[db-wg] country attribute: "ZZ" for unspecified?

Shane Kerr wrote:
[...]
> An attempt was made later, which you can see in the minutes from RIPE 54:
> 
> https://ripe59.ripe.net/ripe/wg/db/minutes/ripe-54.html
> 
> It got dropped between RIPE 55 and RIPE 56, I'm not sure why.

One of the reasons why we didn't follow up and keep pushing (direction?),
was input received from dependable sources in the hallways: that *keeping*
the country: attribute - even if it is vague, misleading or plain wrong (in
some cases) - overall it were still good enough for generating coarse-grained
statistics.

> Opinion
> -------
> 
> My theory is that people *want* the "country:" attribute to be useful so
> badly they don't care that it does not actually work.
> 
> And of course it is useful in most cases. But in some cases it is not.
> And in some cases it is misleading or otherwise harmful.
> 
> I think making it optional makes complete sense. Or allowing ZZ. Or both. :)
> 
> --
> Shane

Wilfried.