Discussion:
[ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa Portion of the ARIN Region
Member Services
2003-09-22 20:47:32 UTC
Permalink
ARIN welcomes feedback and discussion about the following policy
proposal in the weeks leading to the ARIN Public Policy Meeting
in Chicago, Illinois, scheduled for October 22-23, 2003. All feedback
received on the mailing list about this policy proposal will be
included in the discussions that will take place at the upcoming
Public Policy Meeting.

This policy proposal discussion will take place on the ARIN Public
Policy Mailing List. Subscription information is available at
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/index.html

Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)

### * ###

Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region

1. Minimum Allocation. The minimum allocation size for ISPs from the
African portion of the ARIN region is /22.

2. Allocation Criteria.

a. The requesting organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /22 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/22) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 4 /24s.

b. A multi-homed organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /23 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/23) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 2 /24s.

3. Utilization Reporting and Justification. All other ARIN policies
regarding the reporting of justification information for the
allocation of IPv4 address space will remain in effect.

********************************************************************

Discussion:

This proposal is the result of the discussion and agreement of those
ISPs in the ARIN region that were in attendance at the AfriNIC
meeting held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 17, 2003.

This policy proposal is submitted with the intent it only be applied
to the Africa portion of the ARIN region, i.e., those countries in
Africa that are in the ARIN region.

It is proposed the minimum allocation criteria and minimum allocation
size for ISPs in Africa be modified. Specifically, the following
modifications to IPv4 policy are proposed:

Change the minimum allocation size from a /20 to /22.
Change the ISP criteria for obtaining an allocation to the following.

CRITERIA POINT 1

Current Criteria: The current IPv4 policy for ISPs calls for "the
efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /20 from
their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /20 allocation from
ARIN.

Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 policy for ISPs call for
"the efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /22
from their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /22 allocation
from ARIN.

CRITERIA POINT 2

Current Criteria: The current IPv4 multi-homed policy states "Multi-
homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a /21 may be
allocated a /20."

Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 multi-homed policy state
that, "Multi-homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a
/23 may be allocated a /22." Due to the emerging nature of Internet
services in Africa and the economic environment, it is often not
possible for ISPs to meet the current ARIN criteria for the smallest
allocation size of a /20, or to obtain the IPv4 address space they
need from an upstream provider in their area of operation. It is due
to these reasons, and others listed below, that this proposal is
submitted.

Arguments for Policy Change

The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.

Proposed Timetable for Implementation

It is requested this policy proposal be discussed on the ARIN public
policy mailing list and at the ARIN public policy meeting in October
2003. It is further requested this policy proposal receive immediate
attention of the ARIN Advisory Council and Board of Trustees
following the October 2003 meeting for implementation before the
close of the 2003 calendar year. Implementation of this policy change
is critical to the growth and development of the Internet in the
Africa portion of the ARIN region.
Alec H. Peterson
2003-09-22 20:54:36 UTC
Permalink
--On Monday, September 22, 2003 16:47 -0400 Member Services
Post by Member Services
[...]
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
I am curious, why are African ISPs unable to obtain sufficient address
space from their upstream providers? Is the issue that such upstreams
don't themselves qualify under ARIN's current policies?

Alec
ARIN AC Chair (but speaking only for himself)
Gregory Massel
2003-09-22 22:59:03 UTC
Permalink
Post by Alec H. Peterson
I am curious, why are African ISPs unable to obtain sufficient address
space from their upstream providers? Is the issue that such upstreams
don't themselves qualify under ARIN's current policies?
The scale of African ISPs is significantly smaller than that of North
American ISPs. Consequently, many African ISPs have a requirement to
multi-home at point where they are using much less address space than North
American ISPs. The need to multi-home for additional redundancy is also
significantly greater with reliance on satellite and microwave technology
and theft of and damage to terrestrial cables.

Often upstreams of African ISPs are North American or European ISPs. In
these cases, using the upstream's address space makes multi-homing tricky
and tends to restrict us to relying on using a single international
satellite link or submarine circuit (where available) for global
connectivity.
Post by Alec H. Peterson
Reason for 196/8 is because this ip block currently has enough free space
(9227 /24 blocks allocated - 14%, 56309 /24 ip blocks not allocated - 85%)
for Africa and of the allocation 14% of the blocks, about 1/3 are already
for organizations in Africa - largest portion of African allocations then
any other ip block ARIN has. Do note that currently IANA identifies 196/8
as "Various Registries - Early Internic Registrations" which generally
means ARIN is not allowed to make current registrations out of it (but I
have in fact seen new registrations as close as 2001 made to africa out of
this ip block), ARIN should oficially request IANA to change it and
identify to IANA that it will be making new allocations out of this ip
block for African portion of the net.
Approximately 70% of IP prefixes announced by South African ISPs fall within
196.0.0.0/8.

192.96.0.0/16 was assigned to the Uninet Project around 1991 and
sub-allocated to various organisations in the following years; consequently,
this is also quite widely used by organisations who received address space
in the early 90's.

The exceptions to these two blocks tend to be historical assignments of
Class B addresses made prior to the introduction of CIDR and IPs assigned by
North American or European upstreams to South African customers.

One can view a South African routing table by telnetting to
public-route-server.is.co.za and issuing the command "show ip bgp". There
are only around 650 prefixes.

Gregory Massel
Co-chairman: ISPA (South Africa)
http://www.ispa.org.za/
Abraham van der Merwe
2003-09-23 00:20:38 UTC
Permalink
Post by Alec H. Peterson
Post by Member Services
[...]
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
I am curious, why are African ISPs unable to obtain sufficient address
space from their upstream providers? Is the issue that such upstreams
don't themselves qualify under ARIN's current policies?
It is not just a question of obtaining sufficient address space, it is a
question of multi-homing.

Bandwidth here are very expensive. That means most of us have to scrounge
for cheap local-only connections (cheaper), assymetric satellite connections
(because bidirectional in some places such as South Africa is illegal) for
international bandwidth, and some other connections for outgoing traffic
through one of our very few big ISPs. Unfortunately this is only
possible for those of us who can get portable address space.

There's the question of peering. I can't speak for the rest of Africa, but
here in South Africa we desperately need to get our cost of local bandwidth
down (for most of us it is cheaper to get a international link up than get a
link between major cities here in the country!) and we can only accomplish
that with more peering links - something which is impossible for most right
now because nobody can get portable address space.
--
Regards
Abraham

The only real argument for marriage is that it remains the best method
for getting acquainted.
-- Heywood Broun

___________________________________________________
Abraham vd Merwe - Frogfoot Networks CC
9 Kinnaird Court, 33 Main Street, Newlands, 7700
Phone: +27 21 686 1665 Cell: +27 82 565 4451
Http: http://www.frogfoot.net/ Email: ***@frogfoot.net
Abdul Rehman Gani
2003-09-23 07:02:12 UTC
Permalink
Post by Alec H. Peterson
--On Monday, September 22, 2003 16:47 -0400 Member Services
I am curious, why are African ISPs unable to obtain sufficient address
space from their upstream providers? Is the issue that such upstreams
don't themselves qualify under ARIN's current policies?
African ISP's tend to be smaller because of local conditions. Although
we can obtain required addresses from our upstream, we are at a stage
where we would like reduce dependence on our upstream (changing
upstreams involves renumbering) and, possibly, start multihoming.
Unfortunately both of those are difficult to impossible without our own
allocation. Reducing the allocation size will allow us to obtain our own
space without prejudicing us for maintaining policies wrt to efficient
usage of space (ie allocating smaller (/28 - /32) blocks to NATted
clients)

Regards

Abdul
Post by Alec H. Peterson
Alec
ARIN AC Chair (but speaking only for himself)
w***@elan.net
2003-09-22 19:25:20 UTC
Permalink
Add the following into this since we're talking about African Region.

"4. All allocations and assignments for African Portion of ARIN Region
will be made out of distinct /8 reserved for such purpose and it should
be reported to IANA which ip block is reserved for African Region. The
first such reserved African Region ip block shall be 196/8"

Reasoning is to do it similar to LACNIC (for which ARIN was using 200/8
for all allocations) and when AfriNIC to ready to be able to transfer /8
to it with as little outside pollution as possible, plus since we have
this special /22 allocation policy, it would be good to have exact /8
identified in ARIN region as being used for /22 allocations.

Reason for 196/8 is because this ip block currently has enough free space
(9227 /24 blocks allocated - 14%, 56309 /24 ip blocks not allocated - 85%)
for Africa and of the allocation 14% of the blocks, about 1/3 are already
for organizations in Africa - largest portion of African allocations then
any other ip block ARIN has. Do note that currently IANA identifies 196/8
as "Various Registries - Early Internic Registrations" which generally
means ARIN is not allowed to make current registrations out of it (but I
have in fact seen new registrations as close as 2001 made to africa out of
this ip block), ARIN should oficially request IANA to change it and
identify to IANA that it will be making new allocations out of this ip
block for African portion of the net.
Post by Member Services
ARIN welcomes feedback and discussion about the following policy
proposal in the weeks leading to the ARIN Public Policy Meeting
in Chicago, Illinois, scheduled for October 22-23, 2003. All feedback
received on the mailing list about this policy proposal will be
included in the discussions that will take place at the upcoming
Public Policy Meeting.
This policy proposal discussion will take place on the ARIN Public
Policy Mailing List. Subscription information is available at
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/index.html
Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)
### * ###
Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region
1. Minimum Allocation. The minimum allocation size for ISPs from the
African portion of the ARIN region is /22.
2. Allocation Criteria.
a. The requesting organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /22 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/22) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 4 /24s.
b. A multi-homed organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /23 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/23) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 2 /24s.
3. Utilization Reporting and Justification. All other ARIN policies
regarding the reporting of justification information for the
allocation of IPv4 address space will remain in effect.
********************************************************************
This proposal is the result of the discussion and agreement of those
ISPs in the ARIN region that were in attendance at the AfriNIC
meeting held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 17, 2003.
This policy proposal is submitted with the intent it only be applied
to the Africa portion of the ARIN region, i.e., those countries in
Africa that are in the ARIN region.
It is proposed the minimum allocation criteria and minimum allocation
size for ISPs in Africa be modified. Specifically, the following
Change the minimum allocation size from a /20 to /22.
Change the ISP criteria for obtaining an allocation to the following.
CRITERIA POINT 1
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 policy for ISPs calls for "the
efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /20 from
their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /20 allocation from
ARIN.
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 policy for ISPs call for
"the efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /22
from their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /22 allocation
from ARIN.
CRITERIA POINT 2
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 multi-homed policy states "Multi-
homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a /21 may be
allocated a /20."
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 multi-homed policy state
that, "Multi-homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a
/23 may be allocated a /22." Due to the emerging nature of Internet
services in Africa and the economic environment, it is often not
possible for ISPs to meet the current ARIN criteria for the smallest
allocation size of a /20, or to obtain the IPv4 address space they
need from an upstream provider in their area of operation. It is due
to these reasons, and others listed below, that this proposal is
submitted.
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
Proposed Timetable for Implementation
It is requested this policy proposal be discussed on the ARIN public
policy mailing list and at the ARIN public policy meeting in October
2003. It is further requested this policy proposal receive immediate
attention of the ARIN Advisory Council and Board of Trustees
following the October 2003 meeting for implementation before the
close of the 2003 calendar year. Implementation of this policy change
is critical to the growth and development of the Internet in the
Africa portion of the ARIN region.
Ray Plzak
2003-09-23 00:04:04 UTC
Permalink
ARIN already exclusively uses 196 /8 for allocations to the African part
of the ARIN region. ARIN is in negotiation with RIPE NCC and APNIC with
using this block for their allocations. Since this is a procedural
matter and not a policy matter wrt to a specific /8 the policy propsers,
(the African ISPs) did not think that this was important.

Ray
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Monday, September 22, 2003 3:25 PM
To: Member Services
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation
Policy for the Africa Portion of the ARIN Region
Add the following into this since we're talking about African Region.
"4. All allocations and assignments for African Portion of
ARIN Region
will be made out of distinct /8 reserved for such purpose
and it should
be reported to IANA which ip block is reserved for African
Region. The
first such reserved African Region ip block shall be 196/8"
Reasoning is to do it similar to LACNIC (for which ARIN was
using 200/8
for all allocations) and when AfriNIC to ready to be able to
transfer /8
to it with as little outside pollution as possible, plus
since we have
this special /22 allocation policy, it would be good to have exact /8
identified in ARIN region as being used for /22 allocations.
Reason for 196/8 is because this ip block currently has
enough free space
(9227 /24 blocks allocated - 14%, 56309 /24 ip blocks not
allocated - 85%)
for Africa and of the allocation 14% of the blocks, about 1/3
are already
for organizations in Africa - largest portion of African
allocations then
any other ip block ARIN has. Do note that currently IANA
identifies 196/8
as "Various Registries - Early Internic Registrations" which
generally
means ARIN is not allowed to make current registrations out
of it (but I
have in fact seen new registrations as close as 2001 made to
africa out of
this ip block), ARIN should oficially request IANA to change it and
identify to IANA that it will be making new allocations out
of this ip
block for African portion of the net.
Post by Member Services
ARIN welcomes feedback and discussion about the following policy
proposal in the weeks leading to the ARIN Public Policy Meeting
in Chicago, Illinois, scheduled for October 22-23, 2003.
All feedback
Post by Member Services
received on the mailing list about this policy proposal will be
included in the discussions that will take place at the upcoming
Public Policy Meeting.
This policy proposal discussion will take place on the ARIN Public
Policy Mailing List. Subscription information is available at
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/index.html
Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)
### * ###
Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region
1. Minimum Allocation. The minimum allocation size for ISPs
from the
Post by Member Services
African portion of the ARIN region is /22.
2. Allocation Criteria.
a. The requesting organization must show the efficient
utilization of
Post by Member Services
an entire previously allocated /22 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/22) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 4 /24s.
b. A multi-homed organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /23 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/23) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 2 /24s.
3. Utilization Reporting and Justification. All other ARIN policies
regarding the reporting of justification information for the
allocation of IPv4 address space will remain in effect.
********************************************************************
Post by Member Services
This proposal is the result of the discussion and agreement of those
ISPs in the ARIN region that were in attendance at the AfriNIC
meeting held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 17, 2003.
This policy proposal is submitted with the intent it only be applied
to the Africa portion of the ARIN region, i.e., those countries in
Africa that are in the ARIN region.
It is proposed the minimum allocation criteria and minimum
allocation
Post by Member Services
size for ISPs in Africa be modified. Specifically, the following
Change the minimum allocation size from a /20 to /22.
Change the ISP criteria for obtaining an allocation to the
following.
Post by Member Services
CRITERIA POINT 1
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 policy for ISPs calls for "the
efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /20 from
their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /20 allocation from
ARIN.
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 policy for ISPs call for
"the efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /22
from their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /22 allocation
from ARIN.
CRITERIA POINT 2
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 multi-homed policy states "Multi-
homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a /21 may be
allocated a /20."
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 multi-homed policy state
that, "Multi-homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a
/23 may be allocated a /22." Due to the emerging nature of Internet
services in Africa and the economic environment, it is often not
possible for ISPs to meet the current ARIN criteria for the
smallest
Post by Member Services
allocation size of a /20, or to obtain the IPv4 address space they
need from an upstream provider in their area of operation.
It is due
Post by Member Services
to these reasons, and others listed below, that this proposal is
submitted.
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain
IPv4 address
Post by Member Services
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
Proposed Timetable for Implementation
It is requested this policy proposal be discussed on the
ARIN public
Post by Member Services
policy mailing list and at the ARIN public policy meeting in October
2003. It is further requested this policy proposal receive
immediate
Post by Member Services
attention of the ARIN Advisory Council and Board of Trustees
following the October 2003 meeting for implementation before the
close of the 2003 calendar year. Implementation of this
policy change
Post by Member Services
is critical to the growth and development of the Internet in the
Africa portion of the ARIN region.
w***@elan.net
2003-09-22 22:07:45 UTC
Permalink
Procedural matters are sometimes important too as is informing the public
about things like regional reserved blocks. I did quite a bit of statistical
analysis of RIR whois data in the last few weeks so I already figured you
were using it for African allocations - however if it were somebody else
they would never know the ip block is actively being used for African region
(and that 197/8 is on reserve when AFRINIC becomes RIR). For LACNIC everybody
knew in part because it was mentioned by IANA and the ip block was also
mentioned as part of statistics for active ARIN blocks.

If you do not want it as part of policy and are willing to self regulate
(I'll hold you to this promise, I now have scripts running that can easily
detect new regional allocations and in which ip blocks they are being made)
to make sure all ip allocations being made to African region are being
made in that ip block, then at the very least:
1. Contact IANA to change the ip blocks designation in their file
at http://www.iana.org/assignments/ipv4-address-space
2. Put information on ARIN website by listing it as one of ARIN ip
blocks and commenting that it is being used for African region
3. If policy is passed inform public about minimum allocation &
assignment size that applies to that ip block

For those interested for last 1.5 years, I have kept my own file on how
ip allocations are made for /8 ip blocks to RIRs (its based on IANA data,
but I added my own comments and new fields), its at:
http://www.completewhois.com/iana-ipv4-addresses.txt
Post by Ray Plzak
ARIN already exclusively uses 196 /8 for allocations to the African part
of the ARIN region. ARIN is in negotiation with RIPE NCC and APNIC with
using this block for their allocations. Since this is a procedural
matter and not a policy matter wrt to a specific /8 the policy propsers,
(the African ISPs) did not think that this was important.
Ray
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Monday, September 22, 2003 3:25 PM
To: Member Services
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation
Policy for the Africa Portion of the ARIN Region
Add the following into this since we're talking about African Region.
"4. All allocations and assignments for African Portion of
ARIN Region
will be made out of distinct /8 reserved for such purpose
and it should
be reported to IANA which ip block is reserved for African
Region. The
first such reserved African Region ip block shall be 196/8"
Reasoning is to do it similar to LACNIC (for which ARIN was
using 200/8
for all allocations) and when AfriNIC to ready to be able to
transfer /8
to it with as little outside pollution as possible, plus
since we have
this special /22 allocation policy, it would be good to have exact /8
identified in ARIN region as being used for /22 allocations.
Reason for 196/8 is because this ip block currently has
enough free space
(9227 /24 blocks allocated - 14%, 56309 /24 ip blocks not
allocated - 85%)
for Africa and of the allocation 14% of the blocks, about 1/3
are already
for organizations in Africa - largest portion of African
allocations then
any other ip block ARIN has. Do note that currently IANA
identifies 196/8
as "Various Registries - Early Internic Registrations" which
generally
means ARIN is not allowed to make current registrations out
of it (but I
have in fact seen new registrations as close as 2001 made to
africa out of
this ip block), ARIN should oficially request IANA to change it and
identify to IANA that it will be making new allocations out
of this ip
block for African portion of the net.
Post by Member Services
ARIN welcomes feedback and discussion about the following policy
proposal in the weeks leading to the ARIN Public Policy Meeting
in Chicago, Illinois, scheduled for October 22-23, 2003.
All feedback
Post by Member Services
received on the mailing list about this policy proposal will be
included in the discussions that will take place at the upcoming
Public Policy Meeting.
This policy proposal discussion will take place on the ARIN Public
Policy Mailing List. Subscription information is available at
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/index.html
Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)
### * ###
Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region
1. Minimum Allocation. The minimum allocation size for ISPs
from the
Post by Member Services
African portion of the ARIN region is /22.
2. Allocation Criteria.
a. The requesting organization must show the efficient
utilization of
Post by Member Services
an entire previously allocated /22 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/22) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 4 /24s.
b. A multi-homed organization must show the efficient utilization of
an entire previously allocated /23 from their upstream ISP. This
allocation (/23) may have been provided by an ISP's upstream
provider(s), and does not have to be contiguous address space. The
organization must meet the requirement of efficient use of 2 /24s.
3. Utilization Reporting and Justification. All other ARIN policies
regarding the reporting of justification information for the
allocation of IPv4 address space will remain in effect.
********************************************************************
Post by Member Services
This proposal is the result of the discussion and agreement of those
ISPs in the ARIN region that were in attendance at the AfriNIC
meeting held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 17, 2003.
This policy proposal is submitted with the intent it only be applied
to the Africa portion of the ARIN region, i.e., those countries in
Africa that are in the ARIN region.
It is proposed the minimum allocation criteria and minimum
allocation
Post by Member Services
size for ISPs in Africa be modified. Specifically, the following
Change the minimum allocation size from a /20 to /22.
Change the ISP criteria for obtaining an allocation to the
following.
Post by Member Services
CRITERIA POINT 1
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 policy for ISPs calls for "the
efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /20 from
their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /20 allocation from
ARIN.
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 policy for ISPs call for
"the efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /22
from their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /22 allocation
from ARIN.
CRITERIA POINT 2
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 multi-homed policy states "Multi-
homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a /21 may be
allocated a /20."
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 multi-homed policy state
that, "Multi-homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a
/23 may be allocated a /22." Due to the emerging nature of Internet
services in Africa and the economic environment, it is often not
possible for ISPs to meet the current ARIN criteria for the
smallest
Post by Member Services
allocation size of a /20, or to obtain the IPv4 address space they
need from an upstream provider in their area of operation.
It is due
Post by Member Services
to these reasons, and others listed below, that this proposal is
submitted.
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain
IPv4 address
Post by Member Services
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
Proposed Timetable for Implementation
It is requested this policy proposal be discussed on the
ARIN public
Post by Member Services
policy mailing list and at the ARIN public policy meeting in October
2003. It is further requested this policy proposal receive
immediate
Post by Member Services
attention of the ARIN Advisory Council and Board of Trustees
following the October 2003 meeting for implementation before the
close of the 2003 calendar year. Implementation of this
policy change
Post by Member Services
is critical to the growth and development of the Internet in the
Africa portion of the ARIN region.
Darren
2003-09-23 06:36:12 UTC
Permalink
Post by Member Services
[...]
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
It is obvious that Africa has no where near the resources of first world
countries and therefore should be judged on their own merits as it is
done in other industries. Whereas a smaller ISP in America can obtain
their own IP allocation, this is not possible in Africa. Only the very
rich companies, which are normally international companies, can obtain
the requirements, while the local companies cannot. This seems to be a
good proposal to try to level the playing fields.

