[ipv6-wg] IPv6 only network at RIPE 68

Hi Philip,

> Did a smiley get dropped?

No, I was being quite serious.

Remember that are talking about the RIPE meeting here. The RIPE
community and the NCC has for years now been encouraging the network
operators in the region to adopt IPv6 because of IPv4 running out. In
the last 20 months we have actually enforced this by refusing to give
IPv4 addresses to network operators who actually need them. These
operators have no choice in the matter, they will have to make do
without the IPv4 they need no matter how difficult or painful that might be.

The RIPE meeting network doesn't have that problem, of course. With a
generously-sized IPv4 assignment, we are completely free to kick back,
enjoy having IPv4 addresses for every device we bring, and consider IPv4
scarcity as «Someone Else's Problem».

This would be having a double standard, though. I believe we should be
eating our own dog food and ourselves do voluntarily what we are
essentially forcing others to do. If we cannot start breaking our
dependency on IPv4 at the RIPE meeting itself, how can we expect others
to do so? Making the primary ESSID IPv6-only would be sending the right
message, and demonstrate by example that what we are asking others to
do, indeed can be done. (Hopefully! If we on the other hand are unable
to do so, perhaps we need revise the entire «deploy IPv6» message.)

Undoubtedly, some people will experience difficulties using an IPv6-only
network. Some issues we already know about, new ones might be revealed
(and, with some luck, get fixed). However, as long as we provide a
safety net in the form of an secondary IPv4-enabled ESSID, then I do not
at all consider this to be a radical proposition. At least, no more
radical than this year's decision to refuse 2.4GHz-only devices access
to the main ESSID.

Tore