[address-policy-wg] Transfer Requirements for IPv4 Allocations

Hi Milton, 

> Erik:
> Have you responded to the analysis of Vladimir Andreev which shows that
the impact of this practice is minimal? 

> From: address-policy-wg [mailto:address-policy-wg-bounces at ripe.net] On
Behalf Of Erik Bais
> The goal of this proposal is to stop the abuse of opening a new LIR,
transferring the /22 for profit to another LIR and close the LIR. 
> As it is against the original intent of the final /8 last /22 procedure
 (https://www.ripe.net/publications/docs/ripe-643#51 ) 

But I'll gladly reply to it .. 

His analyses goes wrong at the following line :  

> Looking at listed items I can suppose either Elvis is angry at people
earning money or really /22 reselling is bad for RIPE and its community.

That is a false assumption and an incorrect stab in the back at Elvis, a
well known community member, who stepped up at the last RIPE meeting and
offered to write the proposal after the RIPE NCC pointed out that they have
seen an increase in this practice and are warning about this as a new
practice which is against the intent of the actual policy. 

As a broker and a community member myself, having written several policies
myself, what one might do for the community, may not always align with
someone their business processes. 
I've written the policy to allow RPKI for NON-Members .. A policy to remove
the multi-homing requirement for PI IPv6 .. a policy to allow the transfer
of IPv6 prefixes ..  
I think that I can safely say that it is a cheap stab in the back to even
HINT ... that personal agenda's are behind this proposal .. There is more at
stake here than a the business we do (out-side the RIPE mailing list or RIPE
meetings.. )  and the one that is paying our mortgage ... either as an ISP
or a broker. . .  

Stating that brokers are behind it ... and that getting IP's via a sign-up
of a new LIR is something that is hurting the broker business ... that is
just false.  
I know most of the brokers in the community ... and I agree with Vladimir in
his analysis .. this has less than minimal impact ... ( as I see it with a
broker hat on .. )  

The intent for the reservation from the final /8 is for new companies to
start an ISP in the next 6 to 10 years .. is why this was put into the
policy ... Because it is close to impossible to start without ANY ipv4 ..
And as a bit it more than nothing .. that is why this has been put into
policy ..  Simply because you can't do any CGNAT .. if you don't have ANY
IPv4 ... This way at least you have an option .. besides building a v6 only
network. 

The fact that Vladimir points out that the policy CURRENTLY may not be
abused as much as one might think ... that does not mean that for the cases
where it is clearly abused... it didn't happen. 

I think that reading the discussion at the mailing list .. that the intent
of some of the people in this community as different as one might hope for..

Personally I don't care if people are going to open a new LIR for themselves
or if they are going to use the gained resources in order to sell them ...  

What I do care about is that the reason why the initial reservation was done
in the first place .. from that final /8.. with all good and noble
intentions of the proposers at that time ... has now become a cheap loophole
for some to be used for their own benefit, with the possible side-effect
that others in this very same community will be left out in the future,
because we did plan for new entries .. but didn't care enough to fix the
loopholes we noticed down the line. 

Will this proposal fix the issue to dis-allow a second /22 from the final /8
in the same LIR ? Nope. It is still possible to get a /22 transferred into
an LIR that already holds a /22 from the final /8. 
And it is will also still be possible to do a M&A of an LIR into another LIR
.. and then you will also have 2 * a /22 from the final /8 ... 

So is it perfect ?  No ...  

But .. will it make the initial intent of the policy more clear ? or will it
move the policy into the right direction ?  YES ...  
Will this have a significant impact on slowing down the consumption rate of
the actual reserved pool in the final /8 ?  Not really .. Similar as
proposing to revoke all un-routed IPv4 space back to the RIR .. and start
re-issuing it ... 
That only delays the inevitable ....  APNIC is out, RIPE is out ... ARIN is
down to the last .23 of their final /8 ... There is no future in IPv4 beyond
7 years ... ( Is my humble guess.. )  

Who knows .. the next Whatsapp or Twitter might come from that one company
that registers as an LIR in that delayed 4 weeks because of this proposal
... 

So, to close of the argument here ..  kudo's to Elvis for writing the
proposal ..  I'm glad to see that it is going to be fixed, because it is the
right thing to do..     

Please let me know if you have any additional questions. 

Regards,
Erik Bais