Thanks,
Darren Harris
Managing Director
Intoweb Design
http://www.intoweb.co.za
Tel: (012) 348 5320
Fax: (012) 361 5576

------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
INTOWEB CLIENT OF THE WEEK, check this site:
See http://www.tangentexhibitions.co.za for
specialised and professional exhibition requirments.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
---


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-***@arin.net [mailto:owner-***@arin.net] On Behalf Of Alec
H. Peterson
Sent: 22 September 2003 10:55 PM
To: Member Services; ***@arin.net
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for
the Africa Portion of the ARIN Region

--On Monday, September 22, 2003 16:47 -0400 Member Services
Post by Member Services
[...]
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
I am curious, why are African ISPs unable to obtain sufficient address
space from their upstream providers? Is the issue that such upstreams
don't themselves qualify under ARIN's current policies?

Alec
ARIN AC Chair (but speaking only for himself)
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-23 15:16:46 UTC
Permalink
Post by Darren
It is obvious that Africa has no where near the resources of first world
countries and therefore should be judged on their own merits as it is
done in other industries. Whereas a smaller ISP in America can obtain
their own IP allocation, this is not possible in Africa. Only the very
rich companies, which are normally international companies, can obtain
the requirements, while the local companies cannot. This seems to be a
good proposal to try to level the playing fields.
I'm having a little bit of trouble with this line of argument. I'd
like to address a few of the points raised.

- The playing field is level.

Today the same policies apply to anyone asking for IP space. It
doesn't matter if your from Africa or Podunk Iowa, the process
is applied equally and fairly. This proposal will actually create
an unlevel playing field that favors African ISP's. For instance,
would it be possible under this proposal for a US company to set
up an African shell company, get IP space, and then use it in the
US? Making things like that possible would be very bad.

- African ISP's have taken steps to preserve space, which is part of
the problem.

I think it's great that African ISP's have figured out how to use
NAT and other technologies to save space. While I don't want to
advocate "wasting" space my first question would be if you're
going to renumber into your own portable block anyway why not get
rid of the NAT, which will also improve your customers connectivity?
There are, after all, applications that do not work through NAT.
Would counting all those customers in a request justify enough
IP's to qualify under the current procedures?

At the end of the day I'm sure there are more than a few ISP's in the US
and Canada that would love to have smaller allocations. Indeed, you'll
see in the archives I've argued that we should make smaller allocations
available to everyone. That said, this proposal leaves a bad taste in
my mouth because it tells the ISP in Africa that needs a /22 that they
are "special enough" to get it, but the same sized ISP in some other
country is not.

Put another way, I don't recall the lack of cheap bandwidth or the
pervasive use of NAT to have ever been factors in setting the allocation
size before, and that makes me wonder why we should start now.

If we're going to change the allocation size I believe strongly it
should be a global change, and not a local change that favors one
particular group.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Aragon Gouveia
2003-09-23 18:59:00 UTC
Permalink
| By Leo Bicknell <***@ufp.org>
| [ 2003-09-23 17:20 +0200 ]
Post by Leo Bicknell
- The playing field is level.
Today the same policies apply to anyone asking for IP space. It
doesn't matter if your from Africa or Podunk Iowa, the process
is applied equally and fairly. This proposal will actually create
an unlevel playing field that favors African ISP's. For instance,
would it be possible under this proposal for a US company to set
up an African shell company, get IP space, and then use it in the
US? Making things like that possible would be very bad.
I think the point Darren was trying to make in the case of South Africa was
that because of our vastly different and smaller economy and demographics,
only about 10% of the ISPs in this country have a large enough subscriber
base to qualify for their own address allocation under the current
procedures. In turn this means only about 10% of the ISPs are capable of
providing the higher service levels that portable address space makes
possible.

There is most certainly a need for higher service levels of internet
connectivity in South Africa to increase internet adoption and, in turn,
grow the local internet here.

Although it may be technically possible for a US company to setup an African
shell company to be used in the US just so they can gain access to their own
/22, this would be practically senseless given the much higher relative costs
of running an ISP type business here and, more importantly, the much lower
levels of service with international connectivity from here. I think they'd
be more likely to seek another line of business than even considering this
route.
Post by Leo Bicknell
- African ISP's have taken steps to preserve space, which is part of
the problem.
I think it's great that African ISP's have figured out how to use
NAT and other technologies to save space. While I don't want to
advocate "wasting" space my first question would be if you're
going to renumber into your own portable block anyway why not get
rid of the NAT, which will also improve your customers connectivity?
There are, after all, applications that do not work through NAT.
Would counting all those customers in a request justify enough
IP's to qualify under the current procedures?
For some ISPs it may bring them closer to qualifying under the current
procedures, but I don't think it'd be the ice breaker for the majority. By
providing smaller allocations it allows one to preserve IP address
efficiency (without having to get rid of NAT for the sole purpose of
obtaining portable address space) and offer better service levels.

But from my own experiences, those that utilise NAT are doing so for reasons
other than address shortage. I actually don't think this is really an
issue.


Regards,
Aragon
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-23 20:40:51 UTC
Permalink
Post by Aragon Gouveia
I think the point Darren was trying to make in the case of South Africa was
that because of our vastly different and smaller economy and demographics,
only about 10% of the ISPs in this country have a large enough subscriber
base to qualify for their own address allocation under the current
procedures. In turn this means only about 10% of the ISPs are capable of
providing the higher service levels that portable address space makes
possible.
Even if I believe this is true for South Africa (and I have no
reason not to believe it), do we have any evidence that this is
significantly different than ISP's anywhere else? There are a ton
of US based ISP's that don't have their own allocation and get
addresses from their upstream. Many are even able to multi-home
with their upstream's permission using their space.

While I understand there may be a need to provide higher service
levels, and that multi-homing is probably part of that process,
that is not what is going to make South Africa's internet grow.
Cheap bandwidth, to other countries, in country, and to the residence
or business will make the internet grow. I would venture the average
residential user doesn't care if their provider is multi-homed or
not. Lower end businesses probably do not. What you're talking
about enabling here is a premium product for a (relatively) small
group of customers. That's not going to fuel real growth.

The market is big enough to support people (10%, by your estimate)
who can offer this service. If the market had no one that could
offer it we might have something to consider, but since it does
clearly there is limited demand for additional service, or those
10% would quickly snap up all the business and no longer be 10%,
but 50% or 100% as the other ISP's went out of business.

So, don't get me wrong, I want smaller allocations and support
proposals like 2003-3. I have yet to see any reason to treat South
Africa special though, and in fact find geographic differences in
allocation policy to generally be an extremely bad idea (and yes,
that also means I would generally prefer APNIC, RIPE and ARIN to
have the same policies as well, but that's an argument for another
day....).
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Abdul Rehman Gani
2003-09-23 20:28:36 UTC
Permalink
Post by Leo Bicknell
- African ISP's have taken steps to preserve space, which is part of
the problem.
I think it's great that African ISP's have figured out how to use
NAT and other technologies to save space. While I don't want to
advocate "wasting" space my first question would be if you're
going to renumber into your own portable block anyway why not get
rid of the NAT, which will also improve your customers connectivity?
We tackle this on a case-by-case basis. Most small to medium companies
or sohos internet requirements are not affected by NAT - therefore, to
save IP space we use NAT.
Post by Leo Bicknell
There are, after all, applications that do not work through NAT.
Would counting all those customers in a request justify enough
IP's to qualify under the current procedures?
We certainly would, quite easily.

Abdul
Theo Kramer
2003-09-23 10:45:30 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 2003-09-22 at 22:47, Member Services wrote:
<snip>
This should have the effect of increasing the membership of ARIN and subsequently AfriNIC.
I am for it.

Regards
Theo
Post by Member Services
This proposal is the result of the discussion and agreement of those
ISPs in the ARIN region that were in attendance at the AfriNIC
meeting held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on September 17, 2003.
This policy proposal is submitted with the intent it only be applied
to the Africa portion of the ARIN region, i.e., those countries in
Africa that are in the ARIN region.
It is proposed the minimum allocation criteria and minimum allocation
size for ISPs in Africa be modified. Specifically, the following
Change the minimum allocation size from a /20 to /22.
Change the ISP criteria for obtaining an allocation to the following.
CRITERIA POINT 1
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 policy for ISPs calls for "the
efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /20 from
their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /20 allocation from
ARIN.
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 policy for ISPs call for
"the efficient utilization of an entire previously allocated /22
from their upstream ISP" in order to qualify for a /22 allocation
from ARIN.
CRITERIA POINT 2
Current Criteria: The current IPv4 multi-homed policy states "Multi-
homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a /21 may be
allocated a /20."
Proposed Criteria: It is proposed the IPv4 multi-homed policy state
that, "Multi-homed organizations that have efficiently utilized a
/23 may be allocated a /22." Due to the emerging nature of Internet
services in Africa and the economic environment, it is often not
possible for ISPs to meet the current ARIN criteria for the smallest
allocation size of a /20, or to obtain the IPv4 address space they
need from an upstream provider in their area of operation. It is due
to these reasons, and others listed below, that this proposal is
submitted.
Arguments for Policy Change
The economies of Africa and those of other countries in the ARIN
region (United States and Canada) are not of the same scale. The
number of Internet users inside Africa is much fewer than in the
other countries in the ARIN region. Whereas it may be reasonable to
expect that the user numbers in North America support an ISP's
ability to meet the current ARIN IPv4 criteria, it is not reasonable
in Africa. Unable to meet the current criteria to obtain IPv4 address
space from ARIN, and unable to obtain adequate address space from
upstream providers; African ISPs must resort to solutions such as
NAT, or sometimes are simply not able to provide services to
customers due to the lack of IPv4 address space. Lack of adequate
IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and development of
the Internet in Africa.
Proposed Timetable for Implementation
It is requested this policy proposal be discussed on the ARIN public
policy mailing list and at the ARIN public policy meeting in October
2003. It is further requested this policy proposal receive immediate
attention of the ARIN Advisory Council and Board of Trustees
following the October 2003 meeting for implementation before the
close of the 2003 calendar year. Implementation of this policy change
is critical to the growth and development of the Internet in the
Africa portion of the ARIN region.
Peter Salvage
2003-09-23 13:31:36 UTC
Permalink
Post by Member Services
Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region
<snip>

I represent a small ISP in South Africa and endorse what's been said before
with regard to the difficulty in obtaining portable address space.
Accordingly I support the proposal as outlined.

Peter Salvage
SybaWeb Internet
Rob Hunter
2003-09-23 13:37:09 UTC
Permalink
Post by Peter Salvage
Accordingly I support the proposal as outlined.
as do UUNET SA

Regards

--Rob
Aragon Gouveia
2003-09-23 13:48:14 UTC
Permalink
I have worked and consulted for a few ISPs in South Africa for the past 4
years and currently consult exclusively to a small South African ISP. I
agree with previous comments about the immense difficulty in obtaining
portable address space here. I also agree the below provisions will greatly
benefit future Internet growth for reasons already outlined by others
that have posted to this thread.

I fully support this proposal.


Regards,
Aragon



| By Member Services <***@arin.net>
| [ 2003-09-22 22:52 +0200 ]
Post by Member Services
ARIN welcomes feedback and discussion about the following policy
proposal in the weeks leading to the ARIN Public Policy Meeting
in Chicago, Illinois, scheduled for October 22-23, 2003. All feedback
received on the mailing list about this policy proposal will be
included in the discussions that will take place at the upcoming
Public Policy Meeting.
This policy proposal discussion will take place on the ARIN Public
Policy Mailing List. Subscription information is available at
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/index.html
Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)
### * ###
Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the Africa
Portion of the ARIN Region
Heath Jordaan
2003-09-23 13:58:10 UTC
Permalink
Must say I support this proposal. Should benefit us all to see it
implemented.

Regards
Heath
Mark ELkins
2003-09-24 14:27:22 UTC
Permalink
I'm in the fortunate position of having some historical allocations.
When it came to assisting some of the ISP's downstream of me with their own
allocations - so they could Multihome - life was not easy. The process took
months. I assisted with two sites, one in Namibia and one in Lesotho. This
is not just a South African thing but very much an African thing and very
much needed. I can see a number of ISP's in Swaziland who will benefit.

Excelent proposal.
(I'd have no problem this becomming a global thing)
--
. . ___. .__ Posix Systems - Sth Africa
/| /| / /__ ***@posix.co.za - Mark J Elkins, SCO ACE, Cisco
CCIE
/ |/ |ARK \_/ /__ LKINS Tel: +27 12 807 0590 Cell: +27 82 601 0496
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 14:43:28 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mark ELkins
I'm in the fortunate position of having some historical allocations.
When it came to assisting some of the ISP's downstream of me with their own
allocations - so they could Multihome - life was not easy. The process took
months. I assisted with two sites, one in Namibia and one in Lesotho. This
is not just a South African thing but very much an African thing and very
much needed. I can see a number of ISP's in Swaziland who will benefit.
Let me ask a different, but related, question.

Who gets to multihome?

For this argument I'll take as fact that allocations (or lack of)
decided who can or cannot multihome. What set of people, globally,
get to multihome?

Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subscribers get to
multihome, yet E-Bay with several gigabits of traffic and millions
of users not?

Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subcribers get to
multihome, but a US ISP with a DS-3 and 10000 subscribers not?

When a US ISP the same size as an African ISP comes to ARIN after
this has passed and claims that if an African ISP of his size can
multi-home, what argument are we going to use to tell him no? You
have it too easy already because you have cheap bandwidth? That
doesn't sound like a good answer.

Who gets to multihome?

Are we changing the requirement from the technical (number of users)
to the political (the poor and disadvantaged get extra help)? That
seems to be a pretty fundamental change to me.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Johann Botha
2003-09-24 15:42:01 UTC
Permalink
Hi Leo >@2003.09.24_16:43:28_+0200

First of all, let me say I support this porposal 100%

I believe we need to see a change in IP allocation criteria for the African
region.. even if only by one bit, if not by two as in the proposal. And if
we dont see this change while ARIN controls our regions alloctations then we
will see it when AfriNIC does... so why wait?, why hamper growth?

I have no problem if ARIN adopts this criteria as policy for other regions.

If porposal 2003-15 is adopted I think it will have a negligible impact on
the size of the global routing table and I cant think of any other technical
reason not to accept this porposal.
Post by Leo Bicknell
Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subscribers get to
multihome, yet E-Bay with several gigabits of traffic and millions
of users not?
Because renumbering 5 webservers is not the same sport as renumbering an
entire ISP client base.. and content providers in Africa are also usually
not multi-homed.
Post by Leo Bicknell
Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subcribers get to
multihome, but a US ISP with a DS-3 and 10000 subscribers not?
Why do you care ? What do you stand to loose ? Ever been to Africa ? It's
very clear there is a need for this policy change.. and more importantly..
there is support for it.

If you feel stongly that the US ISP in your example should be given IP
space.. well, then submit a proposal.

I think this should be an open and shut case, pick a block of IPs to be
moved to AfriNIC soon and start handing out /22s to African networks who fit
the criteria. In my mind this is a smart solution until AfriNIC is up and
running and has no real impact on non African ARIN members.
--
Regards ..Friends don't let friends use Outlook
Johann

'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
________________________________________________________________
Johann L. Botha Frogfoot Networks ISP AS22355
***@frogfoot.net http://www.frogfoot.net/
+27.82.562.6167 Built and Managed with Attention to Detail
0860 KERMIT
http://blue.frogfoot.net/
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 16:00:40 UTC
Permalink
Post by Johann Botha
I believe we need to see a change in IP allocation criteria for the African
region.. even if only by one bit, if not by two as in the proposal. And if
we dont see this change while ARIN controls our regions alloctations then we
will see it when AfriNIC does... so why wait?, why hamper growth?
I have no problem if ARIN adopts this criteria as policy for other regions.
Then please support 2002-3. There are three basic positions, people
who don't want to move the prefix size, people who want to move it
globally, and people who want to move it in Africa. If the latter
two combine efforts behind 2003-3 it will be more likely to pass,
where as if they both continue both are likely to be rejected for
lack of support.

