[members-discuss] Input from Membership on RIPE NCC Charging Scheme Model

On Thu, Sep 15, 2016, at 14:06, Gert Doering wrote:

> But that's not actually true.  A LIR that just humms along, never sending
> any request for resources, never opening a ticket will cause nearly no
> cost - while a LIR that sends in a question every 5 days will cause 
> quite a bit of cost.  Independent of the number of resources they have.
> 
> Back in the day, a "large LIR" would inevitably send in more requests than
> a "small LIR" - but since nobody can get extra resources after their last
> /22, this is no longer true.
> 
> So, if *cost* is the concern, "startup LIRs that request their first /22"
> are actually the ones that need most (human) resources, not "old LIRs
> that have all they will ever get, and never ask for more".  Looking at the
> training department, who do you think will need more training?  Old and
> experienced LIRs, or startups?
> 
> Database costs, housing, electricity are mostly the same, no matter how 
> many resources a LIR has.

Gert,

While human cost is important (56% of total), it's not the only cost. A
big old LIR having a /11 (or similar) that fills the DB with 100K
objects (growing at 10 per week) does generate some indirect work
(including FTEs), much more than an new LIR that will rarely have more
than 50 objects.

... And while the service fee accounts for most of the revenue - 77.5%,
set-up fees account for other 19% of revenue and are supposed to cover
typical use of a new member (checks, exchanging documents, allocating 1
x IPv4, 1 x IPv6 and 1 x ASN - procedures largely simplified recently,
and not to forget 2 free RIPE meeting tickets that I'm not sure so many
members use).

I would like to have some information of the workload required in order
to perform transfers (price = ZERO) and M&A (or what's left of it) which
costs (the LIRs concerned) between (almost) zero and 3/4 of the yearly
fee (depending on the quarter it has been performed in).

And then there's the issue of non-voting members. Not the ones that have
less than 6 months at the GM, but those that are "multiple LIRs per
organisation". While some legal requirements are involved, one may
easily think about "taxation without representation".

And sorry to bring this here, but with a policy proposal in the
discussion phase (2016-03) that aims (among other things) to add some
form of segregation between LIRs based on what they can do with
resources received from RIPE NCC, differentiated service fees starts
making more sense.

Besides, RIPE NCC had differentiated service fees in some form or
another for about 20 years (until 2012). Since then (barely 4 years)
membership count increased by more than 50%; voting members count should
not be far from that.

-- 
Radu-Adrian FEURDEAN