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tagged adulthood blog frank furstenburg network on research to transitions by vedantha ...on 23-JUN-08
“The RIPE NCC is an independent, not-for-profit membership organization that supports the infrastructure of the Internet through technical co-ordination in its service region. The most prominent activity of the RIPE NCC is to act as the Regional Internet Registry (RIR) providing global Internet resources and related services (IPv4, IPv6 and AS Number resources) to members in the RIPE NCC service region. The membership consists mainly of Internet Service Providers (ISPs), telecommunication organizations and large corporations located in Europe, the Middle East and parts of Central Asia.”
“RIPE (Réseaux IP Européens) is a collaborative forum existing since November 1989 and open to all parties interested in wide area IP networks. Work is carried out by individual volunteers in their own or their organization’s time.”
“It was realized that not all activities could be carried out by volunteers, especially those needing continuity and constant availability. Therefore there was a need for the 'RIPE NCC' (Network Coordination Centre) to perform these coordinating tasks.”
A document describing the RIPE NCC was first published in September 1990, and the first activity plan was published in May 1991. RIPE asked RARE (one of the predecessors of TERENA) if they would provide the legal framework for the RIPE NCC. After a solicitation procedure, the RIPE NCC began in April 1992 with its headquarters in Amsterdam, Daniel Karrenberg as manager and only two other staff members. Initial funding was provided by the academic networks (RARE members), EARN and EUnet. It was an important development for European networking that the RIPE NCC succeeded in its first nine months of operations to become a true Regional Internet Registry. Its task was to support all those activities that could not be effectively performed by volunteers from the organizations participating in RIPE.