For the record, I generally support 2002-3. I would like to see
it done differently, but it's the only proposal currently on the
table that does what I want to see, so that's the one I need to
support.
Post by Johann Botha
Post by Leo Bicknell
Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subcribers get to
multihome, but a US ISP with a DS-3 and 10000 subscribers not?
Why do you care ? What do you stand to loose ? Ever been to Africa ? It's
very clear there is a need for this policy change.. and more importantly..
there is support for it.
I care because that will be the very next question raised. I'll
tell you right now that if 100 ISP's in Africa can get the allocation
size moved in Africa, there will be 1000 ISP's in the US who will
come back and say "what about me, I'm bigger then they are after
all, so I should be able to multi-home too". This policy change will
have impact to other regions, and ARIN must consider that when it
makes policy.
Post by Johann Botha
If you feel stongly that the US ISP in your example should be given IP
space.. well, then submit a proposal.
One is already there, 2002-3. I support it.
Post by Johann Botha
I think this should be an open and shut case, pick a block of IPs to be
moved to AfriNIC soon and start handing out /22s to African networks who fit
the criteria. In my mind this is a smart solution until AfriNIC is up and
running and has no real impact on non African ARIN members.
Now, that is a horse of a different color. I had no idea allocations
were so fragmented across the continent (I had simply never looked
before), and now that I see RIPE, ARIN, and APNIC are all involved
I am a strong supporter of getting an AfriNIC up and running to
unify the process in that region. They would of course be free to
set their own policies -- however I still believe there should be
generally the same policy worldwide.

At the end of the day 2003-15 seems to treat a symptom of the real
problem, rather than the problem. We need to pass 2002-3 and solve
the IP allocation size issue for everyone. We need to create AfriNIC
and unify the African allocations. We don't need to apply a region
specific band-aid.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Johann Botha
2003-09-24 16:36:25 UTC
Permalink
Post by Leo Bicknell
I care because that will be the very next question raised. I'll
tell you right now that if 100 ISP's in Africa can get the allocation
size moved in Africa, there will be 1000 ISP's in the US who will
come back and say "what about me, I'm bigger then they are after
all, so I should be able to multi-home too".
I guess the answer would be, because this is a "region specific band-aid"..
(your words)

* until we see AfriNIC up and running
* there was a clear consensus under African network operators
* because ARIN servers probably _the_ two extremes of regions
..but lets not get into comparing Africa and America
--
Regards ..Friends don't let friends use Outlook
Johann

'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
________________________________________________________________
Johann L. Botha Frogfoot Networks ISP AS22355
***@frogfoot.net http://www.frogfoot.net/
+27.82.562.6167 Built and Managed with Attention to Detail
0860 KERMIT
http://blue.frogfoot.net/
German Valdez
2003-09-24 20:04:44 UTC
Permalink
Post by w***@elan.net
Fully setting up RIR is not as easy as that, especially in Africa. Its
not only policies and handling of requests but they need to have enough
members to support the RIR financially (and for example LACNIC is getting
funding from two regional registries in Brazil and Mexico, none of that
exists in Africa).
Just to clarify a point. LACNIC do not receive funding from the two
national registries NIC Brazil and NIC Mexico. Indeed, they support
LACNIC's operation through two cooperation agreements
(http://lacnic.net/en/agreement.html) and they have helped the operation of
LACNIC during the startup process, but they do not inject any amount of
money to LACNIC accounts. There is a internal medium term plan to transfer
this tasks to LACNIC staff. LACNIC receive funding exclusively through
their members

This way, no necessarily through national regstries but ISP associations,
may help AFRINIC for running operation during the startup process.


German Valdez
LACNIC Policy Liaison
Potosí 1517
Montevideo 11500 - Uruguay
Tel: +598 2 606 2822
Fax: +598 2 601 5509
www.lacnic.net
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 16:29:58 UTC
Permalink
--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 5:42 PM +0200 Johann Botha
Post by Johann Botha
Hi Leo
Post by Johann Botha
@2003.09.24_16:43:28_+0200
First of all, let me say I support this porposal 100%
I believe we need to see a change in IP allocation criteria for the
African region.. even if only by one bit, if not by two as in the
proposal. And if we dont see this change while ARIN controls our regions
alloctations then we will see it when AfriNIC does... so why wait?, why
hamper growth?
I believe we need this change globally, and, I see nothing so far that
makes Africa a special case. I will support this proposal if it is
ARIN global. I will not support this proposal if it is sub-region specific.
What AfriNIC may or may not do after it gets created if it gets created
is not something I am willing to consider a factor in developing ARIN
policy. I don't see any reason to wait or hamper growth in North America
or Africa. I certainly don't see a reason to give <=10000 user ISPs in
Africa an advantage over <=10000 user ISPs in North America.
Post by Johann Botha
I have no problem if ARIN adopts this criteria as policy for other regions.
I think you will have a problem if ARIN does not.
Post by Johann Botha
If porposal 2003-15 is adopted I think it will have a negligible impact on
the size of the global routing table and I cant think of any other
technical reason not to accept this porposal.
There is no technical reason not to make it global, either.
Post by Johann Botha
Post by Johann Botha
Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subscribers get to
multihome, yet E-Bay with several gigabits of traffic and millions
of users not?
Because renumbering 5 webservers is not the same sport as renumbering an
entire ISP client base.. and content providers in Africa are also usually
not multi-homed.
1. Ebay has far more than 5 webservers.
2. Renumbering a /22 for 1000 dialup subscribers is nowhere near as
difficult as renumbering a /22 worth of content hosting. Therefore,
I see less reason to make an exception for African ISPs.
Post by Johann Botha
Post by Johann Botha
Why does an African ISP with an E1 and 1000 subcribers get to
multihome, but a US ISP with a DS-3 and 10000 subscribers not?
Why do you care ? What do you stand to loose ? Ever been to Africa ? It's
very clear there is a need for this policy change.. and more importantly..
there is support for it.
Ever been to North America and looked at the reality of being a small(er)
ISP here? It's very clear there is a need for this policy change.
More importantly, there is support for it, but, to some extent, it is an
opressed minority.
Post by Johann Botha
If you feel stongly that the US ISP in your example should be given IP
space.. well, then submit a proposal.
There is a proposal on the table for MicroAllocations. If African ISPs
want this policy (2002-3 if memory serves), they should support it. At
best, 2003-15 is an attempt to get what Africa wants/needs while leaving
the rest of ARINs geography twisting in the wind. My advice would be that
if African ISPs want this, they should get behind the global microallocation
policy and make good use of the allies that will bring to the table.
Post by Johann Botha
I think this should be an open and shut case, pick a block of IPs to be
moved to AfriNIC soon and start handing out /22s to African networks who
fit the criteria. In my mind this is a smart solution until AfriNIC is up
and running and has no real impact on non African ARIN members.
I think this should be an open and shut case and African ISPs should get
behind a global policy to move the prefix size to /22. I agree that ARINs
current operational practice of assigning Africa out of distinct /8(s) is
a good idea. That way, if AfriNIC comes into existance, those /8(s) can
be transferred easily to AfriNIC. However, creating exceptions to global
policy for Africa because AfriNIC may adopt a similar policy if AfriNIC
comes into existance is absurd.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for AfriNIC coming into existance and for them
being able to set whatever policies meet the needs of their region if they
do (within ICANN/IANA guidelines). However, until then, I don't see making
sub-regional exceptions as a good plan. Especially ones that solve a
problem
that is not unique to the sub-region.
Post by Johann Botha
'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
It is much simpler to make a global policy for a global problem.

Owen
Johann Botha
2003-09-24 16:58:10 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
I believe we need this change globally, and, I see nothing so far that
makes Africa a special case. I will support this proposal if it is
ARIN global. I will not support this proposal if it is sub-region specific.
What AfriNIC may or may not do after it gets created if it gets created
is not something I am willing to consider a factor in developing ARIN
policy. I don't see any reason to wait or hamper growth in North America
or Africa. I certainly don't see a reason to give <=10000 user ISPs in
Africa an advantage over <=10000 user ISPs in North America.
In principle I support 2002-3, but..

* It may have a much bigger impact on the size of the global routing table
* If by supporting 2002-3 and letting 2003-15 slide we end up without
consensus or a long timeline until we see this as policy, then I'm sure you
can see why I would rather focus my voice/effort behind 2003-15.
* I see ARIN (and others) as babysitting Africa's RIR services,
try to think of this as a decision AfriNIC should be taking but cant and
is asking for your your support.

So I think what I'm saying is.. please dont stand in the way of 2003-15, or
at least carefully think about why you would want to.. and rather help us
get this done quickly.. after which you can use it as precedent to better
the argument for 2002-3.
--
Regards ..Friends don't let friends use Outlook
Johann

'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
________________________________________________________________
Johann L. Botha Frogfoot Networks ISP AS22355
***@frogfoot.net http://www.frogfoot.net/
+27.82.562.6167 Built and Managed with Attention to Detail
0860 KERMIT
http://blue.frogfoot.net/
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 18:19:09 UTC
Permalink
Post by Johann Botha
In principle I support 2002-3, but..
* It may have a much bigger impact on the size of the global routing table
Likely it will not, since, many of the effected providers are announcing
more specific holes of PA space anyway.
Post by Johann Botha
* If by supporting 2002-3 and letting 2003-15 slide we end up without
consensus or a long timeline until we see this as policy, then I'm sure
you can see why I would rather focus my voice/effort behind 2003-15.
I'm hoping that you can see that by keeping 2003-15 on the table both
policies
are being jeopardized to non-consensus or long timelines. If 2003-15 takes
effect, it could create more of an uphill battle for 2002-3. Afterall, if
Africa gets what they need, they would have no reason to support what we
need in North America, even though we're asking for the same thing.
In 2002-3, we ask for everybody to get what is needed. In 2003-15, Africa
asks for what Africa needs while ignoring that everyone needs it.
Post by Johann Botha
* I see ARIN (and others) as babysitting Africa's RIR services,
try to think of this as a decision AfriNIC should be taking but cant and
is asking for your your support.
Sorry... I don't see it that way. I see AfriNIC as vaporware. If AfriNIC
existed, AfriNIC could take this step. AfriNIC doesn't exist and may or
may not exist some time in the future. I see this as an attempt to get
the policy African ISPs need for African ISPs while leaving other ISPs who
need it out in the cold. I agree that the large North American ISPs that
have a lot of influence in ARIN are more likely to accept 2003-15 than
to accept 2002-3 because they have a vested financial interest in keeping
smaller ISPs stuck in their PA space to prevent provider independence.
However, isn't that the main argument African ISPs have in favor of this
proposal? The need for PI space to get out from under the opressions of
the incumbant telcos? As I see it, the providers in Africa, all of which
qualify as small providers, should band together with those of us in
North America that feel that small providers should be allowed to exist
and have all the same rights to PI space that large providers have (same
ability to get what they need, not necessarily same size blocks). We should
try to adapt 2002-3 to fully encompass that, and, we should try really hard
to get 2002-3 implemented as soon as possible.

Supporting 2003-15 only serves to fragment this already under-represented
community and undermine the possibility of either policy getting passed.
Post by Johann Botha
So I think what I'm saying is.. please dont stand in the way of 2003-15,
or at least carefully think about why you would want to.. and rather help
us get this done quickly.. after which you can use it as precedent to
better the argument for 2002-3.
Sorry... I think 2003-15 is more likely to be used as precedent by the large
ISPs to say "See... This isn't needed in North America where we have large
providers. We made an exception for Africa where it makes sense." and
2002-3 dies on the table. I see 2003-15 as a direct threat to getting
a global policy instead of a step towards it. That is why I will stand
in the way of any sub-regional policy.

Owen
khetan
2003-09-23 14:09:23 UTC
Permalink
We (SAI) a ISP in South Africa fully support the proposal for portable
ip allocations as we find it difficult to obtain our own address
space.
--
Best regards,
khetan

SAI
Mark Slingsby
2003-09-23 14:27:16 UTC
Permalink
We at RSAWeb Internet Services fully support the proposal for portable
ip allocations as we find it difficult to obtain our own address space.

We need to utilise this for multi-homing facilities and to develop our
network further. As an African ISP we do not have the network size
required to be allocated our own address space, but need our own address
space for multihoming and redundancy. At the moment we are limited to
one international connectivity provider and do not have multiple
redundant links because we don't have our own space. Connections
frequently drop due to environmental conditions and other hardware
related issues (not on our side, but our upstream providers)

We fully support this proposal.

Sincerely,

Mark Slingsby

RSAWeb Internet Services cc




-----Original Message-----
From: owner-***@arin.net [mailto:owner-***@arin.net] On Behalf Of
khetan
Sent: 23 September 2003 04:09 PM
To: ***@arin.net
Subject: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the
Africa Portion of the ARIN Region



We (SAI) a ISP in South Africa fully support the proposal for portable
ip allocations as we find it difficult to obtain our own address
space.
--
Best regards,
khetan

SAI
Jared Cassidy
2003-09-23 16:38:35 UTC
Permalink
Bucknet supports this proposal, and agree that it will stimulate the african
internet
business.

Jared Cassidy
Bucknet Internet

() ASCII Ribbon Campaign -
/\ Just say "no" to HTML, RTF, MS Word, & vCards in email.
_______________________________________________



---
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Randy Bush
2003-09-23 16:54:39 UTC
Permalink
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.

randy (who suggested this hack five years ago)
Ron da Silva
2003-09-23 17:22:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
Is there anything in 2003-15 that is not covered by 2002-3?
-ron
Rob Hunter
2003-09-23 19:32:06 UTC
Permalink
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
it was definately widely supported by south africans at the meeting.
unfortunately there weren't many faces from isp's from neighboring
countries present. hopefully they'll make their voices heard, as i
expect there to be many worse off than those of us in .za

Regards

--Rob
Randy Bush
2003-09-23 20:29:36 UTC
Permalink
Post by Rob Hunter
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
it was definately widely supported by south africans at the meeting.
unfortunately there weren't many faces from isp's from neighboring
countries present. hopefully they'll make their voices heard, as i
expect there to be many worse off than those of us in .za
hint: this affects the GLOBAL routing tables

randy
Jared Cassidy
2003-09-23 22:07:46 UTC
Permalink
Maybe a good practise to get ready for the rather large tables ipv6 could
bring :)

Jared Cassidy
Bucknet Internet

() ASCII Ribbon Campaign -
/\ Just say "no" to HTML, RTF, MS Word, & vCards in email.
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Randy Bush" <***@psg.com>
To: "Rob Hunter" <***@za.uu.net>
Cc: <***@arin.net>
Sent: Tuesday, September 23, 2003 10:29 PM
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the
Africa Portion of the ARIN Region
Post by Randy Bush
Post by Rob Hunter
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
it was definately widely supported by south africans at the meeting.
unfortunately there weren't many faces from isp's from neighboring
countries present. hopefully they'll make their voices heard, as i
expect there to be many worse off than those of us in .za
hint: this affects the GLOBAL routing tables
randy
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.520 / Virus Database: 318 - Release Date: 9/19/2003
Geoff Huston
2003-09-23 23:43:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by b***@karoshi.com
Post by Randy Bush
Post by Rob Hunter
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
it was definately widely supported by south africans at the meeting.
unfortunately there weren't many faces from isp's from neighboring
countries present. hopefully they'll make their voices heard, as i
expect there to be many worse off than those of us in .za
hint: this affects the GLOBAL routing tables
^ may
Post by Randy Bush
randy
since address delegations do not always routing
entries make. ...
If one places an interpretation on the comment that this may
have a potentially _negative_ effect on the routing system, then......

Even so, this may or may not have any material outcome
in terms of routing scaleability and stability in any case.

Its not the size of the routing table that has been the problem
for many years - memory is indeed cheap

Nor the size of the forwarding tables - while various forms
of TCAM is not cheap, it appears to be sufficiently
cheap.

It has been argued its the compute load associated with the protocol
update volume, although that has not been a problem for some years

So it has then been suggested that it was the observation that the
growth in the table was faster than Moore's law (doubling every 18 months)
and that the update volume was directly proportional to the size of the table
and this growth _could_ cause the load to exceed silicon capabilities
at some time in the future.

The observation is that growth trajectories have altered substantially
since 2000
and this form of Internet death by scaling appears to be once more a
very remote possibility.

So when I read this hint I'm inclined to offer the comment that it is at
present
a very minor consideration, and that this particular initiative would be
absolutely
invisible compared with the more prevalent practice of advertising covering
aggregates and then inserting relatively unstable /24s into the global
routing mesh.
This latter practice is the noisy end of routing that forms the basis of
our mutual
concerns over scaleability of the entire inter-domain routing system.

Of course the author may well have deliberately avoided any form of
positive or negative connotation in the hint, and was neutrally pointing out
that such a policy would generate additional routing table entries. In which
case, yes, the close correlation between assignment policies and resultant
routing
advertisements has been noted in the past, and there is no reason to think
this would be any different.

Geoff
Gregory Massel
2003-09-24 00:56:38 UTC
Permalink
Post by Randy Bush
hint: this affects the GLOBAL routing tables
Let's look at this practically.

ZA is presently announcing approximately 650 prefixes. If you include the
rest of Africa that falls within the ARIN allocation region, this would
still be less than 1000 prefixes. Given that a global routing table is
approximately 120'000 prefixes, we're talking about less than 1% of the
table.

Even if the number of ISPs in Africa receiving address space from ARIN were
to double, this would have an impact of under 1% of the table. (Remember,
not all of the ~1'000 prefixes are ARIN assignments...many - if not most -
are from upstreams and pre-ARIN).

There are only 19 ARIN members in Africa. If this figure were to quadruple,
that may mean another 57 new prefixes to be announced... 0.05% of the total
routing table.

This affects the global routing tables in the same way that a butterfly
affects wind currents.

-Greg
Calvin Browne
2003-09-24 10:47:22 UTC
Permalink
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
Having spoken to other Africans, it's my opinion that they suffer much
more than South African ISP's for the same (but more intense) reasons -
William - how about getting input from the AfrISPA folks from non SA
ISP's?
Post by Randy Bush
randy (who suggested this hack five years ago)
I could have used this five years ago when setting up what by SA
standards would have been a medium ISP, but probably a small ISP by
North American standards.

While we were 'multihomed' we got little of the benefit - eventually I
just hid everything behing IP masquarading, but it was a real pain and
hindered our growth to a large extent - and I've seen the same occuring
to people time again since.

--Calvin

---------------------* My opinions are mine *---------------------------
Calvin Browne ***@UniForum.org.za ***@lvin.co.za
Office phone: 080 314 0077 +27 11 314-0077
http://orange-tree.alt.za Mobile: +27 83 303-0663
Call me for Linux/Internet consulting
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mury
2003-09-23 20:41:36 UTC
Permalink
Post by Aragon Gouveia
procedures. In turn this means only about 10% of the ISPs are capable of
providing the higher service levels that portable address space makes
possible.
Please excuse me for being dense today, but can you define "higher
service levels"? In addition, would you please tell me why one can't
provide those "higher service levels" under current policies?

Is this an issue of not wanting to renumber? If so, I think the
discussion on this policy is dead.

The *only* valid argument in the policy proposal I could find is this:

"Lack of adequate IPv4 address space may be slowing down the growth and
development of the Internet in Africa."

However there are no reasons given. Why are smaller ISPs in Africa unable
to obtain IP space from upstream providers? That question needs to be
answered and if there is a valid issue there it needs to be taken care of
at the source. It shouldn't be circumvented by loosening requirements for
one geogrpahic area.
Post by Aragon Gouveia
Although it may be technically possible for a US company to setup an African
shell company to be used in the US just so they can gain access to their own
/22, this would be practically senseless given the much higher relative costs
of running an ISP type business here and, more importantly, the much lower
levels of service with international connectivity from here. I think they'd
be more likely to seek another line of business than even considering this
route.
Agreed no US company is going to go through the hassle of setting up a
shell company in Africa. Renumbering would be far easier.

