IP addresses are supposed to be free! The RIRs are in the business of handing out addresses to whoever applies for them if the applicant can show that they have a reasonable use for the addresses. But as the IPv4 addresses eventually run out, AWS will then buy addresses directly from whoever has them. This is allowed, but a bit dubious, since if someone aren’t using their addresses, it would make more sense to return them to the RIR to be reassigned. But if AWS owns all the addresses, and nobody can get any more, it makes sense for AWS to start charging for the addresses. It would also make sense for AWS to halt and delay any IPv6 adoption, so we should watch for that.
Not true at all you have apply for asn, you have pay for registration and ips seperately. Which needs to be renewed every year. Also you cant sell to anyone you want. You can transfer ownership but it goes through arin.
In reality, nothing can be free. The cost was initially not being paid for, because initially there's just quite a bit of addresses, and there wouldnt have been any quarrels.
I maintain that the world is being polluted because things aren't free. Imagine if every cubic inch of air, water and land is owned. You would not be allowed to pollute! You'd pay for your use of it!
Had AWS not gone around offering to beat any offered price for IPs things might be a lot more reasonable right now. You can't complain that you had to pay a ton for a scare resource when you were the ones throwing gasoline on the scarcity problem.
They even did backroom deals to steal large blocks of IP space, most notably from the HAM radio community.
