* Gert Doering
The proposal aims to unify IPv6 PA and IPv6 PI space into one kind of address space, "IPv6 addresses". This is the goal.
A goal which I support. However, the proposal does go a bit further than just this. For example, it: - unifies [PA] allocations and [PA] assignments - unifies the LIR and End User roles - allows an infinitely deep hierarchy of LIR+EU organisations - in doing so, significantly changes the structure of the Internet Registry System - dramatically increases the maximum undocumented delegation size from 1 /29 per LIR to $NUMSITES * /29. - codifies particular mercantile/contractual arrangements into internet number policy I think it would benefit the proposal's journey through the PDP if it tried to do fewer things at once, perhaps by splitting it into multiple proposals.
The idea to go there came from various people in the community, mostly for one reason - having two differently "coloured" addresses that do the same thing, routingwise, but follow different policies and have different strings attached, creates quite some confusion for the folks out there that can no longer be nicely separated into "ISPs" (->become RIPE members, use PA) and "end-users" (->use PI, if BGP-based multihoming and/or upstream independence is required).
Most notably, "garage style hosting providers" seem to have issues with the requirement of the IPv6 PI policy that PI space MUST NOT be sub-assigned, which the NCC interprets most strictly (because the vast amount of "grey" between "ok" and "not ok" is hard to codify into hostmaster guidelines). OTOH, I have not heard that complaint from actual hosting providers for a while, so maybe the issue is not that big anymore.
Is this concern really specific to PI? I'd say this is more a problematic property of IPv6 *assignments* - regardless of them being PI or PA. Being a data centre operator and LIR, I believe I cannot currently make an IPv6 PA assignment to a customer of mine who wants to run a cloud service where their customers can rent virtual servers in turn. (A customer of theirs may in turn run some sort of web hotel for another set of customers on those VMs, and so on and so on.) I do have such customers today. "Luckily" they've not yet taken an interest in IPv6. In IPv4, on the other hand, I may (ab)use the "single address loophole" to assign them the addresses they need. In any case, this particular concern could be resolved by relaxing the requirements on assignments somewhat. For example by allowing End Users to use the addresses for providing services to other entities (who may in turn do the same and so on), as long as the End User the assignment is registered to retains operational responsibility for the network in question. Of course, this wouldn't by itself yield PI/PA unification. However I think that too may be accomplished in a less intrusive way than 2013-06 currently proposes: Delete section 7, and add a new section to the appendix or even just the supporting notes saying that it should be possible to obtain become an LIR and hold PA space without being a direct member of the RIPE NCC, and that this should cost about the same as holding PI does today, and that all pre-existing PI holders and their blocks/inet6nums should be automatically converted to this new arrangement. Just my €.02 Tore