Regards,

Mury
b***@karoshi.com
2003-09-23 21:43:20 UTC
Permalink
Post by Randy Bush
Post by Rob Hunter
Post by Randy Bush
clearly there is a big promo campaign in south africa to make
this proposal seem widely supported. i suggest that input from
other folk would be interesting.
it was definately widely supported by south africans at the meeting.
unfortunately there weren't many faces from isp's from neighboring
countries present. hopefully they'll make their voices heard, as i
expect there to be many worse off than those of us in .za
hint: this affects the GLOBAL routing tables
^ may
Post by Randy Bush
randy
since address delegations do not always routing
entries make. ...

--bill
Ian Baker
2003-09-23 22:12:04 UTC
Permalink
Leo,
(I'm sending this by mobile client, so please forgive the formatting
eccentricity)

I see (and mostly agree) with your technicaI argument.

However.

There are very real infrastructure differences and implications between the
US & Africa.
unknown
2003-09-23 16:16:46 UTC
Permalink
Am I attempting to justify some particular policy or override?

No.

Just that - I believe - we all have a common goal in promoting Internet
availabilty and usage, worldwide.

Apologies for the non-technical content, I've just that I've seen this
techie vs. "other" stuff before.

I have no "agenda".

I've visited two N.African countries, but that's it. No axe to bear or
drum/chest to beat..

Regards,

Ian Baker

________________ Reply Header ________________
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for the
Africa Portion of the ARIN Region
Author: Leo Bicknell <***@ufp.org>
Date: 23rd September 2003 11:16:46 am

In a message written on Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 08:36:12AM +0200, Darren
Post by Darren
It is obvious that Africa has no where near the resources of first
world
Post by Darren
countries and therefore should be judged on their own merits as it is
done in other industries. Whereas a smaller ISP in America can obtain
their own IP allocation, this is not possible in Africa. Only the
very
Post by Darren
rich companies, which are normally international companies, can
obtain
Post by Darren
the requirements, while the local companies cannot. This seems to be
a
Post by Darren
good proposal to try to level the playing fields.
I'm having a little bit of trouble with this line of argument. I'd
like to address a few of the points raised.

- The playing field is level.

Today the same policies apply to anyone asking for IP space. It
doesn't matter if your from Africa or Podunk Iowa, the process
is applied equally and fairly. This proposal will actually create
an unlevel playing field that favors African ISP's. For instance,
would it be possible under this proposal for a US company to set
up an African shell company, get IP space, and then use it in the
US? Making things like that possible would be very bad.

- African ISP's have taken steps to preserve space, which is part of
the problem.

I think it's great that African ISP's have figured out how to use
NAT and other technologies to save space. While I don't want to
advocate "wasting" space my first question would be if you're
going to renumber into your own portable block anyway why not get
rid of the NAT, which will also improve your customers connectivity?
There are, after all, applications that do not work through NAT.
Would counting all those customers in a request justify enough
IP's to qualify under the current procedures?

At the end of the day I'm sure there are more than a few ISP's in the
US
and Canada that would love to have smaller allocations. Indeed,
you'll
see in the archives I've argued that we should make smaller
allocations
available to everyone. That said, this proposal leaves a bad taste in
my mouth because it tells the ISP in Africa that needs a /22 that
they
are "special enough" to get it, but the same sized ISP in some
other
country is not.

Put another way, I don't recall the lack of cheap bandwidth or
the
pervasive use of NAT to have ever been factors in setting the
allocation
size before, and that makes me wonder why we should start now.

If we're going to change the allocation size I believe strongly it
should be a global change, and not a local change that favors
one
particular group.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
William Stucke
2003-09-23 23:24:09 UTC
Permalink
Leo Bicknell asked some pertinent questions about "What's special about
Africa"? The answer lies in two related issues: COST and SCALE.

Let's first deal with the issue of cost - and no, it's not a trivial one,
nor is it an "excuse" by Africans for a "free ride".

By way of introduction, in most of the 53 countries in Africa, ISPs don't
have a choice of from whom they get service, nor how it is carried. They are
obliged to use the monopoly incumbent, or go to jail. Some of those monopoly
Telcos are VERY reluctant to assign IP addresses - e.g. Kenya.
It doesn't matter if your from Africa or Podunk Iowa
I couldn't find a Podunk in Iowa (I gather that the term means "nowhere
town" in American?) but I did find Bonaparte, Iowa, population 465. If I was
an ISP in Bonaparte, Iowa, and I wanted a T1 line to the BWW (Big Wide World
[tm]), it would cost me $1,024 to $1,052 per month from one of two providers
(http://shopfort1.com). If I was an ISP in Africa and I got it from my
state-legislated monopoly Telco, it would cost me ~$55,000 per month for the
same dedicated T1 symmetrical bandwidth.

Shared satellite bandwidth is somewhat cheaper, but obviously of a much
poorer quality - although in many African countries it's all one can get.

Additionally, the cost of leased lines to one's customers, or to local
peering points, is generally several orders of magnitude higher than in the
North American continent.

On the income side, the picture is just as bleak. My company charges $14 per
month for an unlimited access dial-up connection, for example. That compares
rather well with a typical North American ISP, I suspect, especially
considering that my primary input cost is 55 times higher than in Podunk (or
75 times higher than in California) ;-)

SCALE

By way of comparison with Bonaparte, Iowa, the population of African
countries varied from 80,000 (Seychelles) to 116,930,000 (Nigeria) in 2001.
A total of 817 million people shared 1.5 Gbps outgoing - the equivalent of
1000 T1s - in 2002.

Market sizes are not large. In fact they're tiny. There are only 1,600,000
dial-up subscribers, and hardly any cable or DSL subscribers, in the whole
of Africa. The reasons for this include extortionately high Telco costs (we
don't have ANY free local calls in any African country that I'm aware of),
very low average income - $1600 per capita per year in sub-Saharan Africa,
very low tele-density and low literacy rates. Not forgetting the incredibly
high cost of international bandwidth that we "enjoy".

On the tele-density issue, one of the most "connected" and "Internet-active"
countries in Africa, Kenya, only had a total of some 450,000 telephone lines
installed when I last heard. Ghana has 250,000. That's more than Bonaparte,
Iowa, but a lot less than a large town or small city in the USA!

A "really big ISP" (think AOL, Earthlink) in Africa has a few 100,000
dial-up subscribers, or a few hundred leased lines. There are only a handful
of these (I can think of three, off hand), which is why there are only 19
LIRs in sub-Saharan Africa. The overwhelming majority of African ISPs are
far, far, smaller. For them, 1,000 subscribers is a lot.

On the issue of scale, the 10 countries in Africa with the most outgoing
international bandwidth (2002) are (figures in Mbps): -

EGYPT 535
SOUTH AFRICA * 399
MOROCCO 136
ALGERIA 83
TUNISIA 75
SENEGAL * 60
KENYA* 28
GABON * 16
NIGERIA * 15
BOTSWANA * 14

* = Sub-Saharan Africa

The remaining countries have less than 13 Mbps each, with Equatorial Guinea
at the bottom of the list with 64 kbps for half a million people.

I'd imagine that many of the people on this list have more bandwidth than
most of these entire countries for their ISP alone. How many North American
ISPs have multiple T3s?

It's not a linear relationship, but size of customer base and IP addresses
used are certainly related to bandwidth consumed.

The high cost (relative to income) of being an Internet subscriber in Africa
means that many ISPs have to share a very small market - which leads to few
IP addresses being used. The high cost of operating as an ISP in Africa
means that margins are small to non-existent, and that it's impossible to
expand as we'd like to.

What this means is that $2500 for an IP allocation from ARIN represents
quite a lot of money for an African ISP. Also, because the scale of an
African ISP is so very much smaller, it's also very difficult indeed to meet
the ARIN requirements in terms of using a /20 before being allocated
portable address space.
That said, this proposal leaves a bad taste in
my mouth because it tells the ISP in Africa that needs a /22 that they
are "special enough" to get it, but the same sized ISP in some other
country is not.

I understand your point, but consider this: there's something else that
leaves a bad taste in my mouth. If I send an email to you in Bonaparte, say,
from anywhere in Africa, I pay the full cost of international transit - both
half circuits. If you send me an email from Bonaparte, I pay the full cost
of international transit - both half circuits. You don't pay a penny for the
international transit. You only pay your "local" connectivity costs of $750
for a T1 in California or $1000 in Bonaparte, Iowa. This represents an
enormous export of scarce foreign currency from the developing world to the
developed world. In fact, Africa pays the developed world some $400M per
year just to send African traffic from one African country to another, via
the USA, Europe and the Far East. (See "The Halfway Proposition"
http://www.afrispa.org)

A point that hasn't been raised yet: PEERING. AfrISPA has been instrumental
in helping a number of countries establish national peering points, with 11
so far installed in total in Africa (AfrISPA can't claim credit for all of
them, mark you). There is *NO* regional peering in place as yet, although
we're working on that too ;-)

It's not impossible to peer at an IXP if you don't have address space
independent from your upstream provider, but it sure is a whole heap
easier - especially if he's uncooperative. It's really difficult to peer
with an ISP in another country (that your upstream doesn't operate in) and
optimise your routing without portable address space.
If we're going to change the allocation size I believe strongly it
should be a global change

I don't disagree with this point. Bear in mind, however, that part of the
justification of the 2003-15 proposal is to enable more LIRs in sub-Saharan
Africa, so that the infant AfriNIC will have more than 19 members to take
on. This is perhaps a (another) suitable justification for a
geographic-specific policy. ;-)
- The playing field is level.
I submit that it's far from level, in comparing sub-Saharan Africa with the
North American continent.

Regards,

William Stucke
ZAnet Internet Services (Pty) Ltd
Chairman - AfrISPA
+27 11 465 0700
***@zanet.co.za

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Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.515 / Virus Database: 313 - Release Date: 2003/09/01
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 00:51:29 UTC
Permalink
Post by William Stucke
I couldn't find a Podunk in Iowa (I gather that the term means "nowhere
town" in American?) but I did find Bonaparte, Iowa, population 465. If I
was an ISP in Bonaparte, Iowa, and I wanted a T1 line to the BWW (Big
Wide World [tm]), it would cost me $1,024 to $1,052 per month from one of
two providers (http://shopfort1.com). If I was an ISP in Africa and I got
it from my state-legislated monopoly Telco, it would cost me ~$55,000 per
month for the same dedicated T1 symmetrical bandwidth.
For that price per month, terrestrial microwave would pay for itself
rather quickly. Have you considered setting up terrestrial microwave
links between providers?
Post by William Stucke
Shared satellite bandwidth is somewhat cheaper, but obviously of a much
poorer quality - although in many African countries it's all one can get.
Additionally, the cost of leased lines to one's customers, or to local
peering points, is generally several orders of magnitude higher than in
the North American continent.
Whereas the cost of terrestrial microwave tends to be on the order of 2-3
times circuits in north am.
Post by William Stucke
On the income side, the picture is just as bleak. My company charges $14
per month for an unlimited access dial-up connection, for example. That
compares rather well with a typical North American ISP, I suspect,
especially considering that my primary input cost is 55 times higher than
in Podunk (or 75 times higher than in California) ;-)
I don't think it is the job of ARIN to make exceptions so that your
particular
business model can work. If your costs are higher, then, those costs should
be passed on to your customers.

I don't object to moving the minimum allocation unit to /22, but, I do
object
to doing it specifically for Africa. It should be done in general.
Post by William Stucke
SCALE
By way of comparison with Bonaparte, Iowa, the population of African
countries varied from 80,000 (Seychelles) to 116,930,000 (Nigeria) in
2001. A total of 817 million people shared 1.5 Gbps outgoing - the
equivalent of 1000 T1s - in 2002.
Market sizes are not large. In fact they're tiny. There are only 1,600,000
dial-up subscribers, and hardly any cable or DSL subscribers, in the whole
of Africa. The reasons for this include extortionately high Telco costs
(we don't have ANY free local calls in any African country that I'm aware
of), very low average income - $1600 per capita per year in sub-Saharan
Africa, very low tele-density and low literacy rates. Not forgetting the
incredibly high cost of international bandwidth that we "enjoy".
I don't see how changing the minimum IP allocation unit will fix any of
those rather severe social engineering problems.
Post by William Stucke
On the tele-density issue, one of the most "connected" and
"Internet-active" countries in Africa, Kenya, only had a total of some
450,000 telephone lines installed when I last heard. Ghana has 250,000.
That's more than Bonaparte, Iowa, but a lot less than a large town or
small city in the USA!
A "really big ISP" (think AOL, Earthlink) in Africa has a few 100,000
dial-up subscribers, or a few hundred leased lines. There are only a
handful of these (I can think of three, off hand), which is why there are
only 19 LIRs in sub-Saharan Africa. The overwhelming majority of African
ISPs are far, far, smaller. For them, 1,000 subscribers is a lot.
OK... So, let me sum up what you're saying... You think that it's still
OK to engineer the internet allocation policies around what the large
providers feel is necessary, but, that's picking on Africa because the
large providers in Africa can't be large enough to appear large to the
big boys in North America. Sorry... We should either fix this for ALL
providers that need /22s or none. I wasn't completely convinced by
Leo's arguments, but, your clarifications have swayed me the rest of
the way there.
Post by William Stucke
On the issue of scale, the 10 countries in Africa with the most outgoing
international bandwidth (2002) are (figures in Mbps): -
I submit that it's far from level, in comparing sub-Saharan Africa with
the North American continent.
The playing field is level. The resources available to the two teams before
they get to the field are vastly different. On one side of the field,
you have a collection of well-funded rich kids from North America. On the
other side, you have a collection of poor ISPs trying to help an even
poorer customer base. The disparity between the economics of the two
teams does not mean the field is not level. It does mean that there
are many other factors that come into whether it is a fair contest or not.

However, making exceptions to the rules of the game to make the contest
more fair for a subset of the disadvantaged teams is not the right
answer. If we are going to change the rules to help disadvantaged teams,
we should help them all. We should change the rules for all smaller
providers.

I would support this if it generally moved the allocation unit to /22
instead of /20. I will not support it if it is specific to Africa.


Owen
Alec H. Peterson
2003-09-24 01:01:33 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
For that price per month, terrestrial microwave would pay for itself
rather quickly. Have you considered setting up terrestrial microwave
links between providers?
This assumes the local authority that regulates the electromagnetic
spectrum allows such links to be setup.

Alec
Aragon Gouveia
2003-09-24 10:01:38 UTC
Permalink
| By Alec H. Peterson <***@hilander.com>
| [ 2003-09-24 03:02 +0200 ]
Post by Alec H. Peterson
Post by Owen DeLong
For that price per month, terrestrial microwave would pay for itself
rather quickly. Have you considered setting up terrestrial microwave
links between providers?
This assumes the local authority that regulates the electromagnetic
spectrum allows such links to be setup.
Thank you for pointing this out. Not even 802.11 is legal in South Africa,
let alone Microwave. Except in very special cases where our monopolised
telco may be forced to implement wireless connectivity, but they will still
charge the same (if not more) for this service as they do for a wired
connection of the same speed.


Regards,
Aragon
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 01:12:35 UTC
Permalink
Post by William Stucke
I couldn't find a Podunk in Iowa (I gather that the term means "nowhere
town" in American?) but I did find Bonaparte, Iowa, population 465. If I was
an ISP in Bonaparte, Iowa, and I wanted a T1 line to the BWW (Big Wide World
[tm]), it would cost me $1,024 to $1,052 per month from one of two providers
(http://shopfort1.com). If I was an ISP in Africa and I got it from my
state-legislated monopoly Telco, it would cost me ~$55,000 per month for the
same dedicated T1 symmetrical bandwidth.
[snip]
Post by William Stucke
On the income side, the picture is just as bleak. My company charges $14 per
month for an unlimited access dial-up connection, for example. That compares
rather well with a typical North American ISP, I suspect, especially
considering that my primary input cost is 55 times higher than in Podunk (or
75 times higher than in California) ;-)
[Note; Yes, Podunk is a generic small town.]

You're getting right to my point with this response. I've been
told small ISP's (eg, 1-5 T1's in a small town, single upstream,
no real network) plan on 50-100 dial-up users per T1. Let me assume
Africa, being more bandwidth starved, is 10 times worse, so 500-1000.
At 1000 users * $14 per user = 14000, if your T1 costs $55000 you're
losing $41000 per month.

Now, let's say I have you a /16 today, free and clear. How are you
ever going to be able to afford to use it? How does having it make
your costs go down? How does having it encourage more people to
buy service from you? Or, most directly to the point, why can't
you get addresses from your upstream to meet your needs? I know
my employer (which doesn't sell IPL's, admittedly) would happily
give you up to a /20, all you have to do is document your usage to
the same guidelines ARIN requires. Is that process broken? Would
multi-homing significantly change the cost model for the better (I would
think it would make it worse)?
Post by William Stucke
A "really big ISP" (think AOL, Earthlink) in Africa has a few 100,000
dial-up subscribers, or a few hundred leased lines. There are only a handful
of these (I can think of three, off hand), which is why there are only 19
LIRs in sub-Saharan Africa. The overwhelming majority of African ISPs are
far, far, smaller. For them, 1,000 subscribers is a lot.
Let's say 10% are online at any one time (I'm assuming dial up,
which if there are no free local calls seems optimistic). the ISP
needs a /25 for the dial pool, let's give them another /25 for
"infrastructure". They fit in a /24.

Is there a problem getting a /24 from the upstream? Do you think it
would be possible to multihome with a /24 (hint, depending on block it
may or may not work)? Does it make sense to require a 25% usage
requirement (assuming we give them a /22, per the proposal)? Is a 75%
waste factor something we want to encourage anywhere?
Post by William Stucke
I understand your point, but consider this: there's something else that
leaves a bad taste in my mouth. If I send an email to you in Bonaparte, say,
from anywhere in Africa, I pay the full cost of international transit - both
half circuits. If you send me an email from Bonaparte, I pay the full cost
of international transit - both half circuits. You don't pay a penny for the
international transit. You only pay your "local" connectivity costs of $750
for a T1 in California or $1000 in Bonaparte, Iowa. This represents an
enormous export of scarce foreign currency from the developing world to the
developed world. In fact, Africa pays the developed world some $400M per
year just to send African traffic from one African country to another, via
the USA, Europe and the Far East. (See "The Halfway Proposition"
http://www.afrispa.org)
I agree 100% that this model is broken. That said, I don't see where
IP's (or lack of them) make any difference in the fact that there is an
imbalance in who pays for the traffic.

All of these arguments come back to the same thing for me, "bandwidth is
expensive". I 100% agree with that statement in Africa. I 100% think
it is an unfair situation. I have yet to see anyone establish a direct
link between IP's (or lack of them) and the problem though. It looks
like a problem that needs, in order of impact:

1) Deregulating state run monopoly telco's.
2) Creating a competitive local enviornment.
3) Raising the general standard of living in that area of the world.
4) Foreign ISP's building into Africa for local peering.
5) African ISP's building their own infrastructure (eg cables) to
other countries for peering.
6) Investment by all parties in infrastructure (eg, undersea and
overland cables).

I have a hard time putting IP's on the list at all, but if I did it
would be way down at the bottom, and it would be because they can
facilitate things like peering. However, with a lack of any peering
points in Africa, and bandwith being too expensive to go to peering
points outside of africa that seems to be putting the cart before the
horse. If there were an African peering point where at least 25% of the
African ISP's showed up, and they could document the problems of
accepting more specifics of other providers space across the exchange I
might have a change of heart.

