[rpd] IPv4 Soft Landing BIS

[Owen DeLong]

> On Jul 27, 2017, at 23:17 , Noah <noah at neo.co.tz> wrote:
> 
> Hi Community, 
> 
> Lets put our chief opposers of the softlanding policies aside for a second..

Yes… This is a typical tactic that you have repeatedly attempted. Let’s brush aside anyone who doesn’t agree with us and pretend that their arguments either don’t exist, have no merit, or can otherwise simply be ignored.

Unfortunately for you, the co-chairs don’t have this option. They must consider all community input no matter how much authors don’t like it.

> I am not sure if I will make sense but let me try to present a case below.

This is simply too easy and rather than comment, I will let the statement stand on its own merits for others to interpret as they see fit.

> We supporters of an updated Softlanding policy believe in the impact that a public IP address can have on our peoples lives.

So do the opposers.

> Its a fact that an IP address has been responsible for the creation of jobs and most of you if not all of you in this community in one way or another are positively affected by the internet.

Yes… So let’s not deny those abilities to real providers creating real networks and services today in favor of keeping them on the shelf for some future provider that may or may not even actually exist in this imaginary future.

> Our governements though the LIR's and PI resource members of  Afrinic collect taxes from this businesses hence develop our respective countries.

You are again continuing to make the same case that we opposers are making against this policy. Perhaps we don’t disagree so much as I thought…

> The IP address has enabled egoverment and now the administrative state can serve citizens through egov services thereby increase government effeciency and more and more of our African governments are putting information online.

> The IP address is responsible for research and education institutes today across the continent to communicate and share ideas and our scholars are able to interact by means of the African Internet.
> 
> 
> The IP address has enabled access to information beyond our reach and this access to information is enabling our people effect socio-economic and political change.
> 
> 
> The IP address has enabled ecommerse and has empowered local fintech innovations like mobile money which has fundamentally had a profound effect on our peoples lives.
> 
> The Internet that is a social media enabler has enabled young men and women across this continent to access a local market and trade online on ecommerce platforms where they dont have to own physical stores/shops but they can market and sale their products online and deliver the same to the buyers.
> 
> With a surge in high unemployments rates across sub-sahara Africa, many unemployed graduates are finding a reason to hope as platforms like Instagram, facebook and others are enabling them to access followers who in one or another have turned out to be a customer or client base.
> 
> Our local musicians today are reaching a far bigger audience that has enabled them grow their artistic talent beyond Africa and our Afrobeat music and house music is now listened and enjoyed by folks from all works of life. They are enabling us change our story.
> 
> The IP address bas enables our friends who come to tour our beautiful continent access to more local information about our various countries thereby enabling us collect revenue and create jobs and build our hospitality industry.

On all of this we agree. These arguments are, in fact, the best drivers for my opposition to this proposed policy because it will interfere with the continued deployment of all of these things.

> Lets not kid ourselves. As the vendors continue fixing the IPv6 software stacks, IPv4 still works and IPv4 will not be less useful anytime soon because vendors across the board still make a killing out of IPv4. 

Um? You do realize that IPv4 doesn’t actually work significantly better than IPv6 in the vast majority of software stacks, right?
You do realize that when IPv4 was only 20 years old, it suffered from even more grievous problems than the worst problems with IPv6 today, right?
You do realize that IPv6 works well enough that Facebook, Google, Comcast, and every major cloud provider are now supporting it, right?
Claiming “IPv4 still works” as if “IPv6 doesn’t” is absurd at best and disinformation at worst.

Actually, I don’t think it’s going to be all that long before IPv4 is less useful. You see, big eyeball providers are already starting to see the excessive costs of IPv4 and the cost reductions that are possible with IPv6 monostack. Once a little more critical mass is available on the content side, the cost-benefit equation will actually lead to many of them finding ways to discourage their customers from using IPv4 and/or turning off IPv4 services for those customers.

At the very least, as IPv4 moves to more and more CGN and centralization, greater concentration of fate sharing, and a continuing reduction in performance due to centralization and layers of NAT, IPv4 will start to become less and less usable in the very near future. If you read the State of the Internet report you will see that these impacts are already measurable. If you want, there are other reports from Potaroo and other sources that also show this.

> Big telecoms have invested in legacy equipmemts and still returning their investments.

