[members-discuss] [ncc-announce] [GM] Draft RIPE NCC Charging Scheme 2025 Proposals

Hi Tobias,

Analogies are always difficult. In your analogy, focusing on shoes, 
shoes are not a finite resource. Someone else (Adidas) can manufacture 
more shoes, but no one can manufacture more IPv4 addresses.

Staying with the football club, let me offer you an analogy that I see 
more fitting to the current scheme:

There's a football club with a nice stadium. Any member can sign up and 
book the stadium for practice (like weekly on Wednesdays 17-18).
In the beginning, default allocation was generous and some members 
booked more time than others, and it was not a problem since there were 
enough available time slots for new joiners. You were even able to book 
a slot by knowing a member and paying a small fee (PI).
As time went by, the schedule started to fill up, and the club reduced 
the standard time allocation over and over and removed the possibility 
to get a slot if you were not a member directly.
Towards the end, new joiners could only get a small time slot 
allocation, and as of now, the newest members are on a waiting list to 
receive their minuscule time allocation.
As you can probably also think, those who have a large allocation of the 
time slots also use our collective resources more, like parking spaces, 
locker rooms, showers, cause greater wear to the grass etc.
Do you think it's fair that all members pay the same?

Judging by the interest on this mailing list, there are more than a few 
members who think that it's unfair that all members pay the same, given 
that the allocation of our finite resources is so disproportionate.

I think that a cost per IPv4 address, IPv6 address and ASN would be the 
most fair way to do it. It can be modeled in different ways, but there 
should be a model that makes those who use more of our shared resources 
pay more.

Best regards,
Tom Blyc

On 2024-04-12 12:17, Tobias Fiebig via members-discuss wrote:
> Dear Sebastian,
> 
>> Evendientally if you look at this discussion and the ones i see going
>> on via other channels, this is a misunderstanding on your part. 
> 
> So far, I do see a lot of opinions...
> 
>> > no 'per resource' charging scheme, if I remember correctly.
>> Just because for one year, members opted not do do tesource based (by
>> vote) does not mean that there may not be any resource based models
>> in the future.
> 
> ... which last year were equally strong against the proposed per-
> resource/category charging model.
> 
>> > I see you misunderstood the point.
>> 
>> All i see is one LIR/member suggesting to another LIR/member (wich
>> has the same rights/voting power/.....): I dont think it makes sense
>> for you, you should really just pay me instead of being a member.
> 
> Oh, but I am happily buying the RIPE cake with all its implications.
> 
>> I dont think any of us get to make the judgement of what is the right
>> reason/model/buisness type to be a ripe member. If all the members
>> are equal with regard to the ncc, then we also have to accept tat
>> there are different viewpoints that do not nessecarily allign with
>> ours. As such, If enough people now want Y instead of X like it was
>> in the past, then this is a completely legimate thing.
> 
> Let's try another example. 
> 
> Imagine there was a football club in a small town, and each member gets
> a pair of--limited availability--football shoes along with the
> membership (and more if they do need more or the old ones break). The
> membership costs EUR10/month. Now, a lot of people want those shoes and
> join the club. Then, the club runs out of shoes.
> 
> The club, however, needs to raise the membership fee to EUR12/month, to
> keep paying for the football field, the matches, the training sessions
> etc. given increasing prices.
> 
> Some members now voice their opinion that the club should, instead
> reduce the fee, as new members did not get shoes (in time), at least
> for those who did not get shoes (or not that many). Instead, people
> with a lot of shoes should pay more. Furthermore, it might be good to
> consider getting rid of that large football field, and maybe costs for
> reimbursing the trainers...
> 
> Now, I am there to play football, and not get shoes; However, if the
> argument becomes--as often heard in this thread already--"we did not
> get football shoes, but paid for them", I do indeed feel inclined to
> suggest a visit to the Adidas Store down-town, which happens to have
> readily available football shoes on sale (and rent).
> 
> Now, there can be a discussion on whether the club-house really _needs_
> to be that expensive; However, when the discussion starts focusing on
> the shoes, it seems to me that the discussion goes a bit besides the
> point.
> 
> I am, by the way, still waiting for an illustration of "my own
> interests". As I said, really curious what these might be.
> 
> With best regards,
> Tobias