While I admit this is my self serving position, I suggest if you want
smaller allocations you get behind 2003-3, or a similar proposal. You
can have your own opinion on if it is American arrogance or that we
really do know better, but I don't think you're going to find any real
support for 2003-15 outside of Africa with the reasons given so far.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Adiel AKPLOGAN
2003-09-24 09:46:46 UTC
Permalink
Hello,
Post by Tiaan van Aardt
As soon as a second carrier is introduced, there is bound to be some shuffle
to the new provider. Likewise with a third carrier (we can dream, can't we).
In such a case would it not be unrealistic to expect said smaller ISP to ask
all its customers to renumber simply because it has changed its upstream to
save dollars?
I think this point is very important. As it is not always easy to
justify that you have to renumber every time you change
your upstream provider....and i can tell you that this happen
very often in our environment...

*** for those wondering why ISP can not get IP from their upstream?
One reason can be the coast for raising their
membership level (category) according to the RIR fees model.
Using more IP address by providing smaller blocks to their
down stream can and up at their end with the need to move
to higher membership level and then paying more for IP block
allocated to them....

- a.


############################################
Adiel AKPLOGAN - Ingenieur réseau - RHCE / CSS
20, Boulevard Richard-Lenoir - 75011 Paris - FRANCE
Hm: +33 (0)1 49 23 02 87 | Mob: +33 (0)6 72 75 80 49
e-mail: ***@akplogan.net | Web: www.akplogan.net
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 14:26:05 UTC
Permalink
Post by Adiel AKPLOGAN
*** for those wondering why ISP can not get IP from their upstream?
One reason can be the coast for raising their
membership level (category) according to the RIR fees model.
Using more IP address by providing smaller blocks to their
down stream can and up at their end with the need to move
to higher membership level and then paying more for IP block
allocated to them....
I can see this is a very legitimate problem. ARIN fees when
translated to local currency and put in the context of an ISP's
budget may be much more of a burden. I don't think anyone wants
the ARIN support fee to prevent people from getting the IP's they
need, so if that's a problem we should get some economic data and
look at how we can make the fee less of a burden to African ISP's.
Post by Adiel AKPLOGAN
Our policy applies to the whole of the RIPE NCC service region. We
do not have any policies that apply to a sub-set of countries within
our region.
[snip]
Post by Adiel AKPLOGAN
We have 69 active LIRs in the part of Africa served by the RIPE NCC.
We have made 149 IPv4 allocations to these LIRs (about a /12 when
combined) and assigned 49 AS Numbers.
We have made eight PI assignments to network operators in Africa
since July 2001. There were all between /24 and /22.
Tiaan van Aardt
2003-09-24 00:06:51 UTC
Permalink
Hi,
Post by William Stucke
If I was an ISP in Africa and I got it from my
state-legislated monopoly Telco, it would cost me ~$55,000 per
month for the same dedicated T1 symmetrical bandwidth.
There is another key point to consider: That of lock-in.

Say you are an ISP in the SME business and you provide services to a whole
bunch of small companies with thin but dedicated lines. You get your
bandwidth from one of the large ISP's who rely on (or are themselves) the
monopoly carrier.

As soon as a second carrier is introduced, there is bound to be some shuffle
to the new provider. Likewise with a third carrier (we can dream, can't we).
In such a case would it not be unrealistic to expect said smaller ISP to ask
all its customers to renumber simply because it has changed its upstream to
save dollars?

Regards,
-Tiaan.
_____________________________________________________
TruTeq Wireless (Pty) Ltd. Tel +27 12 667 1530
http://www.truteq.co.za Fax +27 12 667 1531
Wireless communications for remote machine management
w***@elan.net
2003-09-24 00:55:34 UTC
Permalink
Post by Leo Bicknell
While I admit this is my self serving position, I suggest if you want
smaller allocations you get behind 2003-3, or a similar proposal. You
can have your own opinion on if it is American arrogance or that we
really do know better, but I don't think you're going to find any real
support for 2003-15 outside of Africa with the reasons given so far.
I do not believe opinion of the north american community on smaller
allocations should be predominant issue in this case. I believe ARIN's
operations right now in Africa should be considered as being temporary
and public service to African community until such time as it can finish
setup of its own ip registry. Since ARIN operates under consensus and
based on support from the internet community, I believe ARIN's policies in
African should be basedon consensus and support in African region and
since there is very clear support for smaller allocation in Africa, we
should allow them this.

Plus I think point about ARIN accomodating to allow better development of
internet is important and I do think there are enough good reasons to believe
that portable allocations are either in case you go to peering exchange
and can encorange competiton among upstrem providers which can futher
reduce costs and allow for faster development of internet in the region.
(its not primary factor - Leo provide good overview of what real problems
are but its enough of a factor that it may help ISPs there and they
clearly want it and are asking for it)

I also would like to ask if similar proposal has been put forward
for North African RIPE region (to reduce allocations to /22) and if so
when and how it is being considered. In general I think it would be good
idea for both RIPE and ARIN to begin developing common allocation policies
for African regions it serves based on feedback received from those
regions and to allow for either transition when Afrinic becomes RIR.

Separate but related issue has also been mentioned and that is reducing
costs of smaller allocations and assignments (current minimum maintanance
fee is $2500/year no matter how small ip block is), I believe ARIN Finance
Comitee should now (that we have two proposals for allocations & assignments
to be reduced to /22) begin to consider new level of payments for these
allocations and on the meeting should provide its proposal for new level
to be implemented in case policies are passed. It may even be good to
consider doing proposals for two smaller levels (/21-/22 and /23-/24) in
case as per policy proposal 2002-3 assignments are futher reduced. While
its not appropriate for policy related discussion to dictate exact amounts,
my sence for it would be to reduce the amount of payments for /22 to
about 2/3 of /20 and to about 1/2 for /24 (possibly $1500/year for /22
and $1000/year for /24 to make for even numbers).
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
leo vegoda
2003-09-24 07:22:55 UTC
Permalink
Hi William,

On Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 05:55:34PM -0700, ***@elan.net wrote:

[...]
Post by w***@elan.net
I also would like to ask if similar proposal has been put forward
for North African RIPE region (to reduce allocations to /22) and if so
when and how it is being considered. In general I think it would be good
idea for both RIPE and ARIN to begin developing common allocation policies
for African regions it serves based on feedback received from those
regions and to allow for either transition when Afrinic becomes RIR.
So far there has not been any discussion of separate policies
for the African portion of the RIPE NCC service region. However,
if there is demand then I am sure the topic can be raised on
the <address-policy-***@ripe.net> list and at RIPE 47 in January.

It is worth noting that current RIPE policy allows LIRs to
request PI address space for network operators. Both PA and PI
assignment policies are "exactly identical with regards to the
amount of address space assigned, the registration requirements,
etc. This also implies that assigning PI space prefixes longer
than 24 bits is perfectly acceptable if the request does not
merit 8 bits of address space to be assigned."

(http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/pi-pa.html)

Essentially, network operators in countries served by the RIPE
NCC can receive small (or large) PI assignments when justified.
There are no direct charges for the assignments as the RIPE NCC
provides service on a membership subscription basis. The request
for PI address space does not have to come from the LIR run by
their upstream provider. If their upstream is unwilling to submit
a request then they can ask any other LIR to submit if for them.

I hope this clarifies things for you.

Best regards,
--
leo vegoda
Registration Services Manager
RIPE NCC
j***@lewis.org
2003-09-24 03:56:23 UTC
Permalink
Post by Abdul Rehman Gani
We tackle this on a case-by-case basis. Most small to medium companies
or sohos internet requirements are not affected by NAT - therefore, to
save IP space we use NAT.
Alot of our customers use NAT too, primarily because the average business
connecting to the net has no need for all their windows boxes to be
directly exposed to the internet. We don't "do NAT" on our network for
customers though...it's done on CPE. Are you saying that some African
ISPs are running portions of their network behind NAT that ISPs in the US
generally would not?

What's the motivation behind "saving space"? I don't really worry about
running out of IP space (other than running out before I can get more)
because I knew when I was running a small network in PA space, I could
just ask for (and justify) more and get it. As a larger network in PI
space, the same applies...I just have to do alot more paperwork and go to
ARIN rather than one of my upstreams.

Is there some lack of IP space among African providers? I don't see why
there would be. If you use it, your providers should be able to get more.

As for economic differences, I'm sure we can find ISPs in rural parts of
the US who have few choices (and no cheap ones) for transit providers. Is
there a reason the African ISPs should get special treatment?

And you can multihome without PI space. It sucks being tied to one of
your providers (using their space), but that's the way it is. I have a
client I helped multihome who currently has 3 transit providers. He's got
hundreds of IP devices at the main office and a large handful of remote
offices connected to the main one via leased lines. Except for a few
public IP servers on his DMZ, the entire network is behind NAT. He'd love
to have PI space so he'd be more flexible and be able to "fire" transit
providers at will...but the way he uses IPs, he currently doesn't come
close to qualifying. Why shouldn't this policy apply to him?

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Lewis ****@lewis.org*| I route
Senior Network Engineer | therefore you are
Atlantic Net |
_________ http://www.lewis.org/~jlewis/pgp for PGP public key_________
Abdul Rehman Gani
2003-09-24 12:16:48 UTC
Permalink
Post by j***@lewis.org
Alot of our customers use NAT too, primarily because the average business
connecting to the net has no need for all their windows boxes to be
directly exposed to the internet. We don't "do NAT" on our network for
customers though...it's done on CPE. Are you saying that some African
ISPs are running portions of their network behind NAT that ISPs in the US
generally would not?
No us, but I cannot speak for all ISP's. We do it on CPE.
Post by j***@lewis.org
What's the motivation behind "saving space"? I don't really worry about
Managing a scarce resource.

Abdul
j***@lewis.org
2003-09-24 04:27:24 UTC
Permalink
Post by Tiaan van Aardt
As soon as a second carrier is introduced, there is bound to be some shuffle
to the new provider. Likewise with a third carrier (we can dream, can't we).
In such a case would it not be unrealistic to expect said smaller ISP to ask
all its customers to renumber simply because it has changed its upstream to
save dollars?
That's the way it works in the US.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Lewis ****@lewis.org*| I route
Senior Network Engineer | therefore you are
Atlantic Net |
_________ http://www.lewis.org/~jlewis/pgp for PGP public key_________
w***@elan.net
2003-09-24 06:39:44 UTC
Permalink
Post by leo vegoda
It is worth noting that current RIPE policy allows LIRs to
request PI address space for network operators. Both PA and PI
assignment policies are "exactly identical with regards to the
amount of address space assigned, the registration requirements,
etc. This also implies that assigning PI space prefixes longer
than 24 bits is perfectly acceptable if the request does not
merit 8 bits of address space to be assigned."
(http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/pi-pa.html)
Thank you for the clarification as I could never understood for sure if
your PI blocks can be allocated or only assigned and it was difficult to
tell for sure from allocations because so many blocks are improperly
marked in whois assigned instead of allocated and PA instead of PI.

As it appears inlike ARIN, RIPE already has policies that apply to Africa
that allow providers there to request PI space, I think it would be
interesting as feedback when considering 2003-15 to know how many PI
blocks have been allocated by RIPE to organizations with address listed in
Africa. If you have kept such statistics, please let us know for last
several years, if possible separately listing number of PI assigned and
PI Allocated space per year to organizations in Africa.

If possible also for comparison provide statistics on how LIRs in RIPE
are from Africa (i.e. like member ISPs in ARIN).

Thanks
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
leo vegoda
2003-09-24 11:15:16 UTC
Permalink
Hi William,

On Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 11:39:44PM -0700, ***@elan.net wrote:

[...]
Post by w***@elan.net
Thank you for the clarification as I could never understood for sure if
your PI blocks can be allocated or only assigned and it was difficult to
tell for sure from allocations because so many blocks are improperly
marked in whois assigned instead of allocated and PA instead of PI.
We only make PI assignments, now. In the past we have made PI
allocations. The definitions we use for the terms "allocate" and
"assign" are nicely defined in the common IPv6 policy document (our
IPv4 policy documentation is being updated).

http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ipv6policy.html#allocate

http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ipv6policy.html#assign
Post by w***@elan.net
As it appears inlike ARIN, RIPE already has policies that apply to Africa
that allow providers there to request PI space, I think it would be
Our policy applies to the whole of the RIPE NCC service region. We
do not have any policies that apply to a sub-set of countries within
our region.
Post by w***@elan.net
interesting as feedback when considering 2003-15 to know how many PI
blocks have been allocated by RIPE to organizations with address listed in
Africa. If you have kept such statistics, please let us know for last
several years, if possible separately listing number of PI assigned and
PI Allocated space per year to organizations in Africa.
If possible also for comparison provide statistics on how LIRs in RIPE
are from Africa (i.e. like member ISPs in ARIN).
We have 69 active LIRs in the part of Africa served by the RIPE NCC.
We have made 149 IPv4 allocations to these LIRs (about a /12 when
combined) and assigned 49 AS Numbers.

We have made eight PI assignments to network operators in Africa
since July 2001. There were all between /24 and /22.

I hope this information is useful to you.

Best regards,
--
leo vegoda
Registration Services Manager
RIPE NCC
M***@radianz.com
2003-09-24 09:32:14 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
Post by Aragon Gouveia
procedures. In turn this means only about 10% of the ISPs are capable
of
Post by Mury
Post by Aragon Gouveia
providing the higher service levels that portable address space makes
possible.
Please excuse me for being dense today, but can you define "higher
service levels"? In addition, would you please tell me why one can't
provide those "higher service levels" under current policies?
It was already pointed out that portable space is needed for multihoming
and, in Africa, there are more frequent outages for single-homed
providers, therefore in order to increase service levels a provider
needs to multihome. And since these are smaller companies on average
it makes sense to allocate them smaller portable blocks to avoid
wasting IP addresses.

Since current policies make it impossible for African ISPs to get
portable blocks, current policies are making multihoming impossible
therefore current policies are an indirect cause of low service
levels in Africa.
Post by Mury
However there are no reasons given. Why are smaller ISPs in Africa
unable
Post by Mury
to obtain IP space from upstream providers?
We went through this discussion several years ago when U.S. ISPs were a
lot smaller on average. The issue is not lack of IP space, it is lack
of portable IP space. An upstream provider cannot issue portable IP space,
only an RIR like ARIN can do that.
Post by Mury
That question needs to be
answered and if there is a valid issue there it needs to be taken care of
at the source. It shouldn't be circumvented by loosening requirements
for
Post by Mury
one geogrpahic area.
In this special case, I don't see a problem with setting special policies
for one geographic area. This is a transitional policy that is part of the
process of setting up an African RIR to handle the needs of ISPs that are
now served by RIPE and ARIN and APNIC. I would be opposed to special
policies
for California or Newfoundland but I support them for continental Africa.

--Michael Dillon
Theo Kramer
2003-09-24 11:45:17 UTC
Permalink
Not really. Randy has a point. The proposal is targetted at Africa, not just
South Africa. I'd also like to hear the opinions of other African countries
to see if they're faced with the same difficulties we are.
It is targeted at the region of Africa which is covered by ARIN.
Unfortunately I have a feeling few other African internet communities will
be aware of this proposal right now. :/
If they are, speak up please!
I have forwarded the policy notification to afrinic-***@afrinic.org.
Regards
Theo
Richard Jimmerson
2003-09-24 15:46:29 UTC
Permalink
Hello Leo,
So, is ARIN or RIPE assigning space in Africa?
Mark ELkins (by way of Mark ELkins )
2003-09-24 15:51:57 UTC
Permalink
So, is ARIN or RIPE assigning space in Africa?
William Stucke
2003-09-24 15:57:17 UTC
Permalink
Leo Bicknell asked: -
So, is ARIN or RIPE assigning space in Africa?
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 16:35:08 UTC
Permalink
The E-Bay example is comparing apples with oranges, I think. E-Bay runs a
web site, they don't provide access, as far as I know. Their "users" are
accessing their web sites to buy and sell stuff. That doesn't make them an
ISP. It means that they go to an ISP who *IS* multihomed and pay him to
host their servers.
E-Bay is not an ISP. However, E-Bay does have reasons to go to more than
one ISP and _BE_ multihomed themselves.
Post by Leo Bicknell
When a US ISP the same size as an African ISP comes to ARIN after
this has passed and claims that if an African ISP of his size can
multi-home, what argument are we going to use to tell him no?
I have no problem in making it a global solution. Follow the RIPE example
and have "micro" members.
Then encourage everyone trying to get 2003-15 to get behind the
micro-allocation
policy (I think it's 2002-3) and we can stop having 2003-15 detract from
a real solution.

Owen
w***@elan.net
2003-09-24 14:10:22 UTC
Permalink
Post by Leo Bicknell
Post by Johann Botha
I have no problem if ARIN adopts this criteria as policy for other regions.
Then please support 2002-3. There are three basic positions, people
who don't want to move the prefix size, people who want to move it
globally, and people who want to move it in Africa. If the latter
two combine efforts behind 2003-3 it will be more likely to pass,
where as if they both continue both are likely to be rejected for
lack of support.
I would like to highlight some differences between 2002-3 and 2002-15:

2002-3 is policy to alloe micro-assignments for ARIN region, that is
assignments of ip space for use directly by organization (that
organization can be ISP and use it for dialup, though as I uderstand
which may work for African ISPs). Also note that organizations that
received ip space under 2002 would not become members of ARIN (at least as
far as I understand proposal now, I would like to have ARIN staff respond
here if this is not true and they would be members automaticly with
micro-assignments).

2003-15 proposal would allow for smaller allocations for African region
only, allowing those ip blocks to be used by ISPs not only for themselve
but also allowing them to reassign portion of the block to their customers.
Since these would be allocations, my understanding is that African ISPs
received ip blocks under that proposal would become members of ARIN
Post by Leo Bicknell
I care because that will be the very next question raised. I'll
tell you right now that if 100 ISP's in Africa can get the allocation
size moved in Africa, there will be 1000 ISP's in the US who will
come back and say "what about me, I'm bigger then they are after
all, so I should be able to multi-home too". This policy change will
have impact to other regions, and ARIN must consider that when it
makes policy.
If we make sufficiently clear that policy is being adapted only to support
establishment of RIR in that region, they would understand and not ask.
Post by Leo Bicknell
Post by Johann Botha
If you feel stongly that the US ISP in your example should be given IP
space.. well, then submit a proposal.
One is already there, 2002-3. I support it.
See above on differences between 2002-3 (ip space provided to end-usersk,
not ISPs) and 2003-15 (ip space for ISPs).
Post by Leo Bicknell
Now, that is a horse of a different color. I had no idea allocations
were so fragmented across the continent (I had simply never looked
before), and now that I see RIPE, ARIN, and APNIC are all involved
I am a strong supporter of getting an AfriNIC up and running to
unify the process in that region. They would of course be free to
set their own policies -- however
Fully setting up RIR is not as easy as that, especially in Africa. Its
not only policies and handling of requests but they need to have enough
members to support the RIR financially (and for example LACNIC is getting
funding from two regional registries in Brazil and Mexico, none of that
exists in Africa). There are also lots of other technical, administration,
legal and other challenges before RIR could be ready. I do not think
Afrinic is anywhere close to that position and will not be in the next 2
years. Currently Afrinic is instead planning to setup a mini RIR within
RIPE and handle registrations by their personnel but according to RIPE
policies, but providing ip space in South Africa would still mean that
policies of ARIN apply there.

