[address-policy-wg] 2007-08 Review Period extended until 9 July 2008 (Enabling Methods for Reallocation of IPv4 Resources)

On Jun 12, 2008, at 9:13 PM, David Conrad wrote:

> Jay,
>
> On Jun 12, 2008, at 9:32 AM, Jay Daley wrote:
>> I do not support this proposal for the following reasons:
>
> [much elided, not because I necessary agree or disagree, but simply  
> because I wanted to get to this:]
>> Rival databases, based around IPv4 trading exchanges, will spring up.
>
> Why do you believe this won't happen due the vacuum created by the  
> lack of RIR involvement?
>
> Thanks,
> -drc


Hi David,

It sounds like you're leaning toward favoring systems for recognizing  
inter-party transfers that are "nice" (i.e., that conform to whatever  
policies the community is willing to abide) because you predict that  
the community is unwilling to abide policies that that some members  
don't like -- specifically the ones that forbid inter-party transfers...

So, that's a familiar kind of argument for "decriminalization" in  
other contexts, although I've only heard it used by people who think  
that the law in question was *always* inherently wrong or silly (c.f.,  
minority rights restrictions, some kinds of victimless crimes like  
drug use, consensual adult sexual behavior, etc.), or else now  
completely anachronistic because it has no common/everyday referent in  
the modern world (c.f., all of the above plus feeding your horse in  
front of the saloon, etc).

The only question -- and the one that people seem to be unwilling to  
engage -- is whether this particular prohibition was always inherently  
silly or rather important in its own right, whether the infraction to  
be legalized was/is trivial or truly dangerous.

ftp://ftp.ietf.org/ietf-online-proceedings/95apr/area.and.wg.reports/ops/cidrd/cidrd.rekhter.slides.ps

Was Yakov always wrong? Has something changed to make him less wrong  
today?

Even the sale/exchange of private property between two private parties  
is not always a victimless crime. I can think of a variety of cases of  
private goods in which sales restrictions apply because of specific  
associated licensing requirements (e.g., cars, guns, etc.) -- which  
are in place themselves because of the potential for misuse (i.e.,  
crimes with victims) of the goods in question. In all of those other  
cases, however, the property rights are protected, and the licensing  
requirements enforced, by external authorities with the means and  
authority and abundant willingness to actually en-force.

Thought experiment: how many people would bother to register their  
cars, or even to get driver's licenses at all, if the "highway patrol"  
and it's equivalent didn't exist -- had never existed -- and if cars  
were invisible, ephemeral, and could vanish at will? Expecting drivers  
to voluntarily subject themselves to such an egregious, vulnerability- 
creating violation of privacy would be unrealistic, wouldn't it? How  
much less likely would it be if speed limits and other road-related  
laws had just been rescinded because people don't obey them anyway?

Many assertions have been made to the effect that privatization of  
address space is not the intent of these proposals, so I'll happily  
pass over that can of worms here. It's not relevant to the above  
analogy anyway.

As you rightly note, nature abhors a vacuum. I just think that we  
should take in filling one not to create other, even bigger and more  
serious ones.

TV, speaking for self alone