6 ms·

What you are proposing is likely to trigger (or at least prolong) a dark age of the internet. And I'm not exaggerating the slightest. If people have to pay fo

What you are proposing is likely to trigger (or at least prolong) a dark age of the internet. And I'm not exaggerating the slightest. If people have to pay for IP addresses, then the internet will be divided in two: those who can pay, and those who can't run a server. And I predict that the crushing majority of people who use the internet will be of the second category. This would obviously be a catastrophe for freedom of speech and even privacy. The major win for v6 is enormous: an IP for everyone, and the possibility for a server at every home, which will at last give us the decentralized internet we should have had in the first place.

tptacek 16y ago
If it costs $5/yr for a single IP address, I'm not too concerned about the cost. Meanwhile, most of the applications YC-types build don't necessarily need routable IP addresses. In a better world, most of our content would be delivered via overlay networks that abstract away that detail anyways. In the immediacy, what matters is the DNS. We are in a dark age of the Internet, and it's our own doing. We've tethered ourselves to an archaic protocol that already indentures us to massive telco and cable operators, and would even if we had portable /32's assigned directly and personally from ARIN. I don't see why we should be focusing all our engineering efforts on this one technological detail, tethering us forever to the idea that a license to speak on the Internet entails an IP address. There's 15+ years of research behind better networking topologies that care no more about IP addresses than a home router cares about Ethernet MAC addresses. Let's go that direction. It's easier, and probably better.
- signa11 16y ago
  > I don't see why we should be focusing all our engineering efforts on this one technological detail, tethering us forever to the idea that a license to speak on the Internet entails an IP address. There's 15+ years of research behind better networking topologies that care no more about IP addresses than a home router cares about Ethernet MAC addresses. Let's go that direction. It's easier, and probably better. can you please elaborate on the above a bit ? bunch of pointers to papers would be most appreciated. thanks !
  - tptacek 16y ago
    A good place to start is RON, which is a MIT PDOS project that Frans Kaashoek and Robert Morris (that one) were involved in: http://nms.csail.mit.edu/ron/ http://nms.csail.mit.edu/ron/ I had a funded startup in '99 doing this stuff (in our last year, we adapted the MIT Click Modular Router to the same idea).
  - poet 16y ago
    Check out "A Layered Naming Architecture for the Internet". This is the paper we focused on in an Advanced Networking class when we talked about naming. It aggregates several key principles from the literature into one system. I haven't read the RON paper Thomas linked to, but based on a quick glance, I'd say both papers are definitely worth your time. The Naming paper is actually written by several of the same people who wrote or collaborated on RON. Feel free to drop me an email if you want to discuss the Naming paper. http://nms.csail.mit.edu/papers/index.php?detail=4 http://nms.csail.mit.edu/papers/index.php?detail=4
- baq 16y ago
  FYI: a public IP can cost anywhere between $0 and $25/year in Eastern Europe, depending on the ISP.
  - tptacek 16y ago
    Virtually any number between $1 and $100/yr seems reasonable to me. Consider: for the rare (and hopefully rarer and rarer) cases where you need a "native" IP address, 1 will almost always do. Meanwhile, all these prices are feasible (in a first-world kind of way) for individuals, but untenable for wasteful use by company IT departments. $6.5MM/yr may not sound like a dealbreaker for a F-500's /16, but that's actually quite a lot of headcount.
    - omh 16y ago
      Unfortunately $25k is quite a lot for a /24, and you need a /24 if you want to have a network with independent BGP routing (because this is the smallest block in most BGP routers) I manage the networks for a small company and we only need a few public IPs, but because we want the reliability we have a dual-homed connection via two ISPs, and our own /24.
      - tptacek 16y ago
        Most small companies are not in a position to get a BGP-advertised default-free connection to multiple ISPs for an allocation as small as a /24. Can it be done? I'm sure, but only after a sizeable investment of time and effort. My point being, it's not as if this is a capability IPv4 currently provides that is imminently going to be snuffed out by address exhaustion. The ship sailed on free/easy multihoming when Sprint started filtering anything smaller than a /19, back in '97.
        omh 16y ago
        You obviously have more experience with this than me, but in the UK we had no trouble getting BGP advertising with two ISPs for incoming connections (though we're not default-free, just using HSRP between ISPs for outbound).
zoomzoom 16y ago
I agree that the internet would be better off if it was more decoupled from monolithic backbones. Even more, the commercialization arguments underway sound a lot like arguments to deregulate housing loans in 1995...I do not think that IP addresses should be controlled by cable and datacenter companies, who have every interest to inflate the prices. And that is what market regulation without any standards or rational planning will result in. An IP address is a human right on the same order as education and cultural freedom. But I bet that even with v4 people could figure out creative ways to get servers running for a lot more people. Let's not be sensationalist.
- tptacek 16y ago
  Why is an IP address a human right? Isn't "first-class access to the Internet" the right, and IP addresses just an implementation detail?
  - 1053r 16y ago
    Why is first-class access to the Internet a human right? Isn't "ability to communicate freely" the right, and the Internet just an implementation detail?
    - tptacek 16y ago
      Sure, if that's what you think. I don't have a problem with that. What I don't understand is why a personal 32-bit (or 128-bit) identifier is a human right. If it is, most of you, including the ones with static addresses, are getting shafted. Your address means less than you probably think it does.
    - loup-vaillant 16y ago
      Well, it's the implementation detail. Right now, without a first class internet connection, you can't completely exercise your ability to communicate (and publish) freely. Likewise, I think that right now, without a public IP, you don't have a first class internet connection. So, by the contraposition, the transitivity of the implication, and my mathematical powers, having a public IP should be treated as the fundamental right it enables. Of course, if there are several efficient "implementation details" which enable the layer above, then you just need one of those.

