Re: Kremen's Buddy?

[Jack Bates <jbates () brightok net>]

Richard A Steenbergen wrote:
> Ever notice the only folks happy with the status quo are the few who have 
> already have an intimate knowledge of the ARIN allocation process, and/or 
> have the right political connections to resolve the "issues" that come up 
> when dealing with them?
>
> Try looking at it from an outsider's point of view instead. If you're new 
> to dealing with ARIN, it is not uncommon to find the process is absolutely 
> baffling, frustrating, slow, expensive, and requiring intrusive disclosure 
> just shy of an anal cavity probe.

I take offense to all this misinformation based on my not so long ago viewpoint 
as an outsider. Based on everything I heard here, I had a negative view of ARIN. 
After all, everyone here deals with them. If they hate dealing with ARIN, it 
must be horrible. Live an learn.

My experiences with ARIN are simple. It was a lot of work. I didn't have any of 
my netblocks SWIP'd, hadn't analyzed my network in the way that ARIN wanted, and 
so I had to work to get all this information together the first time. However, I 
found ARIN easy to work with. They helped me out when I had questions, and when 
I was terrified that they wouldn't give me IPs, they were generous. My second 
time in dealing with them was aggravating, as I wanted more than what they 
issued (they use time between requests to determine a trend of actual IP 
utilization). However, they were right, and my last request expanded the 
previous request block out (I love contiguous when I can have it) and started a 
new one (yipee! another route!).

Please remember the outsiders. They expect that everyone dealing with ARIN and 
talking bad about the process to know what they are talking about. ARIN may not 
be perfect, but newcomers shouldn't be afraid. The hardest part is information 
gathering to setup for the first time, as many people don't have the information 
ARIN requests readily available. After that, a little due diligence and it's a 
cake walk.

-Jack