Re: AT&T Public Policy Research -- hiring for cypherpunks issues

[Alan Olsen <alano@teleport.com>]

At 03:21 AM 2/13/96 -0800, John Gilmore wrote:
>Date: Mon, 12 Feb 1996 17:02:39 -0500 (EST)
>From: Paul Resnick <presnick@research.att.com>
>To: gnu@eff.org
[Snip]
>Markets for IP Addresses
>
>The 32-bit numbers used for Internet addressing and routing are a
>limited resource. As this resource becomes scarcer, political
>considerations are likely to creep into allocation decisions made
>through existing administrative processes, leading to suboptimal
>allocations. By granting transferable property rights to addresses,
>allocation decisions can be removed from the political realm into the
>economic realm, so that addresses are allocated to those who value them
>most. This project seeks to develop consensus in the Internet community
>for a move to market-based allocation, and investigates alternative
>designs for an electronic market to coordinate the exchange of IP
>addresses.

This proposal bothers me. I do not see any positive results from this
proposal. (Or at least the negatives will far outweigh the positive.)

Here is what I see as the results of such a plan...

Getting an IP address will become prohibitivly expensive except for the
largest megacorps.  Instead of solving the limitations of the current
system, this plan will cause people to "invest" in IP addresses in the hope
that the price will go up.  IP addresses will become part of a corporation's
invenstment portfolio.  This will result in less usage of IP addresses, not
more.  The Internet is a fully complient buzzword.  People will buy IP
addresses becuase it is "the cool thing to do" and they can make a quick buck.

I wonder if "used" addresses will get less money on the "open market" than
"unused" addresses.  If that is the case, then the you will see huge blocks
of addresses go unused so as to not spoil their "market value".

All in all, I see it as a bad idea...

"Ever have a problem getting an IP address from your local ISP?  YOU WILL!
And the poeple to bring it to you? AT&T!"
 
---
Alan Olsen -- alano@teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction
        `finger -l alano@teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key 
                http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ 
  "We had to destroy the Internet in order to save it." - Sen. Exon
"I, Caligula Clinton... In the name of the Senate and the people of Rome!"
   - Bill Clinton signing the CDA with the First Amendment bent over.