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Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

theregister.co.uk

31–40 of 44 posts

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#31

So, $7.5 million for 666,624 IP addresses. Now the question is, how much is the 16,777,214 IP addresses that Apple owns worth? (Apple owns the entire 17.0.0.0 Class A subnet) Was this factored into Apple's valuation? I would love to hear the story behind how Apple got the 17.0.0.0 subnet.

I have no idea, but I think it is even more ridiculous that Ford Motor Company has 19.0.0.0 At some price, I am sure Ford would be willing to sell, but I am not sure it would be worth the hassle for $150M.

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#32
post #22
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft bought 666K addresses. How many addresses does ARIN even have now, and how likely are they to assign such a large block to a single entity at this point?

ARIN has 5.7 /8 equivalents, or 95M addresses available. Their policy is (roughly) to satisfy any requests where the addresses will actually be used in the near future ("50% utilization rate within one year"). http://www.potaroo.net/tools/ipv4/index.html https://www.arin.net/resources/request/ipv4_depletion.html https://www.arin.net/policy/nrpm.html#four

Hmm, that is interesting. I'm surprised that ARIN has that much available at this point.

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#33
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds clever but actually bespeaks a lack of understanding what an IP address is. Microsoft didn't buy a "set of numbers"; they bought the rights, previously secured by another company, to insert prefixes into hundreds of thousands of routers operated (at galactic levels of expense) by hundreds of companies around the world.

So they're paying for the rights for other people to access their systems via a set of numbers. And how is that not making arbitrary numbers artificially scarce and collecting payment for them? IPV6 really can't come soon enough.

FIB sizes in core routers (operated at great expense by people you do not pay) are not an artificial scarcity.

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#34

So, $7.5 million for 666,624 IP addresses. Now the question is, how much is the 16,777,214 IP addresses that Apple owns worth? (Apple owns the entire 17.0.0.0 Class A subnet) Was this factored into Apple's valuation? I would love to hear the story behind how Apple got the 17.0.0.0 subnet.

If you want to be optimistic you could carry a /8 on your books at ~$150M. That's a drop in the bucket for most companies that hold /8s, so it's probably not worth arguing about.

The legacy class As were given out by Jon Postel just for asking; if you would ever need more than 256 subnets then a class B wouldn't be big enough so you got a class A.

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#35
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds clever but actually bespeaks a lack of understanding what an IP address is. Microsoft didn't buy a "set of numbers"; they bought the rights, previously secured by another company, to insert prefixes into hundreds of thousands of routers operated (at galactic levels of expense) by hundreds of companies around the world.

So they're paying for the rights for other people to access their systems via a set of numbers. And how is that not making arbitrary numbers artificially scarce and collecting payment for them? IPV6 really can't come soon enough.

IPv4 was designed in the early 1980s. Are you saying Cerf et al. made IP addresses only 32 bits so they could cash in 30 years later? Or are you saying that almost all ISPs are delaying IPv6 so they can cash in (fairly small amounts of money) on IPv4 addresses?

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#36
post #15

One company sold an asset to another company, and kept normal records of the sale. I don't consider that the "black market." It's just the natural secondary market. (Yes, I'm only making a semantic distinction, but I think it's misleading to use the same term to refer to, say, the cocaine economy and the above-board sale of IP addresses.)

It's not clear if IP addresses are 'assets'. The only thing keeping Microsoft from picking up IPs arbitrarily is the fact that their BGP peers will blacklist those ranges if they do something disruptive like that. If ARIN or the IANA declares the transfer invalid... well, who knows what will happen?

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#37

So, $7.5 million for 666,624 IP addresses. Now the question is, how much is the 16,777,214 IP addresses that Apple owns worth? (Apple owns the entire 17.0.0.0 Class A subnet) Was this factored into Apple's valuation? I would love to hear the story behind how Apple got the 17.0.0.0 subnet.

HP has both 15/8 and 16/8, the latter originally from Compaq. You can see the other "legacy" allocations here:

http://www.iana.org/assignments/ipv4-address-space/ipv4-addr...

Nicely tabulated http://royal.pingdom.com/2008/02/13/where-did-all-the-ip-num...

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#38
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they're paying for the rights for other people to access their systems via a set of numbers. And how is that not making arbitrary numbers artificially scarce and collecting payment for them? IPV6 really can't come soon enough.

IPv4 was designed in the early 1980s. Are you saying Cerf et al. made IP addresses only 32 bits so they could cash in 30 years later? Or are you saying that almost all ISPs are delaying IPv6 so they can cash in (fairly small amounts of money) on IPv4 addresses?

I guess I'm making a more broad statement that IP addresses are rare when, once we migrate to IPV6, they will be free, so we should migrate asap.

Re: Microsoft spends $7.5m on IP addresses

#39
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IPv4 was designed in the early 1980s. Are you saying Cerf et al. made IP addresses only 32 bits so they could cash in 30 years later? Or are you saying that almost all ISPs are delaying IPv6 so they can cash in (fairly small amounts of money) on IPv4 addresses?

I guess I'm making a more broad statement that IP addresses are rare when, once we migrate to IPV6, they will be free, so we should migrate asap.

They won't be free. They're not just numbers.
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