What I do think is that we need a special procedures for policies to be
adapted for emerging RIRs and these should be considered completely
separate from other policies and should be done in more formal and global
manner. Something like that if the organization is recognized as emerging
RIR by ASO and has established liason with ASO, then that liason can
request certain policies for his/hers region and this request should then
be evaluated by effected RIRs (making allocations in the region of
emerging RIR) in a manner similar to global policy but evaluating its
impact primarily only in how it effects the emerging RIR region. After
policy is passed it becames policy that would only effect allocations or
requests in that new region and only if the requests are handled through
emerging RIR i.e. somebody would make request to afrinic for example and
it would then pass along request to ARIN, but policy being applied to
request would be policy specially passed for the emerging RIR. In that
case basicly overtime emerging RIR is able to established its own policies
(which since its not established RIR are evaluated for their consistancy
with some global policy document agreed by all rirs) and these policies
only take effect for the new RIR region. After full RIR is established
the policies ase migrated to the RIR and it can establish new policies
without having them approved by other RIRs.
Post by Leo Bicknell
I still believe there should be
generally the same policy worldwide.
That is what RIRs believe as well, since they tried to work out global
policy for ipv6. However there are enough individual differences between
regions that 100% same policies are not always appropriate so a more
general framework for ip policies is better (as was provided before
by RFC2050), this should be worked out by ASO (or NRO or whatever else
is established as global organization for all RIRs) as global policy
documents.
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 17:00:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by w***@elan.net
2002-3 is policy to alloe micro-assignments for ARIN region, that is
assignments of ip space for use directly by organization (that
organization can be ISP and use it for dialup, though as I uderstand
which may work for African ISPs). Also note that organizations that
received ip space under 2002 would not become members of ARIN (at least as
far as I understand proposal now, I would like to have ARIN staff respond
here if this is not true and they would be members automaticly with
micro-assignments).
A good point. I have previously supported moving both allocations
and assignments, and would support ammending 2002-3, or a new
proposal worded like 2002-3 that addressed both cases.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 18:21:13 UTC
Permalink
I don't know if I can do this on the list or not, but, I hereby formally
propose that proposal 2002-3 be amended to include both allocations and
assignments.

Leo, would you like to second this amendment?

Thanks,

Owen


--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 1:00 PM -0400 Leo Bicknell
In a message written on Wed, Sep 24, 2003 at 07:10:22AM -0700,
Post by w***@elan.net
2002-3 is policy to alloe micro-assignments for ARIN region, that is
assignments of ip space for use directly by organization (that
organization can be ISP and use it for dialup, though as I uderstand
which may work for African ISPs). Also note that organizations that
received ip space under 2002 would not become members of ARIN (at least
as far as I understand proposal now, I would like to have ARIN staff
respond here if this is not true and they would be members automaticly
with micro-assignments).
A good point. I have previously supported moving both allocations
and assignments, and would support ammending 2002-3, or a new
proposal worded like 2002-3 that addressed both cases.
--
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 18:46:35 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
I don't know if I can do this on the list or not, but, I hereby formally
propose that proposal 2002-3 be amended to include both allocations and
assignments.
Leo, would you like to second this amendment?
Not just yet. :) Before we go down that road yet again, we have
the following options:

1) Amend 2002-3 to include allocations and assignments.

2) Create a new policy, identical to 2002-3 with
s/assignments/allocations/g, and allow both to be voted on
separately.

3a) Create a new proposal with possible changes (initial move, final
prefix length, ramp up period, etc) that includes both.

3b) Create a two new proposals and allow them to be voted on separately.

I lean towards #1, as Owen proposed, but also would be quite willing
to consider 3a if we could find a way to make it even more likely
to pass that didn't upset the technical merit of the proposal.

To that end, I'd ask if we amended 2002-3 to include both, and you would
then expect you'd vote AGAINST the proposal, please let us all know why
so we can see if it is something we could address, or if it is just an
item on which we don't see eye to eye.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 17:45:48 UTC
Permalink
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Leo Bicknell
Post by Johann Botha
I have no problem if ARIN adopts this criteria as policy for other regions.
Then please support 2002-3. There are three basic positions, people
who don't want to move the prefix size, people who want to move it
globally, and people who want to move it in Africa. If the latter
two combine efforts behind 2003-3 it will be more likely to pass,
where as if they both continue both are likely to be rejected for
lack of support.
2002-3 is policy to alloe micro-assignments for ARIN region, that is
assignments of ip space for use directly by organization (that
organization can be ISP and use it for dialup, though as I uderstand
which may work for African ISPs). Also note that organizations that
received ip space under 2002 would not become members of ARIN (at least
as far as I understand proposal now, I would like to have ARIN staff
respond here if this is not true and they would be members automaticly
with micro-assignments).
That is true. However, that is no different from end-user /20 allocations
which are also cheaper annual maintenance. In fact, an end-user allocation
plus ARIN membership is cheaper than ISP membership. As such, it seems
to me that this would also help African ISPs more than 2003-15 which, at
least currently, would carry the ISP fee structure.
Post by w***@elan.net
2003-15 proposal would allow for smaller allocations for African region
only, allowing those ip blocks to be used by ISPs not only for themselve
but also allowing them to reassign portion of the block to their
customers. Since these would be allocations, my understanding is that
African ISPs received ip blocks under that proposal would become members
of ARIN
Ok... So, let's amend 2002-3 to encompass Allocations as well as
Assignments.
I agree that should be fixed, although, I think Assignment would be more
beneficial to most African ISPs as described so far.
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Leo Bicknell
I care because that will be the very next question raised. I'll
tell you right now that if 100 ISP's in Africa can get the allocation
size moved in Africa, there will be 1000 ISP's in the US who will
come back and say "what about me, I'm bigger then they are after
all, so I should be able to multi-home too". This policy change will
have impact to other regions, and ARIN must consider that when it
makes policy.
If we make sufficiently clear that policy is being adapted only to
support establishment of RIR in that region, they would understand and
not ask.
Wrong. This policy is needed globally. There is no logical reason to
make a sub-regional exception.
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Leo Bicknell
Post by Johann Botha
If you feel stongly that the US ISP in your example should be given IP
space.. well, then submit a proposal.
One is already there, 2002-3. I support it.
See above on differences between 2002-3 (ip space provided to end-usersk,
not ISPs) and 2003-15 (ip space for ISPs).
Again... Simple amendment to 2002-3.
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Leo Bicknell
Now, that is a horse of a different color. I had no idea allocations
were so fragmented across the continent (I had simply never looked
before), and now that I see RIPE, ARIN, and APNIC are all involved
I am a strong supporter of getting an AfriNIC up and running to
unify the process in that region. They would of course be free to
set their own policies -- however
Fully setting up RIR is not as easy as that, especially in Africa. Its
not only policies and handling of requests but they need to have enough
members to support the RIR financially (and for example LACNIC is getting
funding from two regional registries in Brazil and Mexico, none of that
exists in Africa). There are also lots of other technical,
administration, legal and other challenges before RIR could be ready. I
do not think Afrinic is anywhere close to that position and will not be
in the next 2 years. Currently Afrinic is instead planning to setup a
mini RIR within RIPE and handle registrations by their personnel but
according to RIPE policies, but providing ip space in South Africa would
still mean that policies of ARIN apply there.
Right. That's why I think AfriNIC is vaporware for now and we should
not set ARIN policy exceptions based on the theory that eventually AfriNIC
(whatever it may become) would possibly adopt said policy. If ISPs in
Sub-saharan Africa want to be handled by the Afri-mini registry within
RIPE, I don't see a problem with transferring that responsibility from
ARIN to said mini-registry. However, until that happens, I still don't
see justification for creating an exception instead of fixing the policy
for everyone.
Post by w***@elan.net
What I do think is that we need a special procedures for policies to be
adapted for emerging RIRs and these should be considered completely
separate from other policies and should be done in more formal and global
manner. Something like that if the organization is recognized as emerging
RIR by ASO and has established liason with ASO, then that liason can
request certain policies for his/hers region and this request should then
be evaluated by effected RIRs (making allocations in the region of
emerging RIR) in a manner similar to global policy but evaluating its
impact primarily only in how it effects the emerging RIR region. After
policy is passed it becames policy that would only effect allocations or
requests in that new region and only if the requests are handled through
emerging RIR i.e. somebody would make request to afrinic for example and
it would then pass along request to ARIN, but policy being applied to
request would be policy specially passed for the emerging RIR. In that
case basicly overtime emerging RIR is able to established its own policies
(which since its not established RIR are evaluated for their consistancy
with some global policy document agreed by all rirs) and these policies
only take effect for the new RIR region. After full RIR is established
the policies ase migrated to the RIR and it can establish new policies
without having them approved by other RIRs.
Respectfully, I disagree. Once an emerging registry begins to actually
emerge,
that regsitry can set their own policy. Until then, whatever RIR applies
should have consistent policies. Further, I think the assignment and
allocation
policies of all the registries should be made more consistent with each
other.
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Leo Bicknell
I still believe there should be
generally the same policy worldwide.
That is what RIRs believe as well, since they tried to work out global
policy for ipv6. However there are enough individual differences between
regions that 100% same policies are not always appropriate so a more
general framework for ip policies is better (as was provided before
by RFC2050), this should be worked out by ASO (or NRO or whatever else
is established as global organization for all RIRs) as global policy
documents.
Yep. However, absent that work being completed, making an exception for
Africa is just making more brokenness. This is a good policy. It would
be a good policy for North America. As such, I see no reason not to make
it global. I will vote for it as a global policy. I will vote against
as a sub-regional exception. I think alot more people would vote for
amending 2002-3 to encompass allocations than will vote for an African
sub-regioanl exception. As such, I encourage African ISPs to get behind
2002-3 and recommend an ammendment to expand it to encompass allocations.

Owen
Gregory Massel
2003-09-24 20:21:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
Right. That's why I think AfriNIC is vaporware for now and we should
not set ARIN policy exceptions based on the theory that eventually AfriNIC
(whatever it may become) would possibly adopt said policy. If ISPs in
Sub-saharan Africa want to be handled by the Afri-mini registry within
RIPE, I don't see a problem with transferring that responsibility from
ARIN to said mini-registry. However, until that happens, I still don't
see justification for creating an exception instead of fixing the policy
for everyone.
I'd like to address your misconception that AfriNIC is vaporware.
- AfriNIC was formally proposed in 1997 at Kuala Lumpur
- Numerous AfriNIC meetings were held in the following years
- AfriNIC is now a recognised organisation with numerous sponsors from
around Africa (including private sponsors and government)
- AfriNIC is in the process of setting up offices in four countries (Egypt,
Ghana, Mauritius and South Africa)
- AfriNIC has an elected board (in fact it has had for many years)
- AfriNIC has two hostmasters (who are in training)

It is true, however, that AfriNIC is not yet able to operate as a
self-sufficient NIC. That will only happen once the offices are all
operational, additional staff have been hired and trained and policies and
fees have been formalised.

The reason AfriNIC will operate as a mini-registry within RIPE initially is
so that the organisation can draw on RIPE's expertise, learn from an
establised NIC, and keep startup costs to a minimum.
Post by Owen DeLong
This brings up a new question for me. When AfriNIC becomes a reality are
they going to implement this policy any way? If so, we may as well do it
now. I don't agree with it, but if it's a future reality why wait.
When AfriNIC first starts making assignments/allocations (???), it will draw
strongly on RIPE and ARIN's existing policies, especially where there are
similarities. Given the almost unanimous support from the African community
for 2003-15, I think it is obvious that AfriNIC will take this into
consideration.

I agree with you wholeheartedly - why wait? The reality is that supporting
2003-15 is very similar to supporting the formation of AfriNIC. Both
ackowlege that the region needs to influence its governance.
Post by Owen DeLong
Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
Yes - 196.0.0.0/8
There have been allocations from other blocks, but by far the bulk are from
the aforementioned.
Post by Owen DeLong
I'm hoping that you can see that by keeping 2003-15 on the table both
policies
are being jeopardized to non-consensus or long timelines. If 2003-15
takes
Post by Owen DeLong
effect, it could create more of an uphill battle for 2002-3. Afterall, if
Africa gets what they need, they would have no reason to support what we
need in North America, even though we're asking for the same thing.
In 2002-3, we ask for everybody to get what is needed. In 2003-15, Africa
asks for what Africa needs while ignoring that everyone needs it.
Owen, I don't see how 2003-15 would compromise 2002-3. If anything, I
believe that if 2003-15 is passed, it will create a strong precedent for the
passing of 2002-3.

Where the two proposals differ fundamentally, is that one establishes a
fundamental acceptance that the African region needs to be strongly
acknowleged in the setting of policies that affect it. This is why I support
both 2002-3 and 2003-15 and believe that they should be evaluated
separately.

I also find it alarming that you think that Africa will not back 2002-3 as
well. The reality is that we have felt the pain first hand and accordingly
are immensely sympathetic to our colleagues world-wide. We understand that
in order to gain the support of the global Internet community, we need to
support it too. At the same time, I'd strongly discourage alienating the
African Internet community, because we are your strongest allies with
proposals like 2002-3.

Yes, we have been rather silent in the past, but the reality is that until
recently most Africans were unaware that ARIN was interested in what they
had to say. The time devoted to AfriNIC and ARIN presence at the iWeek
conference in Johannesburg has created a lot more awareness than there was.
In the future, you will see more of us both on this list and at ARIN
meetings.
Post by Owen DeLong
I don't know if I can do this on the list or not, but, I hereby formally
propose that proposal 2002-3 be amended to include both allocations and
assignments.
I support this suggestion.

Finally, I want to address what I see as one of the concerns that 2003-15
may introduce - what happens when a North American ISP asks, "Why am I being
treated differently?"

My answer (assuming hypothetically that 2003-15 is accepted) would be: ARIN
members have afforded Africa the right to influence the policy that is
applied to their region. Similar proposals (eg. 2002-3) are on the cards and
apply to the North American region; We strongly suggest that you voice your
support for these proposals.

Regards
Gregory Massel
co-chairman: ISPA (South Africa)
http://www.ispa.org.za/
Owen DeLong
2003-09-25 01:53:39 UTC
Permalink
Post by Gregory Massel
I'd like to address your misconception that AfriNIC is vaporware.
- AfriNIC was formally proposed in 1997 at Kuala Lumpur
- Numerous AfriNIC meetings were held in the following years
- AfriNIC is now a recognised organisation with numerous sponsors from
around Africa (including private sponsors and government)
- AfriNIC is in the process of setting up offices in four countries
(Egypt, Ghana, Mauritius and South Africa)
- AfriNIC has an elected board (in fact it has had for many years)
- AfriNIC has two hostmasters (who are in training)
OK... I stand corrected. AfriNIC is not vaporware. An AfriNIC RIR is
vaporware.
Post by Gregory Massel
It is true, however, that AfriNIC is not yet able to operate as a
self-sufficient NIC. That will only happen once the offices are all
operational, additional staff have been hired and trained and policies and
fees have been formalised.
The reason AfriNIC will operate as a mini-registry within RIPE initially
is so that the organisation can draw on RIPE's expertise, learn from an
establised NIC, and keep startup costs to a minimum.
Then, at that time, ARIN and APNIC should transfer to RIPE/AfriNIC the
delegations that apply to Africa and AfriNIC should gain control of policies
for those allocations. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for that. I wish
AfriNIC
all the success and independence it deserves. I like AfriNIC as a concept.
I did not mean to imply that I didn't think highly of the project. However,
I don't think that the project is at such a state that it makes sense to
regard speculation about what AfriNIC will do as a guideline for setting
policy in ARIN.
Post by Gregory Massel
Post by Mury
This brings up a new question for me. When AfriNIC becomes a reality are
they going to implement this policy any way? If so, we may as well do it
now. I don't agree with it, but if it's a future reality why wait.
When AfriNIC first starts making assignments/allocations (???), it will
draw strongly on RIPE and ARIN's existing policies, especially where
there are similarities. Given the almost unanimous support from the
African community for 2003-15, I think it is obvious that AfriNIC will
take this into consideration.
I agree with you wholeheartedly - why wait? The reality is that supporting
2003-15 is very similar to supporting the formation of AfriNIC. Both
ackowlege that the region needs to influence its governance.
I support the formation of AfriNIC. However, there are non-African
ramifications to ARIN adopting 2003-15 which I believe override the
desire to provide this solution for Africa. I believe 2003-15 represents
a good policy with one flaw. It is Africa specific. As long as it is
Africa specific, I will vote against it. If 2003-15 is amended to cover
all of ARIN, I will vote for it. I will vote for 2002-3. I will vote
for an amendment to 2002-3 to expand it's scope to include Allocations as
well as assignments.
Post by Gregory Massel
Owen, I don't see how 2003-15 would compromise 2002-3. If anything, I
believe that if 2003-15 is passed, it will create a strong precedent for
the passing of 2002-3.
You and I have differing views of the political realities of ARIN. How
many years have you been watching what happens with ARIN? Admittedly, I
am a recent addition to ARIN PPML and Public Policy meetings, and, Chicago
will be my first meeting as an ARIN member. However, I have been involved
in ARIN politics as a small(er) and/or large provider since it's inception.
Post by Gregory Massel
Where the two proposals differ fundamentally, is that one establishes a
fundamental acceptance that the African region needs to be strongly
acknowleged in the setting of policies that affect it. This is why I
support both 2002-3 and 2003-15 and believe that they should be evaluated
separately.
That is only one place they differ. There are two others. In 2003-15, it
creates support for micro-allcations in Africa ONLY. This will be used by
large(ish) ISPs in north america as a justification that mciro-assignments
and micro-allocations aren't necessary in North America, and, see, we made
this exception for Africa, so the problem is solved. Further, I have no
reason to believe that African ISPs have the resources or desire to actively
work for 2002-3 once they receive 2003-15. This is not a criticism, just
reality. They have much bigger problems to address and much more limited
resources. If we all support an ammended 2002-3, then we all win. If we
continue to divide support between 2003-15 and 2002-3, then we will all
lose.

The second way in which they are different is that 2003-15 provides for
allocations, whereas 2002-3 provides for assignments. Both assignments
and allocations are necessary at the /22 boundary, and that is why
I have proposed an amendment to 2002-3 to achieve that.
Post by Gregory Massel
I also find it alarming that you think that Africa will not back 2002-3 as
well. The reality is that we have felt the pain first hand and accordingly
are immensely sympathetic to our colleagues world-wide. We understand that
in order to gain the support of the global Internet community, we need to
support it too. At the same time, I'd strongly discourage alienating the
African Internet community, because we are your strongest allies with
proposals like 2002-3.
It's not that I don't think you will back it. It's that I don't think that
you have the resources to keep attention focused on it after you receive
2003-15 if 2002-3 tunrs into a longer battle. Be realistic here. Many
people have pointed out the difficulty and scarcity of resources for
African ISPs. A prolonged political struggle for something that won't
really effect them is not likely something they will choose to do.
Post by Gregory Massel
Yes, we have been rather silent in the past, but the reality is that until
recently most Africans were unaware that ARIN was interested in what they
had to say. The time devoted to AfriNIC and ARIN presence at the iWeek
conference in Johannesburg has created a lot more awareness than there
was. In the future, you will see more of us both on this list and at ARIN
meetings.
That's fantastic. I'm glad to see you guys here, and, I'm very glad to
see you proposing policy, even if I don't agree with the proposal. I
welcome you to the process and I look forward to working with you as things
evolve. I agree with you that in an ideal world, we could simply support
both policies and it would work out well for all. However, we don't live
in an ideal world, and, the large providers that traditionally dominate
policy in the ARIN community will use 2003-15 as a means to squash 2002-3
if it passes. I understand that you don't see it that way, and, I wish I
didn't. However, in North America, economic self interest is the primary
motivating factor in how most providers have been voting from what I have
observed. It is in the economic interest of large providers to make it
difficult for large businesses and small(er) ISPs to change upstream
providers. As such, they tend to vote for policies that allow them to
do so.

