IPv6

Posted by davemill on 13/07/2011 None comments

I feel like I’ve been a bit slack, as this is only my 4th post it seems as part of the InternetNZ council election build up. But its been a busy few weeks so can’t be helped. Anyway, here’s some thoughts on something that I feel is rather important to the future of our Internet – IPv6.

So, what is IPv6? In short, IPv6, is the next version of the Internet Protocol. Whenever we communicate with anyone or something online we use an Internet Protocol. Currently we generally use IPv4, but IPv4 is in the process of running out.

Why is IPv4 running out? IPv4 emerged in the early 1980s. This was when the Internet was very small, and didn’t have many computers connected to it. IPv4 catered for up to 4 billion computers being connected which back then seemed huge, but which in this day and age is far too small.

We realised that IPv4 was running out in the 90s. But initially we brought in a cludge to temporarily fix the issue rather than properly fixing the issue. This cludge was NAT. And yes, this temporary fix is still in widespread use today.

So, What is NAT? Prior to NAT, everything connected to the Internet had a public IP address. That is an IP address that is globally reachable. This is how the Internet is supposed to work, each part of the Internet can talk to any other part on its globally reachable IP address. NAT means that computers and devices on the Internet can have a private IP address which isn’t routed on the internet, and hence isn’t available publically. NAT (Network Address Translation) is then performed to allow that private IP to talk to the greater internet.

Almost everyone uses NAT every day. If your computer has a 192.168.x.x address you’re likely using NAT. If you have broadband at work or home, NAT is probably involved. If you ever get annoyed with pinholing a game or application on your broadband router, NAT is to blame.

So, NAT was bought in during the 1990s, as a temporary fix to the limitations of IPv4. Shortly after IPv6 began being developed, but because NAT filled the gap the Internet carried to function on IPv4 and IPv6 was never really adopted. IPv6 has a few extra public IPs when compared to IPv4. Approximately 340,282,366,920,938,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 in fact..

And then IPv4 ran-out. Whilst, the “end is nigh” has been hailed by various organisations for many years, often people refused to believe it. However, during 2010, IANA, the central IP repository, ran out of IPv4 addresses. Then early 2011, APNIC, our region’s IP pool allocator, also ran out of IPv4 addresses. This means that if an ISP or organisation requires more public IPv4 addresses they will not be available, unless they are required to transition to IPv6.

So what now? IPv6 is still the only real solution to IPv4 run out. Other than the only thing we can do is something called carrier grade NAT. Carrier grade NAT, or CGN, will mean ISPs will allocate your broadband router a private IP address hidden behind NAT. You in turn will NAT your computers and devices behind this. More NAT breaks more things, and further destroys the end-to-end connectivity that the Internet used to have.

But, we keep talking about IPv6, but it always seems to be talking rather than doing. Very few ISPs in NZ support it, the exceptions being places like Inspire, WXC and FX. Vendors need to roll out IPv6 support to their broadband routers, ISPs need to support it, businesses need to adopt it, and home users need to be seemlessly moved to it when upgrading their broadband routers.

Until IPv6 happens, we’re just going to be living with an ever increasingly broken Internet.

To play my part in resolving all of this I’ve done a few things. First of all, I’ve dual-stacked (both IPv4 and IPv6) the Internet Net core network. Since then I’ve been testing that various services of ours work over IPv6. This is a long and ardorous process but something I believe has to happen. I’m a member of both the NZ IPv6 Technical Special Interest Group and the NZ IPv6 TaskForce. Both of these groups are funded and supported by InternetNZ.

I want to see New Zealanders and InternetNZ, supporting and adopting IPv6 and show the world that we’re a nation of do-ers, rather than just talkers. We need to transition to IPv6.

Vote for me in the InternetNZ elections :)

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Ultra Fast Broadband

Posted by davemill on 06/07/2011 None comments

Given UFB has been such a hot topic over the past 3 years I guess this blog always had to have at least one post on this subject. However, I warn you I’m extremely divided on what has occurred here so my thoughts on this are unlikely going to be that coherent. I’ll do my best though…

(for any of those who have been living in a dark hole for the past 3 years UFB is the government’s attempt to roll-out fibre internet access to the majority of New Zealanders over the next 5 – 10 years)

How about we start with the positives behind with all of this – that won’t take long.

The Government are finally showing interest in getting fibre to businesses, schools, home, etc. Really, until now we’ve had very little involvement from the government in making our broadband better. Yes, we’ve had engagement in both wholesaling and unbundling DSL access, but that’s a bit like crying over spilt milk. DSL is old technology and anything like DSL and wireless is just filling in the gap until fibre comes around. We’re now finally attempting to implement a real broadband solution – fibre to the X.

What could also be seen as a positive is how the government has tried to be really careful in splitting ‘lines’ companies from retail companies – something we should be familiar with from our experience with power companies. But as to whether this is a good thing or a bad thing I’m still very divided on.

