RE: IPv6 push doesn't have much pull in U.S

["Kuhtz, Christian" <christian.kuhtz () bellsouth com>]

> On 18-jul-2005, at 18:31, Kuhtz, Christian wrote:
>
> > If there is pressure to adopt IPv6 rapidly in a given 
> region, and that 
> > given region also happens to drive broadband technology 
> evolution, and 
> > North America ends up being dependent on cheap equipment primarily 
> > driven by overseas standards..
>
> I don't see this. For instance, the need for non-ASCII characters in  
> (for instance) Asian languages has pushed Unicode. Modern systems in  
> NA are all capable of using Unicode. But do users in NA actually  
> _use_ Unicode? ASCII works fine for them 99% of the time.

I don't disagree with that point at all.  But what I was trying to say
goes a little further and is basically the notion that you're likely to
use gear that happens to speak Unicode because of other developments and
while you may be fine using ASCII most of the time (given that it is a
charset specifically developed to meet North American English needs some
time ago), you may be receiving a parasitic benefit of it showing up
elsewhere or everywhere else.

It won't influence purchase decisions perhaps, you won't buy gear X
because it doesn't do Unicode, but it may just show up as the defacto
standard.  Just like other charsets have made it into just about every
current, modern operating system and application..  So, you'd adopt just
because it's there and it's no worth fighting the current of being
different.  (GSM in North America is a similar example, I think :-)

There are economic forces at work, that have very little to do with the
suitability of technology for a specific locale, which may drive
adoption of technology.

> Same thing with IPv6. Windows and MacOS have had IPv6 on board for  
> years. Doesn't mean people use it.

Yup.  That is absolutely correct.

But, if there are huge amounts of actions in a given market place,
that's bound to spill over into a different market place because of
global distribution of goods.  Not because the other, different market
asked for it, but just because it's more economical to make one set of
gear that is a superset in the end.
 
> > The key questions are
>
> >     When will who you want to talk to speak IPv6?
>
> That's a key question when you've made up your mind to be one of the  
> last to adopt IPv6.

Yes, and in terms of volume, that's where I see North America being
right now..  We're on a track to be dead last (well, almost) on the path
we are on right now (and have been for some years).

> The real key question is: when will it start to  
> make sense to use IPv6 for my own stuff, regardless of what the rest  
> of the world does?

Not if you are fine with what you have, and believe in never change a
running system because one doesn't believe it's prudent to keep up with
technology...

> In an enterprise environment the ease of never  
> again having to think about how many hosts are going to end 
> up in the  
> same subnet alone may be quite compelling. But it only makes sense  
> when you can turn off IPv4 in most of the network and proxy or  
> translate communications to the outside.

Well, I'm not sure I would be so bold as to say it's an either or
choice, but it would have to be for substantial islands of a corporation
or other type of organization to make economic sense.  Just like there's
still antiquated computing gear (& software on it) hopping around
happily all over the place, although isolated and put into a scenario
where there are gateways or dain bramage impact on the rest of the world
is otherwise limited, there will be IPv4 in islands long after IPv6
achieves world domination (which has yet to be seen).

If there is a business case for IPv6, it is pandemic rather than
epidemic for as far as my rather cloudy crystal ball will let me see...

Best regards,
Christian

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