Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Other FAQ sections

10 easy mini steps to IPv6 Can I change handles? Can I share my account? Email Bounces / Email address requirements How can I remove my account? How do I update my account information? How many accounts am I allowed to have? / How many times can I signup? I've lost my password My signup was rejected What about credits and ISK? Where do I get my own RIPE handle? Why does SixXS need my valid address information?

What about credits and ISK?

SixXS uses a credit system to limit users in repeating bad actions and to make sure they maintain their tunnels and most likely thus actually use them. For example if a static tunnel is down it will cost you some credits, thus you better keep it up. One could see the credit system as a bank, you got a credit limit and you can't go over it and buy everything you want, but when you earn credits because your tunnel is up you can do a lot with it.

The currency unit used is the IP SixXS Kredit (ISK). The currency is completely virtual and has no relation to any real, physical, value. The main target of the existance of this currency is to make people actually use their tunnel and keep them working. You do something for the system, and the system allows you do other things.

Extra Credits

Extra credits can be earned by reporting bugs in the system, coding cool IPv6 applications, contributing a significant useful article to the Wiki and of course we can be bribed with all kinds of goodies.

At signup time provide links to your LinkedIn and/or Xing profile in your signup reason. The approval process is done by the SixXS Staff, who can then evaluate the profile (must have proper connctions) and provide extra credits as they can direcly see that your data is valid. Due to the extra credits this allows you to directly request a tunnel and subnet! The profile is only used as a one-time verification and it does need to have a reasonable amount of connections to other profiles for it to be accepted. If you didn't provide your profile during signup, you can always provide the links to the profiles per email and request extra ISK that way.

Running out of money

When your credit count is 0 (zero) or lower, moving the endpoint of a tunnel is still possible, the tunnel will also keep on working no matter how low the credit count is. If the tunnel was not working you would not be able to earn credits thus ending you up in a deadlock situation, this allows you to make the tunnel working again and regain a positive credit balance.

When the credit count is 15 ISK or lower, you will not be able to request new tunnels, subnets or NS entries. This is the so called lower credit threshold/boundary. Note that users with very low credits will automatically be disabled by our robot.

Credit Loans / Bonusses

When you have demonstrated that you can keep your tunnel active for more than 3 consecutive weeks and you are still below the 0 credit limit, you can ask the SixXS Staff to give you a credit loan, which will give you a credit boost so that you can request new items. Of course this loan can be denied depending on your credit record. Do provide a good reason why you should be given the extra credit.

Refused Requests

If a request gets refused one loses the credits that the request cost. We will not refund any credits. To make an analogy: one can spend money on a lot of silly things you don't need, your money is gone and there is no refund.

Dynamic Tunnels

As dynamic (AYIYA and heartbeat) tunnels won't be up all the time it will only receive a 5 ISK bonus after it has been created for one week. This will thus allow one to request a subnet after a week of operating the heartbeat tunnel. After that uptime credits will be given biweekly when the tunnel is alive.

One can't lose any credits with a dynamic tunnel but the tunnel must be up if you want to receive credits.

Example Credit Plan

Most users will have the following "credit plan":

Action	Cost	Description
Signup	25
Tunnel Request	-10
Tunnel Approve	-5
	10	Can't request a subnet, due to lower bound
Week uptime	5
	15	Can request a subnet
Subnet Request	-10
Subnet Approve	-4
Configure 1 NS	-1
	0	Out of credits, save some more in the coming weeks

Cost Table

The current default cost table is:

Action		Cost
Adding a reverse DNS server	debits	1
Approving a subnet request	debits	4
Approving a tunnel request	debits	5
Deleting a subnet	debits	50
Deletion of a tunnel	debits	25
IPv6 endpoint didn't ping for a day	debits	5
IPv6 endpoint didn't ping for a week (autodisable)	debits	50
Moving a tunnel's endpoint / Change Tunnel Type	debits	15
Removing a reverse DNS server	debits	1
Requesting a subnet	debits	10
Requesting a tunnel	debits	10
The host pinged yet another week	credits	5

The above list shows the default credit costs, each PoP can have their own set of costs.