Bennett;
Same goes for ftp as far as I know.
ftp can't be name-virtual-hosted. It is also such a wretched protocol that it urgently needs to be retired in all settings for all purposes.
The only real excuse I'd argue for keeping IP virtual hosts is
Excuse? Why? I'm afraid some of you, including ARIN, are assuming, that IPv4 address space will last forever, if ARIN allocate the space cautiously. But, IPv4 address space will be used up, sooner or later certainly before anonymous ftp become obsoleted and, perhaps, a lot sooner than most of you expect and Note that there is no requirement to preserve IPv4 address space forever and the only requirement is to preserve IPv4 address space until we are ready for IPv6. However, the effort not to allocate enough IPv4 address space to satisfy ISP requirements make name virtual hosts and NAT popular, which, then, let people think IPv4 address space last forever, which motivate ISPs delay the deployment of IPv6. So, when we really use up the IPv4 address space, ISPs will not be ready for IPv6. The only reasonable solution for the problem, it seems to me, is to assign a lot of IPv4 address space to good ISPs (good means various things including that they are ready for IPv6) and let all the ISPs realize the space will be used up soon. Masataka Ohta