tptacek 16y ago

If it costs $5/yr for a single IP address, I'm not too concerned about the cost. Meanwhile, most of the applications YC-types build don't necessarily need routable IP addresses. In a better world, most of our content would be delivered via overlay networks that abstract away that detail anyways. In the immediacy, what matters is the DNS. We are in a dark age of the Internet, and it's our own doing. We've tethered ourselves to an archaic protocol that already indentures us to massive telco and cable operators, and would even if we had portable /32's assigned directly and personally from ARIN. I don't see why we should be focusing all our engineering efforts on this one technological detail, tethering us forever to the idea that a license to speak on the Internet entails an IP address. There's 15+ years of research behind better networking topologies that care no more about IP addresses than a home router cares about Ethernet MAC addresses. Let's go that direction. It's easier, and probably better.

signa11 16y ago
> I don't see why we should be focusing all our engineering efforts on this one technological detail, tethering us forever to the idea that a license to speak on the Internet entails an IP address. There's 15+ years of research behind better networking topologies that care no more about IP addresses than a home router cares about Ethernet MAC addresses. Let's go that direction. It's easier, and probably better. can you please elaborate on the above a bit ? bunch of pointers to papers would be most appreciated. thanks !
- tptacek 16y ago
  A good place to start is RON, which is a MIT PDOS project that Frans Kaashoek and Robert Morris (that one) were involved in: http://nms.csail.mit.edu/ron/ http://nms.csail.mit.edu/ron/ I had a funded startup in '99 doing this stuff (in our last year, we adapted the MIT Click Modular Router to the same idea).
- poet 16y ago
  Check out "A Layered Naming Architecture for the Internet". This is the paper we focused on in an Advanced Networking class when we talked about naming. It aggregates several key principles from the literature into one system. I haven't read the RON paper Thomas linked to, but based on a quick glance, I'd say both papers are definitely worth your time. The Naming paper is actually written by several of the same people who wrote or collaborated on RON. Feel free to drop me an email if you want to discuss the Naming paper. http://nms.csail.mit.edu/papers/index.php?detail=4 http://nms.csail.mit.edu/papers/index.php?detail=4
baq 16y ago
FYI: a public IP can cost anywhere between $0 and $25/year in Eastern Europe, depending on the ISP.
- tptacek 16y ago
  Virtually any number between $1 and $100/yr seems reasonable to me. Consider: for the rare (and hopefully rarer and rarer) cases where you need a "native" IP address, 1 will almost always do. Meanwhile, all these prices are feasible (in a first-world kind of way) for individuals, but untenable for wasteful use by company IT departments. $6.5MM/yr may not sound like a dealbreaker for a F-500's /16, but that's actually quite a lot of headcount.
  - omh 16y ago
    Unfortunately $25k is quite a lot for a /24, and you need a /24 if you want to have a network with independent BGP routing (because this is the smallest block in most BGP routers) I manage the networks for a small company and we only need a few public IPs, but because we want the reliability we have a dual-homed connection via two ISPs, and our own /24.
    - tptacek 16y ago
      Most small companies are not in a position to get a BGP-advertised default-free connection to multiple ISPs for an allocation as small as a /24. Can it be done? I'm sure, but only after a sizeable investment of time and effort. My point being, it's not as if this is a capability IPv4 currently provides that is imminently going to be snuffed out by address exhaustion. The ship sailed on free/easy multihoming when Sprint started filtering anything smaller than a /19, back in '97.
      - omh 16y ago
        You obviously have more experience with this than me, but in the UK we had no trouble getting BGP advertising with two ISPs for incoming connections (though we're not default-free, just using HSRP between ISPs for outbound).

zoomzoom 16y ago

I agree that the internet would be better off if it was more decoupled from monolithic backbones. Even more, the commercialization arguments underway sound a lot like arguments to deregulate housing loans in 1995...I do not think that IP addresses should be controlled by cable and datacenter companies, who have every interest to inflate the prices. And that is what market regulation without any standards or rational planning will result in. An IP address is a human right on the same order as education and cultural freedom. But I bet that even with v4 people could figure out creative ways to get servers running for a lot more people. Let's not be sensationalist.

tptacek 16y ago
Why is an IP address a human right? Isn't "first-class access to the Internet" the right, and IP addresses just an implementation detail?
- 1053r 16y ago
  Why is first-class access to the Internet a human right? Isn't "ability to communicate freely" the right, and the Internet just an implementation detail?
  - tptacek 16y ago
    Sure, if that's what you think. I don't have a problem with that. What I don't understand is why a personal 32-bit (or 128-bit) identifier is a human right. If it is, most of you, including the ones with static addresses, are getting shafted. Your address means less than you probably think it does.
  - loup-vaillant 16y ago
    Well, it's the implementation detail. Right now, without a first class internet connection, you can't completely exercise your ability to communicate (and publish) freely. Likewise, I think that right now, without a public IP, you don't have a first class internet connection. So, by the contraposition, the transitivity of the implication, and my mathematical powers, having a public IP should be treated as the fundamental right it enables. Of course, if there are several efficient "implementation details" which enable the layer above, then you just need one of those.