[AfriNIC-rpd] Policy Proposal: End user classification for Universities

[Owen DeLong]

Sent from my iPad

On Jun 28, 2012, at 11:10 AM, Andrew Alston <alston.networks at gmail.com> wrote:

> So under which part of the existing policy is this decision being made?
> 
> If an LIR were to request the address space from Afrinc for a
> University would space be granted for their use?
> 
> Yes, it would be, AfriNIC seems to acknowledge that the usage justification is valid.
>  
> Or is it that the University is applying directly to Afrinc for the
> space and being rejected?
> 
> The University is being told that it qualifies for the space but it must be an LIR.
> 
> Basically, at current the university has agreed to become an LIR because there was no other option, the space is needed with critical urgency, the university cannot roll out various services without it, so they have no option but to declare themselves an LIR to get the space, which this policy would rectify.
> 
> The result of declaring the university as an LIR is as follows:
> 
> A.) The university has to pay LIR recurring fees, which are not warranted
> B.) Because of the LIR rules, where you have to say WHO space is assigned to, the University will either have to declare the entire space assigned to the IT department (single user, themselves, which is NOT an LIR), or, effectively assign it to a "building", which is not a faculty, not a legal entity, not an autonomous entity at all... how does this make sense?
> 

The University has a number of options...

First, it can list the various blocks dynamically assigned to student residential subscribers as dynamic residential services pools.

It can list the other blocks as assigned to various departments within the university (math, bio-sciences, law, etc., your university's makeup may vary).

In actual fact, a University IS an LIR and the fees ARE warranted IMHO.

> But, because the university in question has no option, they have accepted to become an LIR and the process is under way, as I said, we feel like a gun has been held to our heads here.
> 

There is no gun.

You could have gotten PI space if you wanted to continue pretending you were not an LIR.

> At current we sit in a situation where there are other universities who are shortly to apply for space, who I was having discussions within the last few days as well, and they are waiting to see the outcome of this, because they openly say, they simply do not have the funds, or the resources to become LIR's, and they aren't LIR's since they don't onward assign, so why should they become such?  There are institutions who would rather forgo the space and be forced into NAT than pay these fees and live under these conditions and that means that AfriNIC is effectively enforcing NAT on the academic community because of this stance.

This isn't a policy matter, IMHO. The more appropriate solution would be to seek some form of fee waiver for such classes from the AfriNIC board rather than to seek policy changes to reclassify such LIRs as non-LIRs just to avoid fees and evade registration policies.

Owen

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