Address space for individuals

> On Fri, 20 May 94 17:32:13 BST you said:
> >One point I'd suggest though -- I don't believe it would be realistic
> >to expect a uniform charge across Europe. As with everything else in life,
> >costs will vary from country to country. One discussion point will be
> >whether one wants the idea of free competition across Europe, with
> >customers "shopping around" (the Maastricht ideal, I suppose), or a
> >situation where customers aren't "allowed" to apply in other than
> >their own country (ie regulation, or a cartel, depending on your view.)

A note on the side: not allowing purchase of IP addresses in other
countries would very likely be illegal at least inside the EU including
any other restrictions on usage of not nationally obtained IP addresses.

> >If the latter then there's an interesting consequence of what to do
> >if a one country's Last Resort Registry starts charging unreasonably
> >high prices ... this is a problem that hasn't been solved yet in the
> >well known area of line provision!
> 
> Imagine the havoc it would play on CIDR if everyone shopped around
> to save a few ECUs on an IP address.   RIPE could come out with
> a recommendation range, i.e. $10-$30 per class C.

The main problem is that if it's a small enough ammount to be painless,
it's too expensive to bill for (a one time bill for $10 is clearly not
going to make any sense at all).

Simon