[address-policy-wg] Proposal 2011-02 moving to Last Call

> Mikael Abrahamsson wrote:
> We still need to in the long term. IPv6 PI, ie keeping state
> for all end-users in all DFZ routers on the Internet, does
> not scale with billions of routes.

We have known that for 20 years; it was part of the very design of IPv6:
small, aggregated DFZ. Unfortunately, nobody has been able to deliver
it. Another undelivered feature is easy renumbering, which is why we are
starting to see all kinds of IPv6 NAT.

Time to wake up: Even IPv4 address shortage has not triggered IPv6
adoption; no PI and no NAT are small perks compared to address shortage.


> So yes, there is no solution right now, that doesn't mean
> IPv6 PI is any kind of long term solution.

This is the wording I object. By writing this, you are saying that the
quest for the Holy Grail has not stopped and implying that we will find
it. Don't get me wrong: 10 years ago I wrote that, too. But now the game
has changed: we do not have another 20 or 50 years to deploy IPv6.

For the same reasons most have eliminated other protocols such as IPX,
Appletalk, DECNET, etc in favor of IPv4, we do not have eternity before
people start to fall back on IPv4-only networks, if IPv6 adoption
remains at the current levels and growth rate.

It's too late to talk about making IPv6 better. The only game left is
the survival of IPv6, not dreams for 50 years from now. 


> We know it's bad, we still use it because there is no better
> way right now. That doesn't mean we should give up.

I'm saying that not only we should give up, but we must give up.
Although they are not the main reason, never-ending changes in
deployment strategies are one of the factors that slow down adoption.
Time to finalize deployment scenario has come.

By keeping the quest for the Holy Grail open, you send the wrong message
out. The message you are sending out is that you are still looking for
ways to slow distribution of IPv6 PI addresses, and this is one of the
things that makes potential adopters run away from it and invest in CGNs
instead.


> It's again tragedy of the commons. For the individual user,
> PI is always the easiest way out. For humanity/Internet as
> a whole in the long term, not so much.

Denial to recognize the fact that organizations will always go for the
easy way out is precisely where we collectively have failed. The grand
scheme of doing what is right does not work in the real word.

You are still in denial that the initial design objectives have not been
met.
 
Michel.