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RE: 16 vs 32 bit ASNs [Re: BBC does IPv6 ;) (Was: large multi-siteenterprises and PI]

  • From: Pekka Savola
  • Date: Tue Nov 30 12:54:12 2004

On Tue, 30 Nov 2004, Owen DeLong wrote:
--On Tuesday, November 30, 2004 7:44 AM +0200 Pekka Savola <[email protected]> wrote:
On Mon, 29 Nov 2004, Chris Burton wrote:
	It is highly doubtful that the policies in place will become
more relaxed with the introduction of 32-bit ASNs, the more likely
scenario is that they will stay the same or get far stricter as with
assignments of IPv4 or IPv6 addresses.
I find this hard to believe.  When there is 64K times as much the
resource, there is no way the policies would get stricter, because it can
easily and logically be argued that they don't need to be stricter.

Reality denies your statement.  Currently, one could at least argue, that
IPv6 policies are significantly stricter than IPv4 policies.  The ratio
between IPv6 addresses and IPv4 addresses is much much more than 64K times
as much.  As such, your argument falls very flat very early just based on
current experience.
And they have been under constant attack since the beginning. Lots of folks (like you :) have been suggesting creating all kinds of PI space, to use more of the bits because they are available. The pressure is building up.

Do you think the situation would be any different with 32-bit space? We could certainly _try_ to be strict (provided that there's sufficient consensus in the community that this is the way to go), but similar to the v6 allocation policies, sooner or later it would likely budge in some direction.

Face it, with 32 bit ASNs, pretty much anyone could have an ASN if they
wanted to unless the policies were very strict, and it would be very
difficult to justify why it would have to be strict because there is so
vast resource to be used.

It needs to be strict because, as you have pointed out, the assignment of an
ASN has potential consequences beyond simply ASN exhaustion.  The current
ASN policies are not there primarily to keep from running out of ASNs.  The
general attitude towards this from the RIRs has been "32 bit ASNs are coming
soon anyway, so, ASN exhaustion is not the issue".
Agree. I think the RIRs, despite the resolution how to go forward, take heed from this.

--
Pekka Savola "You each name yourselves king, yet the
Netcore Oy kingdom bleeds."
Systems. Networks. Security. -- George R.R. Martin: A Clash of Kings