[address-policy-wg] RE: Private address space in IPv4 and IPv6 [was something irrelevantly titled]

> 2. The same network should have access to the Internet. Then 
> it should use NAT (not possibly in IPv6) or just be partially 
> connected to the Internet. The second case - is announcing 
> the block (or part of the
> block) to the Internet. The first case - internal network may have RFC
> 1918 or other IP addresses.

Radianz is only one of several internetworks with connect many
organizations together with circuits that are completely separate
from the Internet. All of these organizations also have connections
to the Internet. Internally, sometimes there is separate LAN 
cabling for the Radianz-connected workstations, and sometimes
everything is on one LAN.

If everything is on one LAN, then the only reason that Radianz is 
not connected to the Internet is because of many ACLs and firewall
rules that control where traffic goes.

People who make addressing policy, don't often think about ACLs
and firewall rules, but they are at least as important as
routing. If the Radianz network operates with globally unique
IP addresses, then the subscribers can be confident that any
ACLs blocking Radianz traffic from the Internet will never cause
a problem for real Internet traffic. Globally unique addresses
are required to have reliable ACLs in enterprise LANs.

Technically speaking, you could claim that Radianz is actually
connected to the Internet, even though they do not announce 
their address prefixes, and there are many ACLs and firewall
rules blocking traffic from leaking out. 

Note that these types of traffic controls (ACLs) can be used
in other scenarios. Network X could announce their addresses 
to some neighbour ASes in country A, and those ASes might 
not announce the routes to international peers. They might 
also implement ACLs so that no traffic can flow to 
international peers. Network X would still be on the Internet
and their customers in country A would be happy that they
can browse all kinds of sites on the Internet in country A.
They could even send email internationally because it would
be relayed by the ASes with international peering agreements.

Is Network X on the Internet? Is the Radianz network on the 
Internet?

Addressing policy would be just as complex as today if RIPE
agreed that the scope for RIPE-NCC allocations should be
restricted to "the Internet". There is no point in making
such a change, and people who are ignorant of history need
to take the time and learn about the history of the Internet,
of IANA and of RIPE.

Vlad, ne bud pizdetsom! Prochitay istoriyu i prekrashay
svoyi glupie pisma.

--Michael Dillon

P.S. Radianz is merely an example of many other internetworks
that carry IP traffic from many organizations, but which do
not openly peer with the Internet. 

P.P.S. We are going through a time with lots of change, IPv4 runout,
AS runout, RFC 1918 runout, AS32 introduction, IPv6 deployment.
In addition, the landscape is not as uniform as it was back
in the early days. LIR is no longer the same thing as ISP since
there are now many more business models, and more diversity 
in how IP networks are built and operated. We need to keep a
balanced view as we make changes to policy because RIPE policy
has to be workable for everybody.