De-funding the ITU

Sun Jan 13 07:07:38 UTC 2013

On Jan 12, 2013, at 8:17 PM, "John Levine" <johnl at iecc.com> wrote:
> The political fallout from the US being seen as a big rich bully taking its wallet
> and going home is likely not worth the trivial amount of money involved.

Trivial to whom?  Is $11M/year trivial relative to the $181M/year ITU budget?  Relative to the $2M/year IETF budget?  Relative to the $600K/year budget of NANOG?  The petition does not suggest "taking its wallet and going home," it suggests reallocating money from an organization that's fighting against the Internet, to organizations that are fighting for the Internet, and doing so much more efficiently.  This is as much about funding NANOG and the IETF as it is about removing 7.7% of the ITU's budget.  You really think the ITU can make better use of that money than NANOG and the IETF?

                                -Bill