misunderstanding scale

Sun Mar 23 16:13:40 UTC 2014

On 23/03/2014 03:00, Doug Barton wrote:
> Hyperbole of the past doesn't negate the reality of the future. :)

the past and present hyperbole continues to grate.

> With respect I think you're ignoring some pretty important facts. Not
> the least of which is the level of pressure that's been taken off of
> IPv4 runout by the large providers (referenced elsewhere in the thread)
> who have already moved to IPv6.

it depends where you are in the world. Growing markets in China seem to
have spurred on a good deal of development in terms of ipv6-only access,
although getting hard data on this is difficult.  We've seen a lot less of
this in the ripe service region because the access markets peaked several
years ago in many (but not all) countries.

> I think you're also ignoring the fact
> that at this point unless you can afford to buy substantial address
> space on the darkish-grey market it's basically impossible to launch a
> new Internet enterprise of any real scale on IPv4.

yep, it is now very difficult for new market entrants in growing access
markets.  Africa in particular will be especially hosed from the point of
view of ipv4 address availability in the long term, given its overall
assignment of 6x /8s.

> More importantly I'm confused/dismayed by your language, "still nowhere
> near the point that ipv6 can be considered a viable alternative." Even
> though the major content networks already have well-established IPv6
> networks

A small number of the major content networks have done the internet proud
by proving that enabling ipv6 does not substantially break things.  But
they are low hanging fruit and ultimately only a handful of companies;
none of them has plans to disable ipv4 any time soon.

> So at this point IPv6 is not "an alternative," it's a
> complement to IPv4. "Doing" IPv6 now means that you'll be ready far in
> advance of the point when you no longer have a choice.

yep, agreed - doing ipv6 now is a sensible business proposition.  But it
needs to be tempered with the realisation that for nearly all networks,
ipv6 is complementary to ipv4 and not a replacement;  nor will it become a
replacement until the time that people feel that adding A records to their
hostnames is unnecessary.

Nick