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Is the Internet Shutting Out Independent Players?

Posted by Cliff on from the routing-table-roulette dept.

ikekrull asks: "After looking to see how I could set up my company's LAN to be multi-homed ? , I found that it would be next-to-impossible for me to do this. 'Providerless' IP addresses are no longer allocated to anybody in this part of the world (New Zealand) by APNIC ? , unless you meet requirements (financial and political) that are pretty much unmeetable by anyone but a large ISP. Does this put control of the entire internet further and further into the hands of large corporate players, and and is anyone particularly interested in changing this situation?"

"ISPs aren't advertizing routes for competing ISPs, and since IP blocks are heavily filtered upstream, this won't do much good anyway. The reasons for this are clear (Routing table growth was getting way out of hand), hence the introduction of CIDR ? , and the allocation of IPs to ISPs, with a resulting lockout on availability of routable IP space to individuals or smaller groups.

With the availabilty of IPv6, and the cost of RAM, I find it somewhat hard to believe that either IP address blocks are scarce, or that the size of routing tables are unmanageable any more. This might have been true with an 8MB Cisco 10 years ago, but surely it would be a negligible cost to put 1-2GB of RAM on even a reasonably budget router at todays prices.

Obviously, IPV6 isn't really here yet, but i would like to think that when (if) it arrives, we will see a more open routing system.

Is anybody working on returning some kind of equal standing to 'the little guys' when it comes to internet routing infrastructure, and how a more 'open' system could work in practice on tomorrow's (or today's) internet?"

8 of 357 comments (clear)

  1. Just make one up. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny


    Here - 217.53.98.174 - doesn't seem to be responding; use that one.

    1. Re:Just make one up. by eMilkshake · · Score: 2, Funny

      Neither does 192.168.10.73 -- in fact, you could have all of 192.168.10!

    2. Re:Just make one up. by Casca · · Score: 3, Funny

      Better yet, while trying to prove to a manager that some of our NT (MCSE) admins don't have a clue, this was heard:

      NT guy: "Somethings wrong with the network, I can't access my share drive."

      LAN guy: "Can you ping your default gateway?"

      NT guy: "What address is that?"

      LAN guy: (mumbling something about bodily functions and low SAT scores) "Its 172.358.44.261"

      NT guy: (remember, he passed Microsofts TCP/IP course) "Nope, it doesn't respond."

      --
      Casca
  2. Re:You can buy multi-homed connections. by FatRatBastard · · Score: 4, Funny

    You just called a Kiwi an Aussie... [gulp] its going to get mighty ugly ;)

  3. You should be happy by snatchitup · · Score: 2, Funny

    You don't want every Tom, Dick, & Harry setting up networks like Loose Cannons. And Domain names, Darn-It! There are no more left, except of course www.clownpenis.fart.

  4. Re:You can buy multi-homed connections. by barnaclebarnes · · Score: 3, Funny

    Australia is New Zealands West Island. get it right. ;)

    'Just how much can Koala Bear'

    --
    [Please type your sig here.]
  5. Re:Woah. by Binestar · · Score: 2, Funny

    Course if my ping times were 60,000,000ms to anywhere I would be quite upset.

    =)

    --
    Do you Gentoo!?
  6. IPv6 by redcliffe · · Score: 2, Funny

    That's why we need IPv6 NOW!!!!! Join the crusade - Organise a one million geek march on the capitol demanding IPv6 NOW!!! :-)