[afnog] [rpd] Re: A typical case of abuse of our resources!!!

Wed Sep 24 13:28:03 UTC 2014

On 24 September 2014 00:34, Owen DeLong <owen at delong.com> wrote:

> Asking AfriNIC staff to implement the spirit of the policy rather than
> taking care to write what we really want as a community into the letter of
> the policy is a very dangerous request.
>

> If you had a loosely written policy to a dozen people and ask each of them
> to explain the spirit of the policy, it is unlikely that more than one or
> two of them (at best) will come particularly close to the original author's
> stated intent for the policy.
>
> More importantly, you will probably have at least 12 different (and often
> some of them radically different) ideas as to the core intent of the policy.
>

In saying the spirit was as important as the letter, I meant complying with
the letter of the policy but guided by its spirit.  I appreciate folks
having differing views of the same but the intent of the IPv4 allocation
policy is straightforward enough for broad consensus

> I agree that the allocation is suspicious, but if the postmasters say that
> the justification supplied meets policy, then I believe we must trust them
> absent any strong evidence of fraud. Share suspicion alone is not
> sufficient.
>

Agreed if you mean sheer suspicion.  Fraud is the furthest from my thoughts
but it would be interesting to know if the hostmasters' report was
rubber-stamped by management or overridden.

>
> I suspect that the domains are being used to host VPNs and are likely
> serving end-users outside the region via these VPNs. Currently, there's
> nothing in AfriNIC policy to prohibit that. I leave it as an exercise for
> other members of this list to decide whether there should be policy to
> prohibit such allocations.
>

You can correct me but I understand that IANA allocates to Afrinic for
redistribution in the African region and in the absence of guiding policy,
the goals of Afrinic as custodian take precedence.

I also understand that assignments are only valid if the original criteria
for justification and assignment remains valid.  If the allocation looks
suspicious as many have opined, there should be some assessment to test for
validity especially as it is this large.

>
> I will say this... Regardless of how we hand out the remaining IPv4
> addresses, the simple reality is that IPv4 will soon be much less important
> than having an IPv6 deployment and I believe that the community would be
> better served by aggressively implementing IPv6 than by handwringing over
> the mechanism by which the limited IPv4 free pool is drained.
>

This will happen with time.  Some like academia have additional incentive
to deploy IPv6 in their networks and are likely to do so faster especially
with the excellent support from Afrinic, but we still need IPv4 and trusted
processes.

Omo

>
> Owen
>
> On Sep 23, 2014, at 5:39 AM, Omo Oaiya <omo at wacren.net> wrote:
>
> Hi
>
> It is easy enough to say the "community" does not participate and this may
> be true but the "community" also needs to feel its voice can be heard.  We
> also don't all have to be involved in policy making to see the obvious.
>
> Policies are only ideas. It is the implementation that counts and quite
> often the spirit is as important as the letter.   Writing yet another
> policy does not necessarily fix the issue.  Some of the policies that have
> been suggested have outcomes that are satisfied by the requirements for
> justification in existing policies.  What we perhaps need to revise is our
> understanding of the content and contexts of existing policies.
>
> Btw, thanks to the staff for reverting and even if process was followed as
> implied, a /12 is an odd million addresses and remains a million anyhow you
> shake it up.   An innovation that requires this many addresses in today's
> African Internet is not likely to be missed by the pundits.   Would be nice
> to see the utilisation that convinced staff .... Mr Lu has not been able to
> revert on the funny domains with random letters and no website.  Can anyone
> help him?
>
> <Speaking as myself ... inline with the latest trends >
>
> Best wishes
>
> Omo
>
> On 22 September 2014 19:40, Victor Ndonnang <ndonnang at nvconsulting.biz>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi Andrew,
>> Thank you for your clear input. I can't agree more with you on that. It
>> is not just about saying this is good or bad; It is about getting involved
>> and help make things better and more globally acceptable.
>> But efforts are needed on both sides:
>>
>> -The interested stakeholders in the community should take time to learn
>> the process, understand it and help change what is imperfect... Policies
>> are there to evolve.
>> - Afrinic as a community driven organization should continue doing more
>> efforts to have more people in the PDP process.
>>
>> Best regards,
>> Victor.
>>
>> ************
>> Victor Ndonnang
>> https://twitter.com/VictorNdonnang
>> <https://mobile.twitter.com/VictorNdonnang>
>> ~Sent from my iPhone~
>>
>> On Sep 21, 2014, at 2:25 AM, Andrew Alston <
>> Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com> wrote:
>>
>>  Disclaimer: Speaking in my personal capacity and not representative of
>> the AfriNIC board or any other organisation/company to which I am
>> affiliated.
>>
>>   > Very few people are involved in AFNIC policy development process and
>> sometimes, they just develop a policy to support what they want or like
>> rather than developing policies that really support the
>>    > development of the Internet in Africa.
>>
>>   Victor, this is true, but it is by choice that individuals do not get
>> involved in the PdP, since it is an open body.  Year after year I have
>> stood at PdP meetings and we get people in the room, lots of them, but when
>> it comes to discussions about policy on the PdP list, I would be amazed
>> there are more than 15 or 20 people who actually get involved and talk on
>> there on a regular and sustained basis.
>>
>>  This has been spoken about MANY times.  But I say this, it is like an
>> election in a country, if the community does not choose to partake in the
>> PdP lists, and does not choose to get involved in the formulation of policy
>> (and the modifications to policies they aren't happy with etc), then they
>> have absolutely zero right to complain afterwards if the policies that are
>> put in place do not meet their needs.
>>
>>  My message to the community, if you feel the current policies aren't
>> working, or you aren't happy with them, write new ones, go to the PdP, and
>> if the rest of the community is in agreement with you, your amendments/new
>> policies will get passed, if they don't pass, listen to WHY the community
>> isn't passing them, and either change your position or modify so that the
>> community is happy with them.  Basically: Take some responsibility for the
>> policies that are out there, since you, as a community put them there,
>> either through showing consensus at a meeting, or through apathy that
>> stopped you objecting to them) and you as a community have the chance to
>> change them.
>>
>>  Just my thoughts
>>
>>   *Andrew Alston*
>> Group Head of IP Strategy
>>
>> <1D7357BF-29F7-4C26-9D6A-6EFCA78201B1[24].png>
>>
>> Sameer business Park, Block A, Mombasa Road. Nairobi, Kenya
>>
>> *T:* +254 205000000 -  *M*: +254 733 2222 04 - *E:*
>> andrew.alston at liquidtelecom.com
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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