Owen
Post by Gregory Massel
Post by Mury
I don't know if I can do this on the list or not, but, I hereby formally
propose that proposal 2002-3 be amended to include both allocations and
assignments.
I support this suggestion.
Finally, I want to address what I see as one of the concerns that 2003-15
may introduce - what happens when a North American ISP asks, "Why am I
being treated differently?"
ARIN members have afforded Africa the right to influence the policy that
is applied to their region. Similar proposals (eg. 2002-3) are on the
cards and apply to the North American region; We strongly suggest that
you voice your support for these proposals.
Regards
Gregory Massel
co-chairman: ISPA (South Africa)
http://www.ispa.org.za/
Johann Botha
2003-09-25 07:50:03 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
I support the formation of AfriNIC.
cool
Post by Owen DeLong
However, there are non-African ramifications to ARIN adopting 2003-15 which
I believe override the desire to provide this solution for Africa. I
believe 2003-15 represents a good policy with one flaw. It is Africa
specific. As long as it is Africa specific, I will vote against it. If
2003-15 is amended to cover all of ARIN, I will vote for it. I will vote
for 2002-3.
this reminds me of the story of a guy with an open basket full of crayfish.
somebody asked him if he wasn't worried that the crayfish would escape..
no, he replied, as soon as one makes it to the top, the others will drag him
back down.
--
Regards ..Friends don't let friends use Outlook
Johann

'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
________________________________________________________________
Johann L. Botha Frogfoot Networks ISP AS22355
***@frogfoot.net http://www.frogfoot.net/
+27.82.562.6167 Built and Managed with Attention to Detail
0860 KERMIT
http://blue.frogfoot.net/
Owen DeLong
2003-09-25 08:04:17 UTC
Permalink
Post by Johann Botha
Post by Owen DeLong
However, there are non-African ramifications to ARIN adopting 2003-15
which I believe override the desire to provide this solution for Africa.
I believe 2003-15 represents a good policy with one flaw. It is Africa
specific. As long as it is Africa specific, I will vote against it. If
2003-15 is amended to cover all of ARIN, I will vote for it. I will vote
for 2002-3.
this reminds me of the story of a guy with an open basket full of
crayfish. somebody asked him if he wasn't worried that the crayfish would
escape.. no, he replied, as soon as one makes it to the top, the others
will drag him back down.
That is not what I am trying to do here. If this were an AfriNIC proposal
for the AfriNIC registry, I would support it as an Africa specific proposal.
However, to make Africa specific policy in ARIN, especially on an issue
which
does need to be resolved globally, sets a very bad precedent. It also has
the potential to further an unnecessary hardship on small(er) providers in
North America. I think you and I agree much more than we disagree.
Hopefully,
together, we can amend and get enacted 2002-3 for assignment and allocation
before 2003-15 comes up for discussion. That would give everyone what they
need. If not, I'll propose amending 2003-15 to make it global, then, if the
amendment is added, I'll support it. Hopefully one of these will move
forward for everyone.

Owen
Post by Johann Botha
--
Regards ..Friends don't let friends use Outlook
Johann
'Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.'
- Leonardo da Vinci
________________________________________________________________
Johann L. Botha Frogfoot Networks ISP AS22355
+27.82.562.6167 Built and Managed with Attention to Detail
0860 KERMIT
http://blue.frogfoot.net/
Adiel AKPLOGAN
2003-09-25 09:19:57 UTC
Permalink
Hello,
Post by Owen DeLong
Right. That's why I think AfriNIC is vaporware for now and we should
not set ARIN policy exceptions based on the theory that eventually AfriNIC
(whatever it may become) would possibly adopt said policy. If ISPs in
Sub-saharan Africa want to be handled by the Afri-mini registry within
RIPE, I don't see a problem with transferring that responsibility from
ARIN to said mini-registry.
Let me clarify some inappropriate assumption here about AfriNIC:

o AfrNIC as organization and AfriNIC as RIR is not a vaporware.
The Afrinic Initiative certainly start in 1997, but a lot of progress
was done since then. Our main goal is to get a global consensus
on everything we are doing. Africa is very particular...we have differents
culture, differents language, differents colonization background...an so
and so..
We need to bring everybody together to have a very strong and
sustainable organization.
Today all of these differences are behind us. And AfriNIC is an African
organization supported by the whole community, and on the
process of becoming a recognize RIR www.afrinic.org

o AfriNIC is not running any mini-registry at RIPE. AfriNIC team
are being trained at RIPE as they will probably be at ARIN too.
This is to help during transition from the two different policies
to AfriNIC own one.
Post by Owen DeLong
However, until that happens, I still don't
see justification for creating an exception instead of fixing the policy
for everyone.
The justification is that ARIN is serving two different region (Continent).
And unfortunately the two have a totally different political, social and
economical background. You can not design a business model for America
and African using the same figure...try it you will loose. This should be
applicable for Internet 'PUBLIC' resource too.
Post by Owen DeLong
Why does a NIC need offices in 4 countries?
Please read the rapport on the web site.
http://www.afrinic.org/Kampala-15062003-Report-Back.txt
Post by Owen DeLong
RIPE seems to have _an_ office in The Netherlands. A
RIN seems to have _an_ office in VA.
LACNIC has 3 offices and they running very well. We are
not oblige to follow North American or Europe administration model.
We have our own realities...and we are dealing with them to
better serve our community.
Post by Owen DeLong
Who's going to fund AfriNIC's 4 offices in 4
countries with >4x the overhead of
a single office?
We are working on that....and it is not impossible.

Regards.

- a.
Trevor Paquette
2003-09-24 16:49:27 UTC
Permalink
Post by Gregory Massel
There are only 19 ARIN members in Africa. If this figure were
to quadruple, that may mean another 57 new prefixes to be announced...
0.05% of the total routing table.
This affects the global routing tables in the same way that a
butterfly affects wind currents.
don't go there... ever hear of chaos-theory??
Post by Gregory Massel
-Greg
Mury
2003-09-24 17:53:54 UTC
Permalink
Post by M***@radianz.com
It was already pointed out that portable space is needed for multihoming
and, in Africa, there are more frequent outages for single-homed
providers, therefore in order to increase service levels a provider
needs to multihome. And since these are smaller companies on average
it makes sense to allocate them smaller portable blocks to avoid
wasting IP addresses.
You can't get IPs from one upstream and have your other one announce that
block?
Post by M***@radianz.com
Since current policies make it impossible for African ISPs to get
portable blocks, current policies are making multihoming impossible
therefore current policies are an indirect cause of low service
levels in Africa.
I guess I'm still missing the point. Why can't they get IPs from one
upstream provider and announce those IPs through 2 or more paths?
Post by M***@radianz.com
Post by Mury
However there are no reasons given. Why are smaller ISPs in Africa
unable
Post by Mury
to obtain IP space from upstream providers?
We went through this discussion several years ago when U.S. ISPs were a
lot smaller on average. The issue is not lack of IP space, it is lack
of portable IP space. An upstream provider cannot issue portable IP space,
only an RIR like ARIN can do that.
I didn't think any IP space was "portable." Sure it belongs to one
entity, but their customers can't move that IP space. Where does the
chain end?

We did just fine using our upstream's space until we got our own
"portable" space. Ya, I bitched and moaned just like everyone else does
when we had to renumber, but it didn't kill me.
Post by M***@radianz.com
In this special case, I don't see a problem with setting special policies
for one geographic area. This is a transitional policy that is part of the
process of setting up an African RIR to handle the needs of ISPs that are
now served by RIPE and ARIN and APNIC. I would be opposed to special
policies
for California or Newfoundland but I support them for continental Africa.
This brings up a new question for me. When AfriNIC becomes a reality are
they going to implement this policy any way? If so, we may as well do it
now. I don't agree with it, but if it's a future reality why wait.

Is there any accountability on the part of a RIR to the other RIR's or to
ICAAN? For example, could RIPE implement some policies that are good for
their members, but are obviously poor for the Internet community as a
whole?

Thanks.

Mury
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 18:36:17 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
This brings up a new question for me. When AfriNIC becomes a reality are
they going to implement this policy any way? If so, we may as well do it
now. I don't agree with it, but if it's a future reality why wait.
We don't know what AfriNIC or who AfriNIC will be _IF_ it ever actually
exists. We think it probably will exist at some indeterminant point in
the future. We have some reason to believe that there may, at this time,
be enough support for this in Africa that if it did exist right now, this
policy might pass.

To me, that is far from a certain future reality.
Post by Mury
Is there any accountability on the part of a RIR to the other RIR's or to
ICAAN? For example, could RIPE implement some policies that are good for
their members, but are obviously poor for the Internet community as a
whole?
As near as I can tell, the only accountability to ICANN for anything is
whatever integrity exists within the body. Verisign has no integrity and
appears to have no accountability to ICANN. ARIN, RIPE, and APNIC, while
I do not agree with them on all fronts, appear to have significant integrity
and thus hold themselves accountable to ICANN policies.

In any case where any registry can implement any policy, someone could argue
that said policy is good for the registries members, but bad for the
internet
community. I know of no clear way to make this determination other than on
a case-by case basis, and, it is unclear who gets to make said
determination.

However, I still think this policy should be rolled into 2002-3 and made
global.

Owen
Mury
2003-09-24 18:04:20 UTC
Permalink
Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?

For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space out of 208.X.X.X,
or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is currently making
allocations out of?

If not, does it make sense to have ARIN set aside a block for those
allocations, so if/when AfriNIC is a reality those allocations can be
easily transferred?

I would think it would also be beneficial for filtering purposes.
Non-Afican entities could make the choice to aggregate that block and
push/pull any traffic bound for Africa to a certain path.

This would also ease worries about smaller allocations to African
countries that are insisting they need them. Those worried about routing
tables could lump all those allocations into much larger blocks, if not
just one.

Regards,

Mury
j***@lewis.org
2003-09-24 18:36:41 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
Post by Johann Botha
In principle I support 2002-3, but..
* It may have a much bigger impact on the size of the global routing table
Likely it will not, since, many of the effected providers are announcing
more specific holes of PA space anyway.
And it may actually have the opposite effect people seem to be worried
about. Take a client of mine as an example. He currently has multiple
T1's to 3 "Tier 1's". I'll just call them A, B, and C. He's had his C
connection the longest, so he's using one of C's /24's for his public IPs.
This is announced via BGP to A, B, and C.

Things have changed with C, and he knows that connection will be
terminated at some point in the not too distant future. In fact it
probably would have been already if not for the need to renumber...so he's
effectively keeping that connection for the IP space he's using.

Not knowing which of A or B will be more stable, he's requested and
received /24's from each of them. So, for the time being, he's announcing
3 PA /24's. If he could qualify for a micro-allocation from ARIN, those 3
routes would be replaced with 1.

I don't know how many other networks are in similar situations, but I bet
the number is >0.

It might be an interesting exercise to look at a current show ip bgp
snapshot and see how many AS's announce multiple small PA blocks,
especially from multiple P's. What if all those multiple blocks could be
traded in for single ARIN blocks? Wouldn't that actually be good for the
routing table...and for those AS's?

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Lewis ****@lewis.org*| I route
Senior Network Engineer | therefore you are
Atlantic Net |
_________ http://www.lewis.org/~jlewis/pgp for PGP public key_________
w***@elan.net
2003-09-24 16:07:50 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space out of 208.X.X.X,
or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is currently making
allocations out of?
My whois data research showed that majority of south african ip allocations
are made out of 196/8 ip block (and these allocations account for about 50%
of ip addresses assigned from that ip block - actually greater majority of
85% of that /7 has not been allocated at all). ARIN has confirmed in earlier
post that despite that /8 being listed by IANA as legacy internic space,
its still actively used for new african allocations in arin region, but
I note however that some ip allocations to africa as recent as 2003 were
made out of 216/8 and 209/8 and 196/8 was most actively used for allocations
in 1999 and 2000 and part of 2001. Below message from ARIN President has a
promise to do new african allocations exclusively from 196/8 as before:
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/ppml/1965.html

To my knowledge additional block of 197/8 is also kept in reserve by IANA
for future use by Afrinic (i.e. it parallels how 200/8 was used by ARIN for
assignments made to LACNIC organizations and 201/8 was reserved for LACNIC)

For RIPE there does not appear to be such one single /8 used for african
allocations, although 62/8 and 217/8 have larger number of north african
allocations.
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
Ian Baker
2003-09-24 18:55:04 UTC
Permalink
Reply Header ________________
Subject: Re: [ppml] Policy Proposal 2003-15: IPv4 Allocation Policy for
theAfrica Portion of the ARIN Region
Author: Owen DeLong <***@delong.com>
Date: 24th September 2003 9:29:58 am



--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 5:42 PM +0200 Johann Botha
Post by Johann Botha
Hi Leo
Post by Johann Botha
@2003.09.24_16:43:28_+0200
First of all, let me say I support this porposal 100%
I believe we need to see a change in IP allocation criteria for the
African region.. even if only by one bit, if not by two as in the
proposal. And if we dont see this change while ARIN controls our
regions
Post by Johann Botha
alloctations then we will see it when AfriNIC does... so why wait?,
why
Post by Johann Botha
hamper growth?
I believe we need this change globally, and, I see nothing so far
that
makes Africa a special case. I will support this proposal if it is
ARIN global. I will not support this proposal if it is sub-region
specific.

---

Owen,
With that amplification of your reasons.. I concur with your proposal. (It
read slightly differently before!)

Regards,

Ian
w***@elan.net
2003-09-24 16:32:22 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
Post by Mury
This brings up a new question for me. When AfriNIC becomes a reality are
they going to implement this policy any way? If so, we may as well do it
now. I don't agree with it, but if it's a future reality why wait.
We don't know what AfriNIC or who AfriNIC will be _IF_ it ever actually
exists. We think it probably will exist at some indeterminant point in
the future. We have some reason to believe that there may, at this time,
be enough support for this in Africa that if it did exist right now, this
policy might pass.
To me, that is far from a certain future reality.
I don't think its any longer question of IF the Afrinic would exist, but
its rather question of WHEN. Go to www.afrinic.org - you'll find enough
material there to support my assesment.

And there is also other evidence as seen from posts from African ISPs
on this list that if allocation size for africa was reduced, it would
bring more African ISP members to ARIN (probably from 50% to 100% more)
and that would go long way in helping to establish stable base for future
Afrinic.
Post by Owen DeLong
Post by Mury
Is there any accountability on the part of a RIR to the other RIR's or to
ICAAN? For example, could RIPE implement some policies that are good for
their members, but are obviously poor for the Internet community as a
whole?
As near as I can tell, the only accountability to ICANN for anything is
whatever integrity exists within the body. Verisign has no integrity and
appears to have no accountability to ICANN. ARIN, RIPE, and APNIC, while
I do not agree with them on all fronts, appear to have significant integrity
and thus hold themselves accountable to ICANN policies.
ARIN, RIPE and APNIC also do not want to be accountable to ICANN as can be
seen from some unilateral actions on behalf of RIR such as the latest
NRO proposal. The problem is really not with RIRs but with badly organized
and run ICANN itself (which otherwise would not have alllowed Verisign
freed run it have had so far), but this is topic for discussions on
diffent mailing lists.
Post by Owen DeLong
However, I still think this policy should be rolled into 2002-3 and made
global.
Owen
I have a sad feeling that if we try amend 2003-3 (to which AC finally
agreed to) with such fundamental issue as micro-allocations, then it'll
be delayed even more which is worth for the community. In my view it,
while having both micro assignments and micro-allocation size reduced is
/22 or less should be utlimate gole, we should not to prevent just the
micro-assignments. And Owen, since you have been on most of the last ARIN
meetings you should remember how hard it was to even push simple
micro-assignemtns on that forum that has 10:1 ratio between representative
of LARGE and SMALL ISPs.
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
Alec H. Peterson
2003-09-24 19:14:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by w***@elan.net
I have a sad feeling that if we try amend 2003-3 (to which AC finally
agreed to) with such fundamental issue as micro-allocations, then it'll
be delayed even more which is worth for the community.
Just for clarification, the AC has recommended nothing to the board as far
as ARIN's minimum allocation and assignment size. However, the AC was
involved with the modifications to 2002-3.

Alec
Chair, ARIN AC
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 19:55:19 UTC
Permalink
Post by w***@elan.net
I don't think its any longer question of IF the Afrinic would exist, but
its rather question of WHEN. Go to www.afrinic.org - you'll find enough
material there to support my assesment.
You're probably right, but, it is far from certain.
Post by w***@elan.net
And there is also other evidence as seen from posts from African ISPs
on this list that if allocation size for africa was reduced, it would
bring more African ISP members to ARIN (probably from 50% to 100% more)
and that would go long way in helping to establish stable base for future
Afrinic.
I agree the allocation size needs to be reduced. I just don't agree that
this need is specific t Africa.
Post by w***@elan.net
ARIN, RIPE and APNIC also do not want to be accountable to ICANN as can be
seen from some unilateral actions on behalf of RIR such as the latest
<snip> You are right... this is off topic.
Post by w***@elan.net
Post by Owen DeLong
However, I still think this policy should be rolled into 2002-3 and made
global.
Owen
I have a sad feeling that if we try amend 2003-3 (to which AC finally
agreed to) with such fundamental issue as micro-allocations, then it'll
be delayed even more which is worth for the community. In my view it,
while having both micro assignments and micro-allocation size reduced is
/22 or less should be utlimate gole, we should not to prevent just the
micro-assignments. And Owen, since you have been on most of the last ARIN
meetings you should remember how hard it was to even push simple
micro-assignemtns on that forum that has 10:1 ratio between
representative of LARGE and SMALL ISPs.
I think amending 2002-3 probably won't delay this. I think keeping 2003-15
will kill 2002-3 and 2003-15 by divide and conquer.

Yes, I do remember. That is why I think that getting ANY microassignment
passed will require the cooperation of ALL people desiring microassignment
(or microallocation) towards a common goal. If we allow ourselves to become
divided, we will become conquered. As such, I think that we should amend
2002-3 to support both Micro Assignments and Micro Allocations, and make
a global policy that addresses the needs of small(er) ISPs everywhere in
the ARIN service area.

I also agree that ARIN needs to more actively recruit participation from
small(er) ISPs, but, this is a hard problem to solve. Unfortunately, the
disenfranchised are the ones least likely to have the resources to become
enfranchised (is that even a valid word?).

Owen
Mury
2003-09-24 19:14:51 UTC
Permalink
I want to make sure that I'm reading this correctly:

"If an end-user is multi-homed, and has an ARIN assigned ASN, the minimum
justified block of IP address space assigned by ARIN is a /22. Such
assignment will be made from a reserve block for this purpose."

Does this mean that a particular block will be used exclusively for
micro-assignments? Only micro-assignments will be made out of this block
and all micro-assignments will be made from this block?

In other words anyone could aggregate this block in their routing tables
if they wanted to? I'm thinking especially of Tier II-III providers.

If this is the case I support 2002-03.

After trying to search for a good reason to support 2003-15, I haven't
found one. I think a sub-regional policy is asking for trouble down the
road.

