[address-policy-wg] Fwd: selling ip:s? (kf)

Hi

That RIPE quote is outdated. Document itself is dated "Date: 22 April 1996".

Nowadays "value" cannot (or should not) be prescribed or declared,
because as it stands, "value of a thing is what thing can bring".

And clearly, IP numbers are very valuable comodity, if available.

Legally, however, RIPE (or Internet community ?!) should clarify
this "non selling position".

That IP numbers cannot be OWNED, and therefore, since noone can
claim ownership over certain IP number or IP range, noone is ENTITLED
to SELL it, and noone is, therefore, able to buy it.

Claiming that "IP numbers themselves" have "no intrinsic value" might
be, under certain circumstances, misleading, since, if someone is
able to prove othervise (say, "if I can earn money by selling and
buying IP numbers/renges, then, hell, they DO have value, not only
intrinsic but very real, and very tangible..) then he successfully
(if a matter is referred to a court) might undermine current standing
that "IP numbers have no intrinsic value".

To put it bluntly, "we" should make sure that kind of behaviour
(selling and/or trafficking with IP numbers) is treated the same way
as selling anything that seller does not own in the first place.

I presume, selling a real-estate that one does not own is a crime
(fraud?!). At least it's a fraud in my country.

Regards!
Darko

-- 

Mike Norris wrote:
>  
>>  why are we not allowed to sell ip address? i dont understand...please 
> explain...thank you   
>  
> Quote from ripe-152:
>  
>     "By themselves, these resources have no intrinsic value; their worth 
> is only
>     realised in conjunction with the provision of Internet 
> access.  Thus, while
>     registries may charge for their administrative and technical 
> services, they
>     may not charge for name space or address space as such; no unit cost 
> or price
>     tag can be attached to a domain name or to an IP address, public or 
> private. "
>  
> See http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/ripe-152.html for the full document.
>  
> Regards.
>  
> Mike Norris
>