OK, now the good things are out of the way, I’ll explain my thoughts on some of the aspects of UFB.

UFB is an election promise. Someone prior to the past general election came up with the idea of rolling out fibre to NZers. It was a major election promise and National seem to have tried their best to achieve this. However, whether the original idea was a good one, and if how the government has gone about implementing UFB so far is good, will remain to be seen.

To try and generate some fairness and competition, early on the decision was made to make sure we have companies that own and operate the fibre in the ground, and separate companies that sell retail services over these networks. This sounds good initially, until you look at some consequences of this…

Whilst a lot of people have just sat on their arse complaining about NZ’s crap broadband, many other people and organisations have been actively doing something about this. Organisations in Christchurch, Nelson, Wellington, Palmerston North, and Auckland have been putting fibre in the ground, stringing it off buildings, and connecting businesses and schools to it for many years. There is already substantial fibre in many locations in NZ. I work for a company that already has 100s of kilometres of fibre around Palmerston North, Tararua, and surrounding areas.

However, as mentioned before, there is now a split between ‘lines’ companies and retail companies. Which means many of the companies that already have assets in the ground, and have put a whole lot of hard work in to fixing NZ’s broadband woes, are not allowed bid to become local fibre companies – LFCs. So, this means that we, the tax payer, will now be paying to put the same assets in the ground again, dig up the same roads again, and connect many of the schools and businesses to fibre again. I for one, just see this as a big waste of time and money.

Through-out the whole process it’s always been (sensibly?) deemed that, amongst other things, the company that can get fibre out there at the lowest cost will win the relevant contracts. Hence, it’s really no surprise to me that a Telecom off-shoot, Chorus, will likely be awarded the majority of the country’s contracts to set-up this fibre network. Telecom of course already has the most infrastructure in the ground, hence the lowest implementation cost, and hence they’ve basically been awarded NZ’s fibre contract on a plate.

This, I find an interesting outcome. To solve our broadband woes, which in the past have been often made worse by having a single, monopolistic company controlling most of our broadband access methods, we have then given this same monopolistic company a contract to roll-out fibre to most of NZ! Sounds like a great idea! :)

OK. My incoherent ramblings aside, where to from here? Well, from what I see, what is done is done. Decisions have been made, and contracts have been awarded. Telecom/Chorus will likely do the majority of the roll-out. But there is still work to do. Care needs to be taken that things are done well, and its simple for ISPs to supply services to the end users, and that this huge investment in money will actually improve NZ’s broadband. This is where organisations like InternetNZ can play their part and try and make sure that things are done correctly, and when not done correctly at the very least openly voice their disapproval of what’s being done wrong.

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Digital Copyright

Posted by davemill on 16/06/2011 None comments

What’s had a lot of media coverage lately is the digital copyright law changes that have been recently passed under urgency by New Zealand’s parliament. Whilst I’m a firm believer in copyright itself, I don’t think this law change really addresses the effects of digital copyright infringements. In this post I’ll try and explain and justify my stance on copyright in a digital age.

I think we have two very important concepts when addressing copyright infringements.

Copyright is fundamentally good. Copyright law attempts to generate a flow of money back to the artists who actually produce music, movies, books, TV and games amongst other items. Without this flow of money, its likely that our favourite groups wouldn’t make their music, the movie giants wouldn’t make their movies, the corporate gods wouldn’t make our favourite shows, and authors wouldn’t spend many months writing their novels. If everyone copies, rather than purchases, copyrighted works then  this income stream dries up and its highly likely we’ll see less being produced. We all suddenly have to re-learn the magical art of conversation to fill in our winter’s evenings.

We live in a digital age. From the moment copyrighted works have been produced and released to all or part of the public it’s generally possible to reproduce those works in some digital shape and form. The results may vary depending on the media to be replicated, the techniques used, and the Internet bandwidth required to transport them. We can now instantly obtain the latest productions within hours or even minutes of them being released, rather than the traditional days, weekends or even months that we’ve often *cough* enjoyed here in NZ. Copyrighted material can generally be found using a method like torrents, but finding legal alternatives often depends on the type of media being sought.

It seems the world has really embraced iTunes and other methods of obtaining music easily and legally. The games community has backed innovations like Steam and now just download their games upon release. If some music, or game is out, it’s out all around the world at the same time. However, this is where I firmly believe things begin to fail…

If you, as a New Zealander, want to watch a movie without leaving your house, you can do so. I can sit in the comfort of my living room and after a few taps of my remote have rented or bought a movie for $6 or $twenty-odd respectively. But you can only see what you are allowed to see, in your part of the world, New Zealand. If some executive in a plush office in the States has deemed you cannot watch some movie that has been out for many months, you can’t.