Mury
Alec H. Peterson
2003-09-24 19:17:00 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
"If an end-user is multi-homed, and has an ARIN assigned ASN, the minimum
justified block of IP address space assigned by ARIN is a /22. Such
assignment will be made from a reserve block for this purpose."
Does this mean that a particular block will be used exclusively for
micro-assignments? Only micro-assignments will be made out of this block
and all micro-assignments will be made from this block?
In other words anyone could aggregate this block in their routing tables
if they wanted to? I'm thinking especially of Tier II-III providers.
Anybody can aggregate anything he wants to in his own network. 0.0.0.0/0
is a very effective aggregate, however it generally results in sub-optimal
routing when diverse egress paths are available.

Based on how the policy reads all micro-allocations will be made from a
distinct block of address space.

Alec
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 19:18:20 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
Does this mean that a particular block will be used exclusively for
micro-assignments? Only micro-assignments will be made out of this block
and all micro-assignments will be made from this block?
Yes.
Post by Mury
In other words anyone could aggregate this block in their routing tables
if they wanted to? I'm thinking especially of Tier II-III providers.
No! It would be no more aggregatable than 64/8, or any other block
we're assigning IP's from. The reason to put it into one block is
to make it possible for people to filter based on minimum allocation
size easily.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 19:32:21 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
"If an end-user is multi-homed, and has an ARIN assigned ASN, the minimum
justified block of IP address space assigned by ARIN is a /22. Such
assignment will be made from a reserve block for this purpose."
This paragraph means that ARIN can assign a /22 to that end user. It
doesn't say anything about which block that /22 would come from or
how it would relate to other allocations or assignments.
Post by Mury
Does this mean that a particular block will be used exclusively for
micro-assignments? Only micro-assignments will be made out of this block
and all micro-assignments will be made from this block?
I don't see that in the paragraph you quoted, no.
Post by Mury
In other words anyone could aggregate this block in their routing tables
if they wanted to? I'm thinking especially of Tier II-III providers.
Even if what you said above was true, this conclusion would be false. If
ARIN were to allocate multiple /22s to different organizations under this
micro-assignment policy, and those organizations had different ISPs with
different upstreams, I don't see how an aggregation of those /22s would
do anything but break connectivity to some subset of them.
Post by Mury
If this is the case I support 2002-03.
After trying to search for a good reason to support 2003-15, I haven't
found one. I think a sub-regional policy is asking for trouble down the
road.
I agree. I think from your comments above, however, that you may be
thinking
that micro-assignments as being discussed in 2002-3 are sub-assignments of
a /22. That is not the case. The policy is to allow ARIN to make micro-
assignments of /22s to end users. I have proposed an amendment to extend
that capability in the policy to ISPs as well and allow ISPs to treat
it as an allocation instead of an assignment.
Post by Mury
Mury
I hope that clarifies.

Owen
Mury
2003-09-24 19:37:10 UTC
Permalink
Post by Leo Bicknell
No! It would be no more aggregatable than 64/8, or any other block
we're assigning IP's from. The reason to put it into one block is
to make it possible for people to filter based on minimum allocation
size easily.
What's the difference between filtering those blocks out by minimum size
and having your default route take over, or putting a static route in for
that /8 block?

Thanks.

Mury
Leo Bicknell
2003-09-24 19:35:54 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mury
What's the difference between filtering those blocks out by minimum size
and having your default route take over, or putting a static route in for
that /8 block?
If you're a tier 1 ISP you don't have default, and you're not going
to static route everyone. So, on your peering links you install
filters, and one of the simplest is to filter on minimum allocation
size.
--
Leo Bicknell - ***@ufp.org - CCIE 3440
PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-***@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 19:43:44 UTC
Permalink
Because hopefuly you set your filters to allow /20s from say 64/8 and
similar prefixes and /22s from the prefix covering the micro-allocations
so that all the legitimate routes get through, but, you can still ignore
the /30s and /28s etc.

Owen
Post by Mury
Post by Leo Bicknell
No! It would be no more aggregatable than 64/8, or any other block
we're assigning IP's from. The reason to put it into one block is
to make it possible for people to filter based on minimum allocation
size easily.
What's the difference between filtering those blocks out by minimum size
and having your default route take over, or putting a static route in for
that /8 block?
Thanks.
Mury
Taylor, Stacy
2003-09-24 19:31:55 UTC
Permalink
Hi All,
I have confirmed with Richard that 2002-3 does not include ARIN membership
with the assignments.
/S

-----Original Message-----
From: ***@elan.net [mailto:***@elan.net]
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 9:08 AM
To: Mury
Cc: ***@arin.net
Subject: Re: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
Post by Mury
Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space out of 208.X.X.X,
or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is currently making
allocations out of?
My whois data research showed that majority of south african ip allocations
are made out of 196/8 ip block (and these allocations account for about 50%
of ip addresses assigned from that ip block - actually greater majority of
85% of that /7 has not been allocated at all). ARIN has confirmed in earlier
post that despite that /8 being listed by IANA as legacy internic space,
its still actively used for new african allocations in arin region, but
I note however that some ip allocations to africa as recent as 2003 were
made out of 216/8 and 209/8 and 196/8 was most actively used for allocations
in 1999 and 2000 and part of 2001. Below message from ARIN President has a
promise to do new african allocations exclusively from 196/8 as before:
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/ppml/1965.html

To my knowledge additional block of 197/8 is also kept in reserve by IANA
for future use by Afrinic (i.e. it parallels how 200/8 was used by ARIN for
assignments made to LACNIC organizations and 201/8 was reserved for LACNIC)

For RIPE there does not appear to be such one single /8 used for african
allocations, although 62/8 and 217/8 have larger number of north african
allocations.
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
***@elan.net
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 19:47:53 UTC
Permalink
There are three possible ways to deal with this:

1. Amend 2002-3 to include membership if we feel this is important.

2. Leave 2002-3 as is and allow smaller allocation users to separately
join ARIN. Fee-wise, that is still cheaper per year than joining
as an ISP, so, that may be the best route for African ISPs.

3. Amend 2002-3 to modify it to include membership for Allocations and
not for Assignments, as is the current policy for End-User vs. ISP
registrations of any size.

Personally, I think number 3 is the most consistent, number 2 is the easiest
and most advantageous for African ISPs, and, 1 is the better way to go.

However, I'd like to see membership conferred on _ALL_ ARIN resource
allocations, not just ISP allocations.

Owen


--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 1:31 PM -0600 "Taylor, Stacy"
Post by Taylor, Stacy
Hi All,
I have confirmed with Richard that 2002-3 does not include ARIN membership
with the assignments.
/S
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 9:08 AM
To: Mury
Subject: Re: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
Post by Mury
Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space out of
208.X.X.X, or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is
currently making allocations out of?
My whois data research showed that majority of south african ip
allocations are made out of 196/8 ip block (and these allocations
account for about 50% of ip addresses assigned from that ip block -
actually greater majority of 85% of that /7 has not been allocated at
all). ARIN has confirmed in earlier post that despite that /8 being
listed by IANA as legacy internic space, its still actively used for new
african allocations in arin region, but I note however that some ip
allocations to africa as recent as 2003 were made out of 216/8 and 209/8
and 196/8 was most actively used for allocations in 1999 and 2000 and
part of 2001. Below message from ARIN President has a promise to do new
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/ppml/1965.html
To my knowledge additional block of 197/8 is also kept in reserve by IANA
for future use by Afrinic (i.e. it parallels how 200/8 was used by ARIN
for assignments made to LACNIC organizations and 201/8 was reserved for
LACNIC)
For RIPE there does not appear to be such one single /8 used for african
allocations, although 62/8 and 217/8 have larger number of north african
allocations.
--
William Leibzon
Elan Networks
McBurnett, Jim
2003-09-24 19:49:12 UTC
Permalink
I am confused here.
If 2002-3 is giving out everything an ISP would get,
and would require nearly everything and ISP would have,
why not give membership?

IE an ISP I know in SC has a single /22, and an ASN.
and ONLY 1 upstream. They have membership.

Why would someone with a more complex Internet connection
not be afforded the same voting rights given to ISP A?

Just curious...

Jim

->-----Original Message-----
->From: Taylor, Stacy [mailto:***@icgcomm.com]
->Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 3:32 PM
->To: '***@elan.net'; Mury
->Cc: ***@arin.net
->Subject: RE: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
->
->
->Hi All,
->I have confirmed with Richard that 2002-3 does not include
->ARIN membership
->with the assignments.
->/S
->
->-----Original Message-----
->From: ***@elan.net [mailto:***@elan.net]
->Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 9:08 AM
->To: Mury
->Cc: ***@arin.net
->Subject: Re: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
->
->
->On Wed, 24 Sep 2003, Mury wrote:
->>
->> Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
->>
->> For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space
->out of 208.X.X.X,
->> or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is
->currently making
->> allocations out of?
->
->My whois data research showed that majority of south african
->ip allocations
->are made out of 196/8 ip block (and these allocations account
->for about 50%
->of ip addresses assigned from that ip block - actually
->greater majority of
->85% of that /7 has not been allocated at all). ARIN has
->confirmed in earlier
->post that despite that /8 being listed by IANA as legacy
->internic space,
->its still actively used for new african allocations in arin
->region, but
->I note however that some ip allocations to africa as recent
->as 2003 were
->made out of 216/8 and 209/8 and 196/8 was most actively used
->for allocations
->in 1999 and 2000 and part of 2001. Below message from ARIN
->President has a
->promise to do new african allocations exclusively from 196/8
->as before:
->http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/ppml/1965.html
->
->To my knowledge additional block of 197/8 is also kept in
->reserve by IANA
->for future use by Afrinic (i.e. it parallels how 200/8 was
->used by ARIN for
->assignments made to LACNIC organizations and 201/8 was
->reserved for LACNIC)
->
->For RIPE there does not appear to be such one single /8 used
->for african
->allocations, although 62/8 and 217/8 have larger number of
->north african
->allocations.
->
->--
->William Leibzon
->Elan Networks
->***@elan.net
->
Owen DeLong
2003-09-25 01:38:05 UTC
Permalink
They didn't get that /22 under current ARIN policy from ARIN.

For some reason, in general, ARIN has divided things into two categories:

Allocations: An ISP receives allocations and can assign portions of those
allocations to their customers. ISP efficient utilization is determined
based
on the percentage of their allocation that they have assigned, and, on their
ability to show that their assignments were justified by their customers
under the end-user policies.

Assignments: An end user receives assignments under the end user policies.
Assignments from ARIN do not come with membership, and, are much cheaper
per year than allocations.

The difference between an ISP and an End User is what the ORG decides they
want to be when they apply for the space.

An end user organization may separately join ARIN for $500 per year.

I believe the current maintenance fees for end user assignments (regardless
of the number of assignments, ASNs, etc.) are $100 per year.

Under current policy, noone can get a /22.

Under proposed policy 2002-3, an assignment of /22 is avilable, but, without
amendment, it does not allow for allocation of a /22. I have proposed that
2002-3 be amended to include allocation, but, it has not yet been seconded.

Under porposed policy 2003-15, allocations of /22 would be available, but,
only to ISPs in Sub Saharan Africa.

Hope that clears it up.

Owen


--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 3:49 PM -0400 "McBurnett, Jim"
Post by McBurnett, Jim
I am confused here.
If 2002-3 is giving out everything an ISP would get,
and would require nearly everything and ISP would have,
why not give membership?
IE an ISP I know in SC has a single /22, and an ASN.
and ONLY 1 upstream. They have membership.
Why would someone with a more complex Internet connection
not be afforded the same voting rights given to ISP A?
Just curious...
Jim
->-----Original Message-----
->Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 3:32 PM
->Subject: RE: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
->
->
->Hi All,
->I have confirmed with Richard that 2002-3 does not include
->ARIN membership
->with the assignments.
->/S
->
->-----Original Message-----
->Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003 9:08 AM
->To: Mury
->Subject: Re: [ppml] ARIN IP space in African countries...
->
->
->>
->> Is ARIN allocating IPs to African countries out of the same blocks?
->>
->> For example, are the LIRs in Africa all getting IP space
->out of 208.X.X.X,
->> or is it scattered throughout all the space that ARIN is
->currently making
->> allocations out of?
->
->My whois data research showed that majority of south african
->ip allocations
->are made out of 196/8 ip block (and these allocations account
->for about 50%
->of ip addresses assigned from that ip block - actually
->greater majority of
->85% of that /7 has not been allocated at all). ARIN has
->confirmed in earlier
->post that despite that /8 being listed by IANA as legacy
->internic space,
->its still actively used for new african allocations in arin
->region, but
->I note however that some ip allocations to africa as recent
->as 2003 were
->made out of 216/8 and 209/8 and 196/8 was most actively used
->for allocations
->in 1999 and 2000 and part of 2001. Below message from ARIN
->President has a
->promise to do new african allocations exclusively from 196/8
->http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/ppml/1965.html
->
->To my knowledge additional block of 197/8 is also kept in
->reserve by IANA
->for future use by Afrinic (i.e. it parallels how 200/8 was
->used by ARIN for
->assignments made to LACNIC organizations and 201/8 was
->reserved for LACNIC)
->
->For RIPE there does not appear to be such one single /8 used
->for african
->allocations, although 62/8 and 217/8 have larger number of
->north african
->allocations.
->
->--
->William Leibzon
->Elan Networks
->
Mark ELkins (by way of Mark ELkins )
2003-09-24 19:49:45 UTC
Permalink
Post by Taylor, Stacy
Hi All,
I have confirmed with Richard that 2002-3 does not include ARIN membership
with the assignments.
...which kinda excludes merging 2002-3 with 2003-15 ?

The African 2003-15 policy proposal (though I don't think that this should
necessarily exclude anyone else - except from using something from 196/8)
implies ARIN Membership...
--
. . ___. .__ Posix Systems - Sth Africa
/| /| / /__ ***@posix.co.za - Mark J Elkins, SCO ACE, Cisco
CCIE
/ |/ |ARK \_/ /__ LKINS Tel: +27 12 807 0590 Cell: +27 82 601 0496
Mury
2003-09-24 20:00:03 UTC
Permalink
Sure. Same difference. I should have said it that way. The only reason
I put it my way (mistake) is because I just aggregated a bunch of overseas
stuff with static routes. In addition, I had a customer running a 2501
that needed/wanted BGP, but couldn't handle the size of the table so we
static routed some of the more fragmented blocks into one big one.

The point is there is the ability to still control the size of the routing
tables by assigning/allocating smaller blocks within one particular larger
block.
Post by Owen DeLong
Because hopefuly you set your filters to allow /20s from say 64/8 and
similar prefixes and /22s from the prefix covering the micro-allocations
so that all the legitimate routes get through, but, you can still ignore
the /30s and /28s etc.
Owen
Post by Mury
Post by Leo Bicknell
No! It would be no more aggregatable than 64/8, or any other block
we're assigning IP's from. The reason to put it into one block is
to make it possible for people to filter based on minimum allocation
size easily.
What's the difference between filtering those blocks out by minimum size
and having your default route take over, or putting a static route in for
that /8 block?
Thanks.
Mury
Owen DeLong
2003-09-24 19:58:44 UTC
Permalink
To some extent. However, Aggregating the /22s within the larger block
may or may not produce useful results. The CIDR report is a much
more useful tool for things to aggregate as it does the appropriate
analysis of what could be aggregated without operational impact.

Owen
Post by Mury
Sure. Same difference. I should have said it that way. The only reason
I put it my way (mistake) is because I just aggregated a bunch of overseas
stuff with static routes. In addition, I had a customer running a 2501
that needed/wanted BGP, but couldn't handle the size of the table so we
static routed some of the more fragmented blocks into one big one.
The point is there is the ability to still control the size of the routing
tables by assigning/allocating smaller blocks within one particular larger
block.
Post by Owen DeLong
Because hopefuly you set your filters to allow /20s from say 64/8 and
similar prefixes and /22s from the prefix covering the micro-allocations
so that all the legitimate routes get through, but, you can still ignore
the /30s and /28s etc.
Owen
--On Wednesday, September 24, 2003 2:37 PM -0500 Mury
Post by Mury
Post by Leo Bicknell
No! It would be no more aggregatable than 64/8, or any other block
we're assigning IP's from. The reason to put it into one block is
to make it possible for people to filter based on minimum allocation
size easily.
What's the difference between filtering those blocks out by minimum
size and having your default route take over, or putting a static
route in for that /8 block?
Thanks.
Mury
j***@lewis.org
2003-09-24 20:34:43 UTC
Permalink
Post by Gregory Massel
I'd like to address your misconception that AfriNIC is vaporware.
- AfriNIC was formally proposed in 1997 at Kuala Lumpur
6 years later, it's still not operational? How long do you get before
it's properly called vaporware?
Post by Gregory Massel
- AfriNIC is in the process of setting up offices in four countries (Egypt,
Ghana, Mauritius and South Africa)
Why does a NIC need offices in 4 countries? RIPE seems to have _an_
office in The Netherlands. ARIN seems to have _an_ office in VA. Who's
going to fund AfriNIC's 4 offices in 4 countries with >4x the overhead of
a single office?


----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Lewis ****@lewis.org*| I route
Senior Network Engineer | therefore you are
Atlantic Net |
_________ http://www.lewis.org/~jlewis/pgp for PGP public key_________
Gregory Massel
2003-09-24 21:45:15 UTC
Permalink
Post by j***@lewis.org
6 years later, it's still not operational? How long do you get before
it's properly called vaporware?
You underestimate the amount of work that goes into establishing such an
operation, building up the support of the various Internet communities,
obtaining sponsorships, etc. The history is on the AfriNIC web site
(www.afrinic.org) and I'd encourage you to read it.
Post by j***@lewis.org
Post by Gregory Massel
- AfriNIC is in the process of setting up offices in four countries (Egypt,
Ghana, Mauritius and South Africa)
Why does a NIC need offices in 4 countries? RIPE seems to have _an_
office in The Netherlands. ARIN seems to have _an_ office in VA. Who's
going to fund AfriNIC's 4 offices in 4 countries with >4x the overhead of
a single office?
This is beyond the ambit of the ARIN public policy mailing list and I'm sure
there are many people who would be able to comment on the correct forum.

A corporate plan can be found at
http://www.afrinic.org/AfriNICCorporatePlan-v0.1.shtml

If you have any concerns or comments regarding the funding, I'd strongly
suggest joining the relevent AfriNIC mailing list where such issues are
discussed. Please ensure you are familiar with the plan before knocking it.

Regards
Greg
M***@radianz.com
2003-09-25 10:01:07 UTC
Permalink
Post by Owen DeLong
We don't know what AfriNIC or who AfriNIC will be _IF_ it ever actually
exists.
The funny thing is that Afrinic does exist! It even has a website at
http://www.afrinic.org and it has had several meetings over the past
couple of years including one last week in South Africa at
Internet Week.

So, why haven't the several .ZA ISPs on this list said anything
about this?

Why didn't the policy proposal indicate whether or not Afrinic
had been consulted or whether the Afrinic Board of Trustees
supports the proposal?

I'm beginning to wonder if we are being dragged into some
internal Afrinic politics here. The transition plan for
Afrinic is that in February 2004, i.e. 3 months after the
ARIN meeting, they plan to process IP requests themselves
using ARIN and/or RIPE only for a 2nd opinion.

The Afrinic update presented at RIPE earlier this month
is available here:
http://www.ripe.net/ripe/meetings/ripe-46/presentations/ripe46-plenary-afrinic.pdf

Someone mentioned that RIPE will be providing some sort
of special handling for African IP requests prior to the
transition. I found no evidence of this, however the
Afrinic hostmasters are spending 6 months working at
RIPE as trainees so this may be the source of that
comment.

I'm beginning to think that the best thing ARIN can
do to support African ISPs is to dump them and let
RIPE and Afrinic pick up the pieces.

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