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Dear SIG members
The proposal 'Change in the criteria for the recognition of NIRs in the
APNIC region' has been sent to the Policy SIG for review. It will
be presented at the Policy SIG at APNIC 26 in Christchurch, New
Zealand, 25-29 August 2008.
The proposal's history can be found at:
http://www.apnic.net/policy/proposals/prop-060-v001.html
We invite you to review and comment on the proposal on the mailing list
before the meeting.
The comment period on the mailing list before an APNIC meeting is an
important part of the policy development process. We encourage you to
express your views on the proposal:
- Do you support or oppose this proposal?
- Does this proposal solve a problem you are experiencing? If so,
tell the community about your situation.
- Do you see any disadvantages in this proposal?
- Is there anything in the proposal that is not clear?
- What changes could be made to this proposal to make it more
effective?
randy and jian
________________________________________________________________________
prop-060-v001: Change in the criteria for the recognition of NIRs in
the APNIC region
________________________________________________________________________
Author: Kusumba Sridhar
<kusumba at vebtel dot com>
Version: 1
Date: 16 May 2008
1. Introduction
----------------
This is a proposal to update the criteria for recognising new National
Internet Registries (NIRs) in the APNIC region.
The current criteria are described in the following policy document:
APNIC-104: Criteria for the recognition of NIRs in the APNIC region
http://www.apnic.net/policy/nir-criteria.html
2. Summary of current problem
------------------------------
The existing Policy frame work was last published on 1st December 2002
and the same was not re-visited since then. There has been significant
change in the Political, Economic and Operational situations in various
economies, especially the growing economies. The very structure of
Internet and its Resources has changed in several economies. The
industry participation has also grown significantly leading Internet to
be as ubiquitous as any other resource like Electricity, Water, Shelter
etc., In such a situation, it is important that the very industry
decides the future and applicability of the Internet resources and also
controls them through a community friendly environment. The Government,
while taking a neutral position, is required to support such resources
but must refrain from controlling the same.
The current NIR recognizing criteria requires any Industry
representation to have endorsement of the proposal from the Government
agency (Section 3.1) that is responsible for Internet related activities
including issuing licenses to ISPs etc in a respective country. APNIC
considers any application without such endorsement as "in-complete"
proposal and will not forward to the Executive Council for processing or
approving a NIR.
However, in a situation where such proposal is originated by a unit or
division or department of the Government, such proposal could go through
since the Government endorsement is easily or sometimes automatically
available to them. This is also applicable for National Information
Centers, Internet Exchanges etc., that are largely and many times fully
controlled and manned by the Government.
It is not automatic agreement that a NIC in any country could be the
"first-choice" to form NIR by the Policy. However, in a situation where
it is important for the "Internet" itself to move towards a
free-regulatory World, unfortunately in the several growing economies it
is noticed that Internet is still largely manned by the Government. The
readers may kindly appreciate the difference between "controlling" and
"manning". Due to several Security, Economic and Political reasons, it
may be required that Internet is controlled in such economies.
Due to this, Government has taken control of Infrastructure networks
such as NIC, IXPs etc., with participation of Industry up to an extent
that it is a meager contributing-participation and not decisive-
participation in certain economies.
1. Government represented agencies will be having control on
Internet Resource allocation in the economy, if such NIR is
formed by Government controlled agency.
2. Policy only indicates but may not restrict Government to enforce
rules to obtain resources from NIR and not APNIC directly.
3. Government under the ambit of National Security may demonstrate
the need for the Service Providers to only obtain resources from
regional NIR and not from APNIC despite the policy indication.
4. Member or User community may loose opportunity to grow the
networks largely due to very reason that they may need to obtain
Internet resources only from such NIR and the regulator who is
also directly associated with such NIRs or Policy makers, may
dismiss or delay such allocation requests against any pending
issue or matter concerned to that Service provider and the
government or Regulator.
5. Requirement of Government's endorsement may put the proposing
Industry Board to off-load majority of Permanent Board Positions
to the Government representatives or agencies again leading to
only contributing-participation and not decisive-participation
due to the political situation that the endorsing Government may
seek major stake on the Board representation for the positions
that are Permanent and not Elected.
6. Despite NIR proposal being sent through a Government controlled
agency, the EC may have right to reject such proposal if it has
noticed suitable objections from members. However, in the current
policy criteria, the scope of such objections is only "external"
and not within the policy framework or work flow.
3. Situation in other RIRs
----------------------------
ARIN, RIPE and AfriNIC do not have NIRs. LACNIC has NIRs but does not
have a policy document for the recognition of new NIRs.
4. Details of the proposal
----------------------------
Proposed changes in the policy:
1. NIR application from Industry represented agency may not need
Government's endorsement. However, must qualify Point no. 3
below.
2. NIR application from Government represented agency may not need
Government's endorsement. However, must qualify Point no. 3
below.
3.1 Any NIR application must be put on voting process, both through
Online Voting and Voting at AMM and must achieve support.
OR
3.2 Any NIR application must be put on voting process, both through
Online Voting and Voting at AMM and must achieve atleast 75%
support from the members within that Economy. In such a case,
voting is open only for members from that Economy.
4. Any Economy can apply for NIR only when there are minimum of
certain predefined members under each category since that will
also justify the efficient application of IP resources.
5. Section 3.2.2 must mention that the Board composition of the NIR
must have majority representation from Members, followed by
Academic or Research Organizations etc., The Government or its
participating agencies must have minor role compared to other
representations on the Board of NIR.
6. The Board may restrict its positions to not more than Nine
members since it is difficult to achieve co-ordination of the
same for effective functioning or obtaining decisions for such
NIR.
7. Having either APNIC's Operational office or Branch Office should
not restrict that Economy in applying for NIR.
5. Advantages and disadvantages of the proposal
-------------------------------------------------
There are several advantages of adopting such policy:
1. Neutrality which is inline to "Open Policy" levels while
considering a NIR proposal.
2. Mandates Global Policies for creating Free Access to Internet
Resources.
3. Improves participation by membership community in Internet
Development.
4. Removes the Conditional Policy barriers in several countries where
the Governments cannot impose such conditional terms for
obtaining resources.
There are no disadvantages by adopting the policy.
6. Effect on APNIC
--------------------
APNIC members would be benefited by such policy since they don't have to
fear for undergoing conditional allocations of resources. At the
same time, membership communities in several countries, if eligible by
this policy, will be able to form NIR that is community controlled
rather than any incumbent or Government controlled NIR.
7. Effect on NIRs
-------------------
There is no effect on NIRs.
* sig-policy: APNIC SIG on resource management policy *
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