So, we’re beyond the World IPv6 Launch and the Internet still works. No big surprises, no big crises. We did survive and can go on with our lives. What was so important with this day, then? The commitment from a large set of companies to actually activate and include IPv6 as part of their normal service. Their commitment to continue working with IPv6. As a result we’ll see more and more traffic on the IPv6 enabled networks and slowly the wheels will begin to turn in favor of the whole Internet. Let’s see what a few of these companies say about IPv6 and finish off with a movie. After all, it’s Friday.
British Telecom: On the way
British Telecom Ipv6-enabled a few of their own and a few customer sites. They announce that they are still working on their plans for introduction of IPv6 in their standard services. The plans are detailed and spans up to 2014 for launch in various services.
We have been conducting IPv6 testing and trials for a number of years, and on 6th June 2012 we will be taking part in World IPv6 Launch with both this and www.bt.com sites being IPv6-enabled to show our commitment and support of IPv6 across our networks and services.
A link on their web site took me to BT Diamond and an impressive IPv6 resource center. Check it out! Videos, webinars, white pages. You can spend a lot of time there.
Alcatel-Lucent: IPv6 support in many devices
Alcatel-Lucent joined the IPv6 World Launch and tells us why we need IPv6:
Why does this matter? Because the enormous growth of the Internet means we’re running out of IP addresses. IPv4 allows for only 4 billion unique IP addresses – for a world approaching 7 billion in population. And many of us are connecting with one, two, or more devices. With more and more people, devices, and systems are connecting every day, this Internet of Things is expected to connect 15 billion devices by 2015.
RIPE describes the evolution of the Internet
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IPE published a nice infograph on their web site. It describes the evolution of the Internet leading up to the World IPv6 Launch. IPv4 was first used in 1980 and today we’re seeing the end of the address space. Vint Cerf claims in the World IPv6 Launch video that the decision to use 32 bits was based on experimental use only. It was never intended to be a world-wide information highway address plan. In 1990 there was 313.000 connected devices. The estimate for 2015 (as stated both above and on the RIPE PDF) is 15 billion devices – which can simply not be done with a 32 bit address plan. Print out the PDF
Orange Business Services: Infographic on the need of IPv6
Orange also joins the crowd and educates their customers about IPv6 with a nice infographic. In a related blog entry Christian Petrus writes:
“It’s no longer sustainable to take a wait-and-see approach to IPv6 adoption. For large enterprises, and particularly for multinational companies, this is a major concern. Enterprises have a number of different entities connecting to their network, including customers, suppliers, partners & remote employees. As these organizations and people (and their ISPs) upgrade their own networks, enterprises must be able to accommodate their evolution to IPv6. So from an end-to-end perspective, it is preferable to make content and applications also available directly on IPv6.”
Google: What if the Internet ran out of room? In fact, it’s already happening!
Google published a link on their main US web site to explain IPv6 for all Google users. The explanation is very easy to understand a illustrated to be easy to understand by everyone.
“Clearly the internet needs more IP addresses. How many more, exactly? Well, how about 340 trillion trillion trillion (or, 340,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000)? That’s how many addresses the internet’s new “piping,” IPv6, can handle. That’s a number big enough to give everyone on Earth their own list of billions of IP addresses. Big enough, in other words, to offer the Internet virtually infinite room to grow, from now into the foreseeable future.”
Forbes: 6 Reasons why businesses should deploy IPv6 now!
Leslie Daigle, CITO at the Internet Society, published an article in Forbes Magazine that lists reasons why businesses should not wait, but start deployment of IPv6 now. Leslie doesn’t hesitate to stamp on toes and be very direct:
“Organizations that continue to rely solely on IPv4 with no plans to implement IPv6 in the near future risk running into a host of business challenges, from increased costs and limited website functionality, to inhibiting critical growth opportunities in emerging markets and beyond. The only long-term solution to this shortage, and subsequent business disruptions, is adoption of IPv6, providing a practically unlimited number of addresses.”
…And finally, the video with Vint Cerf
Vint Cerf, the grand father of the Internet has acknowledged that all of this is his fault. Therefore he participates heavily in the process to fix the problem and implement a larger address space. Vint and many others made video statement for the World IPv6 Launch. Surf to the World IPv6 Launch web site (using IPv4 or IPv6) and spend some time to listen to everyone. Here’s Vint:
What do you do now?
That the world IPv6 Launch is over just means that we’re back to normal business, but in a world where TCP/IP means IPv4 and IPv6. All the time. For you, that means that all projects that involves networking now includes IPv4 and IPv6. All applications that use networking needs IPv6 support on the same level as IPv4 – or better. All of the articles, videos and info graphics above will help you gather your arguments, put up posters in the office and make your colleagues understand the need for IPv6 as well as you. You are hereby named Honorary IPv6 Ambassador for your organization. So stop sitting in your chair, get up and work. We have a lot to do in order to provide a network of services for the 15 billion devices – and make sure that all of them are able to connect to everything and every service.
/Olle