Hi all, There are currently 3 policies for consideration at the APNIC 36 meeting Xi'an at the end of August. They are: prop-108 Suggested changes to the APNIC Policy Development Process prop-107 AS number transfer policy proposal prop-105 Distribution of returned IPv4 address (Modification of prop-088) I'll go through briefly what the proposals and where appropriate what I think about them. I'm going to be one of the NZers at the meeting, if there is a point of view that you'd like me to keep in mind during the discussion there then just drop me a line. Regards, Dean prop-108 Suggested changes to the APNIC Policy Development Process ----- Proposed by Dean Pemberton[1] and Izumi Okutani (JPNIC) This proposal seeks to clarify a set of 3 issues with the current PDP which were highlighted during the last meeting in Singapore. The issues are: **Timing Requirements for the Policy-SIG chairs to announce consensus** in the Open Policy Meeting (OPM)** At the moment the Chair calls for consensus on proposals during the OPM and then moves to immediately gauge if consensus has been reached. Due to the nebulous nature of gauging consensus, the Chairs have expressed a desire to be allowed an opportunity to discuss among themselves if consensus has been reached. This proposal seeks to give them this ability as long as a determination on consensus is delivered before the end of the OPM. **Requiring for consensus to be called and demonstrated at the AMM** A historical artefact from the days when there were multiple SIGs within APNIC all producing policy requires that proposals not only gain consensus at their individual OPMs, but also again when the whole membership comes together a day later at the APNIC Members Meeting. This was done to ensure that if there were conflicting policies produced by two SIGs at the same meeting, this would become obvious during the second call for consensus at the AMM and resolved. Now that the Policy-SIG is the only policy-generating body within APNIC, this is no longer necessary and creates confusion as to why a second consensus call is required. This proposal seeks to remove the requirement for a second call for consensus at the AMM unless the SIG Chair deems that it is necessary for any reason. **The length of the required comment period for successful policy proposals after the AMM** Once a policy proposal has gained consensus at the OPM/AMM, it is returned to the mailing list for a comment period lasting 8 weeks. This was historically to allow members not at the OPM/AMM to contribute on the mailing list. In practice there is little to no comment during this time, with all comment on a proposal happening before the OPM. This has the effect of delaying any policy implementations for 8 weeks. This proposal seeks to shorten this comment period to a minimum of 2 weeks unless the SIG Chair deems that it should be longer. Pros: Streamlines the process and removes some of the things which make the PDP a pain Cons: Some members may feel that it gives the Policy-SIG power to implement policy without AMM oversight. In practice this isn't the case as the APNIC exec council has the final decision on policy introduction. prop-107 AS number transfer policy proposal ----- Proposed by Tomohiro Fujisaki There have been a lot of policies dealing with the transfer of IPv4 addresses as RIRs reached exhaustion. What has not been dealt with however are any policies around transferring AS numbers either between APNIC members, or between APNIC members and members of other RIRs. While this is not a huge problem in terms of demand (actual numbers are hard to get, but I’ve been told there are a non-zero number of applicants), it would be good to close this gap in current policy. Generally I'm supportive. Pros: Makes a level playing field between AS numbers and other IP resources in relation to transfer policy Cons: More policy for an area which doesn’t have a significant demand. prop-105 Distribution of returned IPv4 address (Modification of prop-088) ----- Proposed by Tomohiro Fujisaki This one is a bit more contentious. At present APNIC is operating under a policy of only giving a single block of 1024 IPv4 addresses out to any existing or new members. This is basically because they are all gone. Once you get this special last block (being called a 'last slash-8 block') you can never get any more IPv4 addresses. The thing is... IANA has a few more numbers which they can give out. These are dregs which other people have given back to IANA and they are preparing to hand them out to the RIRs. So the question is, what should APNIC do with those addresses? There aren’t THAT many of them (probably about 4 million, but don't quote me), certainly not enough to go back to the old way of allocating them (they would last less than a few months). Should they just be placed into the current pool and treated the same as the 'last slash-8' addresses, or, as this proposal suggests, should APNIC members be allowed a second bite at the cherry? This policy proposes that members be allowed one allocation from the 'last slash-8' and then an additional allocation from any addresses returned by IANA. Opinion is divided here. Some feel that it gives people one last hope for IPv4 when they should be concentrating on deploying IPv6, while others say that they need just a few more addresses to tide them over. Still others say that it should only be available to developing nations or organisations with small allocations already. I'm on the fence here, but I think that the framework we would need to put in place to administer this would outweigh the benefit gained from offering another allocation to members. I'm currently in favour of just putting them in the existing pool and carrying on as we do today. I’ll be meeting with the author in Xi’an to see if there is any convincing argument the other way. If anyone has any feedback on this one let me know. Pros: Gets addresses out to people who need them Cons: Gives an inaccurate impression that there are any more IPv4 addresses left. People should be moving their large IP address demands to IPv6 [1] While I have strived for balance in this assessment, readers should be aware that I am a co-author of the proposal. -- Dean Pemberton Technical Policy Advisor InternetNZ +64 21 920 363 (mob) dean(a)internetnz.net.nz To protect and promote the Internet for New Zealand.