[[lug] DSL, static IPs and the hunt for red october.]

[Duke Smith]

Thanx, Kevin, for the info. Apparently when I bought the license to
my domain name & calss-C block in 1995 or 6, I got a "portable"
block. I have changed ISP's twice since then & an additional change
of registrar. No-one has ever mentioned any charge for keeping
my domain name & its associated address block. The fee went up
from $25/yr to $35/yr about a year ago. I guess I got lucky jumping
on the bandwagon early enough. Even so, I would feel like a robber
baron charging more than, say, $1 / yr per address, a 6140% markup
(ignoring the wasted @'s if I followed the subnetting RFC
reccomendations.)

!! Apologies to the list: this response was delayed for several hours
because my ISP is having problems.

Kevin wrote:

> Allow me to inturrupt with some facts here and an overview of domain
> names  and IP allocation. ;)
>
> You can register a domain name with any of the accredited domain
> registrars like network solutions or register.com or opensrs. This gives you
> control (but not always ownership) of a particular domain name. (see
> http://www.domainnamebuyersguide.com/m001/webpages/registrarranking/registrarrankings01.htm
> if you are shopping for a registrar.) also, take a look at:
> http://slashdot.org/articles/00/05/12/2141250.shtml if you are still
> using network solutions. :)
>
> Once you have a domain name this does not imply it has an IP
> address. You can hold a domain name just fine with no IP associated
> with it. In order to assign an IP to it you need to request an IP or
> block of IP's from your ISP.
>
> The entity that controls IP allocation (In the us at least) is a non
> profit called ARIN. (http://www.arin.net). They are the "top level" of
> allocators. They won't assign anything less than a /16 network (thats
> 16 of the old class C's). So, typically they deal with the very large
> upstream providers and assign them blocks of IP's. Those providers in
> turn subnet and assign smaller portions to their customers and so on.
> It costs $500 to be a ARIN member. The smallest tier provider will pay
> $2500/year for a /16 network. This results in a cost of at least
> $156.25 for a class c network (/24). See:
>        http://www.arin.net/regserv/feeschedule.html
>
> For example, in my case my internet provider is the boulder internet
> coop (http://www.coop.net). I asked them for IP's when they connected
> me, and they gave me a /27 network (32 IP's). They in turn got those
> from ARIN (the coop are ARIN members).
>
> There are two "kinds" of IP blocks. portable and non portable. Most
> IP's you will see these days are non portable. This means that if you
> change ISP's, you can't take your IP's with you. You must get a new
> block assigned from your new ISP. If you are lucky enough to have
> portable IP's, then you can indeed get them to move to a new
> ISP. There is usually a lot of hassle involved in this, and fees from
> arin. See: http://www.arin.net/regserv/transfer.html
>
> If one was to want a portable class C these days, here is how I see
> the procedure going: You call your ISP and ask for it. They have you
> fill out approprate ARIN paperwork indicating what you want to use it
> for and that you are going to be using it in the next 3 months. Then
> they assign you the space if they have it. If they do not, then they
> have to request more space from ARIN. The top level ISP's charge would
> be at least 156.25 (and I would imagine they would want to make a
> profit on it as well), then the next tier ISP takes a cut, etc...
>
> another issue that arises is that ARIN is pretty picky about making
> sure an ISP that they issued a IP block to is using at least 80% of it
> before they get any more. This means that most ISPs try and only give
> customers just the number of IP's they need. In the past you might get
> an entire class c per company, but now, ISP's are likely to start you
> with a /29 or the like and only give you more when you are done using
> up those.
>
> hope that helps someone out there...
>
> kevin
>
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