is an android from Star Trek says "Here, this Linksys thing is only $30."

Unless/until we either get the stores to pull the IPv4-only stuff off their shelves or educate consumers, the continued deployment of additional incapable equipment will be a continuing problem. As bad as the situation is for cablemodems and residential gateways, at least there, an educated consumer can make a good choice. Now, consider DVRs, BluRay players, Receiver/Amplifiers, Televisions, etc. where there are, currently, no IPv6 capable choices available to the best of my knowledge.

Owen