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TLS is a great example of how to do it.

IPv6 is a great example of how not to.



TLS is way more concentrated than IPv6/IPv4.

There are a handful of browsers that pushed the adoption. There's nobody doing the same in the IPv6 space.

There are areas that the browsers purposefully ignored (DNSSEC, DNS-SD) and thus their adoption is low.


Good points.

And brings out the problem with IPv6- there is no sector pushing IPv6, because no sector sees the benefits.

Question is why does no sector see it? My theory is that it adds a lot complexity and planning for little gain. So no sector is going to push for it.


With IPv6, there are mismatched incentives. There are parties that would have to do the investments and another parties would benefit.

For ISPs, it means investments with no benefits. They do it only once their CGNAT is too overloaded or on other sign of running out of IPv4. When they do it, in the simplest and cheapest way possible, which the informed customers see as worse service, so naturally they want to avoid it.

IPv6 would help network application developers, so they could do more or do what they do now with less, but they have no impact on investments ISPs would have to do.

Then there are parties, that have working IPv4 infrastructure, feel no pressure caused by lack of IPv4, and migration would mean just expenses with zero benefits. Exactly like companies that ran login forms over http, up until browsers started to warn users. That was the incentive, that caused them to switch to https.


> TLS is a great example of how to do it.

ASCII -> UTF8

VHS -> DVD

not as successful:

DVD -> BluRay : timing was rather close to the rise of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, etc.


I would posit that BluRay has been less successful for two other reasons:

1. DVD video quality is good enough for most.

2. The Combination of DRM, unskippable portions, and similar is enough of a barrier to discourage the upgrade. Personally, I will only watch a movie on disk when I don’t have time to rip it and remove that crap.


DVD quality may be worse than you remember. The difference is really very clear on modern HD screens.


In my experience, only if you're really looking for it or play them side by side.


That hasn't been my experience. I was watching some instructional DVDs—well-produced, modern stuff https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v68ZP8tHhnc —on a desktop monitor lately and the difference really leaped out at me, despite my already knowing consciously that the video wouldn't be HD, and the fact that I'm far from being any connoisseur of video quality. Given that standard DVD resolution is never higher than 720 × 576 pixels it really shouldn't have been surprising.


The DRM and unskippable portions were the same for DVDs when they launched and yet they were a bigger success in an equal timeframe. I do not think that most consumers care enough about these two points to actually influence their decisionmaking.

I'd be more interested in how the HD DVD as a very visible competitor blocked BluRay adoption because of consumers wanting to wait for a winner in that war.


The move to IPv6 seems a lot like the move to metric (over 40 years ago in UK).


You forgot DVD to HD-DVD too


Tls was a software upgrade for nearly everything. In fact just by building newer devices that software was just there and ready. Ipv6 is not just a software upgrade.




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