Steven Ryerse wrote:
So we have Ipv4 which is the energy currently running most of our internet. IPv4 has a known total of IP addresses. The reserves of unused IPv4 are spread around the planet in an inefficient and uneven manner. Every day more and more IPv4 addresses are put to work running services on the Internet which is slowly making them more scarce. As the price rises over time per IPv4 address on the open market, a lot of this inefficient and uneven spread of IPv4 addresses will even out somewhat via the open market. This will keep the price reasonably low for awhile ($75 Per tank full) but as these IPv4 addresses become more scarce the price will slowly climb until the day comes where they become very expensive by todays standards ($500 per tank full) and at some point ($1000 per tank full or more) and the organizations wanting to add more services to the Internet will look for a cheaper alternative.
The significant difference is that IPv4 is a lot more recyclable than oil.
It happens to be possible to create oil derivatives from other energy
sources.
So it is likely that we may never actually run out of IPv4 addresses
(especially because of the uneven spread of them).
Agreed.
Frequently what I read in this forum from some members makes me feel like I am back in high school being told
we will run out of IPv4 (oil) very soon. As we approached "Exhaustion" there was a steady drumbeat
of various members wanting to update policies to somehow "save" IPv4 from running out. Some
policies were changed to try and slow the run out but we still reached the point of "Exhaustion"
(end of the 1990's) and its now 2021 and guess what - we haven't run out of IPv4. This was easily
predictable and some members shared exactly this perspective in this forum and were largely ignored for a
long time. Now the free market has taken over like it ALWAYS does and the reserves of IPv4 that were always
there - have been slowly coming to market in one way or another as the scarcity of IPv4 is slowly increasing.
This will continue and the price of IPv4 (oil) will slowly rise. I suspect just like the oil predictions in
the 70's, IPv4 may still have a long way to go before it is replaced with a new IP energy (2030's?, 2040's?,
2050's? or possibly later?).
Let us not gloss over the wasted costs associated with this unnecessary
and interminably long period.
The other possibility of new Internet energy happening sooner is a killer
Internet app that eats up IPv4 addresses so fast that the cost per address
rises much faster than it is doing now. VisiCalc and then Word Perfect were
the killer apps that cemented PC usage throughout corporate America, Microsoft
Exchange was the Killer app that cemented Microsoft Windows Server as the de
facto server standard for corporate America, and so on.
Those killer apps are stillborn on the drawing board due to address
scarcity. Any that survive do so without addressing dependencies.
As you probably recall, the internet used to be a whole lot more p2p
than it is now. Now we have all sorts of centralized applications and
services that have significantly displaced that. To what extent has
address scarcity played a role is another question.
Precisely where IPv6 is strongest, mobile, is where p2p is least applicable.
This is why I have always advocated for furthering the Internet by making it reasonably easy and
inexpensive for organizations to get IPv4 resources, especially small organizations. My policy
proposal several years ago to allow any organization in the ARIN region to easily get a /24 was
shot down - or at least not supported by the members of this community and forum. For those that
think we should have switched to IPv6 (new energy) by now, "saving" the Internet from
"Exhaustion" has actually had the opposite effect of delaying the day that IPv6 might
take over as the new Internet energy. So not supporting my policy proposal to make /24 easy to get
(we should still do it) as well as not supporting other members that promoted reasonable easier
access to IPv4 resources have had the effect of delaying the day IPv6 might take over as the
Internet energy. Should we really have a limit on the size of an IPv4 block that ARIN can assign
if the need can be demonstrated?
You cant have it both ways if you want RiR's to implement any form of
rationing and preferential assignment. Which I actually do, on record
with policy proposals.
I'm certainly against fraud of any kind, including in our community and region,
but reasonable policies on leasing IP address space that are aligned with the
free market make sense. Again, I am for any proposal that furthers the
Internet knowing the eventual scarcity in IPv4 will cause us all to switch to
the next IP energy - whenever it happens and whatever it turns out to be. (I
think we should add that original phrase back into the ARIN Mission Statement
even now.) Our organization will be ready for the new Internet energy and we
will embrace it as it comes. All things considered, Excel was better than
Lotus 123 which was better than VisiCalc and so on.
I wonder what predictions they are teaching our children in high school these
days? My twenty-five cents. 😊
Steven Ryerse
President
[email protected] | C: 770.656.1460
100 Ashford Center North | Suite 110 | Atlanta, Georgia 30338
-----Original Message-----
From: ARIN-PPML <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Ronald F. Guilmette
Sent: Sunday, September 12, 2021 12:01 AM
To: arin-ppml <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [arin-ppml] Change of Use and ARIN (was: Re: AFRINIC And The
Stability Of The Internet Number Registry System)
In message <[email protected]>,
Paul E McNary <[email protected]> wrote:
We are out of ipv4 IP's.
Not really. It's just that the ones that we have are very poorly distributed
and also very poorly utilized.
It is technically possible to host 100,000+ web sites on a single IPv4 address.
Is is also technically possible to provide email service for 100,000+ domains
on a single IPv4 address. Is anybody doing that? No. Because the incentives
to do so just aren't there... yet.
If you think that we've run out of IPv4 addresses, talk to the U.S. DoD which
just re-routed 175 million of their 221,971,968 IPv4 addresses, just to use
them as one colossal and record-shattering honeypot.
If you think that we've run out of IPv4 addresses, talk to Comcast and ask them why they
haven't moved to IPv6 and then returned their 79,419,720 IPv4 addresses to the free pool
to help everyone out and relieve this artificial "scarcity" for the benefit of
everyone.
If you think that we've run out of IPv4 addresses, talk to AT&T and T-Mobile
and Verizon about the huge piles of IPv4 that each is sitting on. Or better yet,
talk to the Ford Motor Company, and The Prudential Insurance Comapny, the U.S.
Postal Service, and to Apple, none of whom is a service provider, and all of whom
are individually sitting on an entire /8 or more (i.e.
= 16,777,728 addresses each).
Then maybe we could ask if Amazon really needs 23.3 million, if IBM really
needs a whole 17.5 million, if Google really needs 13.1 million, if Eli Lilly
really needs 11.5 million, and if Merck really needs 7.2 million, and if Bank
of America really needs 6.2 million.
We're dying of thirst in the middle of Lake Superior.
Regards,
rfg
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