If your equipment is less than 10 years old, you can probably put IPv6 on it. You might need a software upgrade.
If your equipment is less more than 10 years old but less than 20, you may be stuck with an inappropriate depreciation schedule which makes it more difficult, but that’s a management problem that shouldn’t be all that hard to address if you simply go fess up to the CFO with accurate information. Certainly starting now will turn out better for you than starting later.

> Big internet companies that depends on global numbers which are mainly still accessible via the IPv4 internet wont risk loosing this market.

If the cost exceeds the benefit, you bet they will. IPv4 represents a rising cost per service in an environment of declining revenues.

> Some startups will be seeking addresses to atleast support critical infrastucture like DNS and Web servers if there is none from Afrinic, you be forced to pay more expensively from those who have the space.

This is a simple reality. Denying addresses to present need in order to protect these johnny-come-lately startups that may not even materialize is absurd. Further, the cost of IPv4 will eventually drive startups to ignore the IPv4 market in favor of simply implementing IPv6 only. There’s no harm in this. There’s greater innovation and better services possible to consumers on IPv6.

> Facebook, youtube,uber,twitter,google,instagram,apple,microsoft,airbnb to name but a few are software companies that have created jobs and are making millions of dollars and affecting lives because the Ip addresses made it possible.

Nearly every name on that list is operating on IPv6. Facebook is aggressively turning off IPV4 wherever they can.

> The IP address is what makes you and me pay our bills within our domain of ICT.

Really? I challenge you to prove this. For me, the transit service I receive from my provider is what makes me pay my ISP bill. I don’t even get my addresses from them.
[Technically I get one IPv4 address from them which I use to terminate tunnels and a handful of IPv6 addresses which I don’t actually use at all yet. However, I will be migrating my tunnels to v4/v6 over GREv6 eventually]

> There million dollar IPv4 transfer market is here to stay and late entreprenuers and startups will pay more expensively for an IP address post IPv4 exhaustion which could potentially discourage investment in the IP related investments.

The million dollar IPv4 transfer market is actually already starting to show significant reductions in availability and in order for a market to continue, you need not only demand (which I believe will somewhat remain), but you also need supply. Now it’s true that supply will ebb and flow with increases in the price per address, but at some point, the cost of an IPv4 address will exceed the ROI and even the last hold-outs will recognize that it’s simply too expensive to continue ignoring IPv6.

> The last IPv4 address ought to be handled with care hence further recommendation on how to deal with this depletion scenario.

Again, I agree with the sentiment, but this proposal is the opposite of proper care.

> We can deplete fast but if any one of you tomorrow wants IP addresses and cant get them from Afrinic, you will be forced to dance to the IPv4 brokers pricing.

Actually, the brokers aren’t setting the prices. The brokers are middle-men taking a commission on each transaction. It is the people who are willing to free up addresses from their networks and make them available who are setting the price.

> You will be forced to look up to IPv4 brokers  for address space and the IPv4 broker will not trade space the same way Afrinic does.

Actually, if you can find someone who will make addresses available to you by sale or trade without involving a broker, you are free to do so. Many such transactions have occurred in at least 3 of the other RIRs.

Perhaps you should check your facts before posting such inaccurate data.

> IPv4 is still relevant than you will ever imagine save for the rhetoric around how IPv4 is legacy and not needed meanwhile millions of dollars are exchanging hands in the IPv4 tranfer market.

IPv4 is relevant today. In 2 years, I think its relevance will begin to decline sharply. In 5 years, I think we will see a very different environment. Ignoring this fact and basing policy decisions for the future only on the past and present is a perilous venture.

> I know its a long one and i could go on but these are my 2cents community.

So it seems you support and I oppose this proposal for many of the same reasons. This is actually good news. It’s not uncommon for people of good conscience to come to different conclusions presented the same facts based on the difference in their experiences.

It appears that you have some errant beliefs about how the transfer markets work and about the future of IPv4. Perhaps if you take a wider and more objective view of the inherent realities of the economics of IPv4 (suggest you review Lee Howard’s presentation on Per User Per Year costing of IPv4 from the Denver INET meeting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXf8ZIew1j0

This is from 2013 and his projections haven’t been 100% realized yet, but only the rate of cost increase differs. All of the trends are going in the directions he predicted, just somewhat slower than forecast.

Owen


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