Move towards TV and things are just as bad. Within a couple of hours of the latest House being released, I can be sitting on my couch, beer in hand, laughing at some terrible exploits. Being done completely illegally. To do the same thing legally, I need to wait for week or months, and at the exact time the TV station dictates sit and watch the content. Or can pay more for something like mySky, or watch a low quality copy online using something like TVNZonDemand. All done when there has been an easily obtainable, high quality version available for months.

So, this all leads me in to a major point. Under this new law, from my understanding, it seems that the copyright courts will decide on punishments based on the loss of income that actually incurred. So, if this episode of House, is not legally available in NZ, or if something else is never going to be legally available in NZ, then what loss of income has occurred? If at the end of watching a series of Californication (illegally), I decide to buy the DVD, how has handover of cash not occurred?

Then you look at the free advertising the illegally downloaded media actually gives. I first ‘pirated’ music by local artists such as Supergroove, Minuit, Rhombus, and from this became a fan. Since then I have spent a scary amount of money, mainly on iTunes on their music plus many other artists. I’ve attend many gigs from artists I’ve discovered through illegal downloads. I love music, and I spend a lot of money on it, and wouldn’t consider myself a criminal. But under this new law I will be a criminal. I heard a statistic banded about lately which I have been unable to verify but fully believe this is the likely case. If you grouped everyone in to one of two groups, those who pirate, and those who don’t, then the pirates spend way more money on copyrighted materials then the non-pirates do. When I look at all the special editions, boxed sets, and complete collections that your stereotypical geeks buy I do not find this hard to believe.

So, do we need this new law? Maybe, but probably not right now. First, we need to ensure that legal methods are available for obtaining media that is out there that ensure a flow of money back to the copyright holders. I believe that often our conventional distribution methods may just not really apply once this has happened. Distributors need to embrace the digital age or face extinction. NZ needs to somehow catch up with the rest of the world. In American and Europe there are many legal methods to stream TV, movies, and music through pay and free services like Netflix, iTunes and Hulu. NZ needs options like this. When that finally occurs we need to ask ourselves some important questions like what social harm does copyright infringement actually cause and what loss of income to copyright holders has actually occurred?

If anyone has any feedback or questions regarding any of this, then please feel free to using this blog, Facebook, or email. Stayed tuned for future posts on topics such as IPv6, Internet Privacy, and National’s Ultra Fast Broadband roll-out.

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Running for InternetNZ Council

Posted by davemill on 09/06/2011 None comments

InternetNZ Council

So, I am running for InternetNZ council. This is a election that will occur (assuming more than 4 people stand) at InternetNZ’s next AGM which takes place in July. As part of the build up to this I’ve decided that it would be timely to start a small blog, and talk about a few Internet ‘issues’ that I find very relevant.

I’ll start this off by explaining a few basic things, especially for those of you that are not familiar with InternetNZ.

What is InternetNZ?

I think the simplest way to put it is that InternetNZ tries to make the Internet in NZ tick. They operate the .nz DNS system, which without, the NZ Internet would not function. If you register a domain name, you indirectly do it through NZRS, which in turn is owned and operated by InternetNZ. InternetNZ has a stance of trying to make New Zealand’s Internet open and uncapturable.

Part of this entails looking at the various legislations and changes that are happening in NZ and around the world. We are currently shaping the future of our Internet with law changes regarding spam, digital copyright, and ability of the government to tap internet. We have an ultra-fast-broadband project around the corner, and the Internet is about to run out of IP(v4) addresses. These are exciting times, and InternetNZ has its part to play.

Why me?

I think I’m in a pretty unique situation in terms of the NZ Internet. First of all, I work as an Internet geek at an ISP. This gives me a great insight in to the technical side of actually making the Internet operate in NZ. Alongside that over the past 10 years or so I’ve really got involved in variety of organisations that exist and attempt to look after a certain part of the Internet.

What first got me interested was the establishment of NZRS at the turn of the century. InternetNZ were establishing a shared domain name system and taking a monopoly away from Domainz. When doing this they consulted ISPs and I got involved. From here I got involved in organising a few NZNOG conferences in about 2006 or so which gave me a bit of an insight in the workings of InternetNZ. Since then I’ve tried to get a lot more involved, playing an active part in the adoption of IPv6 through the IPv6 TaskForce and special interest group, becoming an ISP Association of NZ rep and generally trying to stay involved with what INZ is up to.

Why this blog?

This really just helps me get my views out there. Those of you that already know me might not know my views on specific subjects. Those who don’t know me already may be looking for someone to vote for, and may well find my views match your own. This might help me get elected, it may not, but I can’t see any harm coming from me explaining a bit about my view on the current state of the NZ Internet.

Where to from here?

During June and July I’ll post my views on a few subjects likely to include at least copyright, IPv6, NZNOG and privacy issues. Depending on what is discussed on the InternetNZ mailing lists and in the media there might be other things worth mentioning.

From there you can decide if you want to vote for me. If you’re not already a member of InternetNZ and feel what I’ve discussed interests you then you may want to consider joining as it’s a very low cost.

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