arin representation

Tue Mar 25 08:52:00 UTC 2014

paul,

> ARIN has been gradually evolving and tweaking the governance over the
> past fifteen years.

and there has been microscopic change

> Given it’s a small board it’s been generally done at the full Board
> historically.

i think there is some idiom about the fox guarding the hen house.  it
should be done by a group of grownups from the outside.  a subcommittee
of the current governance discussing change in governance would be a
great joke if you did not seem to take it seriously.

> We’ve recently started to take a long look at a variety of issues to
> see if there is a better way to structure ourselves to deliver the
> mission and stay accountable to the community.

s/stay/become/

83% of the community is not even in the room!  and that is only
considering address holders as the community.

we are actually responsible to a much larger society.  when we were
forming arin, then then chair of the fcc explained to me why the fcc had
commissioners who were from the general consumer public.  i tried to get
a librarian and a 15 year old with a modem on the original icann board,
but no one took me seriously.

> We do have a small sub-set working given there is a lot of things to
> go through and I am leading the charge on that issue for the ARIN
> Board.

once upon a time early in the icann debacle, i was dragged on to some
high-falootin' committee.  at a meeting (in sjc, i think), an outspoken
audience member asked what the hell i was doing on the committee.  i got
out of my chair and asked him to please take it and replace me.  it had
the added feature of getting me out of that committee. :)

now, i have zero desire to be on the arin board again.  but you and the
self appointed internal governance committee need to get out of your
chairs.  we need real governance folk to form a group to figure out how
the heck to get out of the mud.  i did not mention susan crawford idly.
outsiders!

and, btw, it's not just arin.  in general, our internet administrative
groups have classic but quite astonishing governance processes.  while
icann is quite competitive, arin does kinda take the cake.

randy