RE: [ga] DNSO Constituency Structure

[Roeland Meyer <rmeyer@mhsc.com>]

|> From: DPF [mailto:david@farrar.com]
|> Sent: Monday, November 26, 2001 1:56 AM
|> 
|> On Sun, 25 Nov 2001 21:05:28 -0500, "Gomes, Chuck"
|> <cgomes@verisign.com> wrote:
|> 
|> >As I have communicated before, in person in GA meetings and 
|> on this list, I
|> >believe that a new constituency should organize itself and 
|> demonstrate
|> >strong representativeness of the community involved and 
|> then submit its
|> >proposal for recognition.  Just because the idea of an individuals
|> >constituency makes sense to many of us, that is not enough 
|> to approve it.

|> This sounds reasonable but in practice this sets barriers that were
|> not demanded of any of the existing constituencies.  What % of ISPs
|> take part in the ISP constituency - I would say 0.1%.

It only sounds reasonable on the surface. None of the existing
constituencies had to meet these requirements. Let's apply these criteria to
the existing constituencies and see how well they fare.

|> What % of businesses take part in business constituency - I'd say
|> 0.0001%.  

That's probably a high estimnate.

|> Add onto that the huge resource limitations any individual's
|> constituency will have compared to businesses and organisations and
|> the playing field is not merely uneven - it is titled at around 89.9
|> degrees.

I disagree. IMHO, the existing constituencies couldn't meet these standards,
even today, after they've existed for the past few years. How many of them
even have a bank account and budget (2, maybe)? Also, don't forget the
revenue requirements.

|> What is wrong with doing what basically happened to the other seven
|> constituencies.  Approve the concept in principle and then you will
|> find members and structure will come easily.  Also one could assert
|> that as a constituency can change its charter at will from that
|> initially approved why worry about what is there at the moment of
|> application as it could change the next day?

As a practical matter, I don't think this'll fly either. No matter what fiat
is employed, one cannot call a declaration a consensus. Also, you're simply
not going to get donations when ICANN BoD gets the money and electively
doles it out, after paying its own expnses first. And then there's the GA
problem, who's going to put money into a group that doesn't even have a
vote, let alone one that is recognised?

|> >I personally think that a legitimate proposal that is 
|> backed up by a solid
|> >organizational structure and clear evidence of fairly broad 
|> representation
|> >from the involved community would be hard to deny even by 
|> those who may
|> >philosophically oppose such a constituency.
|> 
|> I agree and would like to see this happen.  However it is pretty hard
|> to motivate individuals to spend the hundreds of hours needed and to
|> donate the thousands of dollars also needed on something 
|> which doesn't
|> even have any helpful encouragement from ICANN - just more barriers.

Actually, all we have to date is active discouragement. The money and effort
is guaranteed to be flushed down the particular rat-hole. There is only the
hope that the ICANN BoD will relent and the track-record supports an
expectation that nothing will be done.

|> What is wrong with recognising what we all know that there is a huge
|> gaping hole in the non representation of individuals in the DNSO,
|> approve a constituency in principle and set some minimum 
|> benchmarks in
|> terms of membership, representativeness and funding it has 
|> to achieve.
|> You do that and I'll happily spend hundreds of hours and a 
|> fair amount
|> of my own money making such a constituency happen, as will many
|> others.

Actually, many of us already have.

|> >As I understand the bylaws, a proposal from the board is 
|> allowable, but it
|> >certainly does not seem to be forthcoming.  So sitting 
|> around waiting for
|> >this seems futile.  It seems smarter to self-organize.  I say that
|> >understanding the enormity of the task which brings me to the ALSC
|> >recommendations.  The users SO may be the most realistic way of
|> >accomplishing the objectives related to an individuals constituency.

|> >I like the concept of a Users SO, a Producers SO and a 
|> Developers SO like
|> >the ALSC proposed, although I have not particularly fond of the name
|> >"developers" as applied to the ASO and PSO.

Such a plan has no more validity than the existing plan. Any bets as to
which existing personnel become the new gatekeepers? Under this taxonomy,
there are no available pure populations, as I stated before. Also, I don't
understand the developers SO. Developers of networks are not developers of
systems, most of the time. I don't see too many IT shops developing device
drivers for NICs, or protocol stacks. Yet, they develop software. If that is
not what was meant by Developers SO, then I have just made my point.

Following KISS, the existing SO configuration seems reasonable.The current
structure, at least, has the advantage of being a little less ambiguous then
what is proposed. It is the structure of each SO that is a problem, as well
as the SO funding model. The only thing I would add is a Users SO (ALSO).
However, that doesn't have any effect if the general SO funding model
remains broken.

As far as the DNSO is concerned, the imposed structure is bankrupt, in many
more ways than one.
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