On 6/2/10 1:30 PM, Daniel Golding wrote: > Merit is not our boss. They are not and have never been the leaders of > the North American network operations community. No one elected them and > no one voted for them. As a non-profit, they took over from NSF in > administering the successor to the regional tech meetings. They have no > legitimacy in representing anyone, except for their role in providing > services. The NANOG SC, on the other hand, who you have accused of a > "coup", is elected by the NANOG membership.
I understand that. I also understand that Merit is supposed to have a member on that committee. Within hours after the announcement, Merit replied to the list that they had not been informed and were opposed. Hence the doubt regarding the legitimacy particularly when the decision was declared to be unanimous. > NANOG SC members and many NANOG volunteers have been talking about doing > this for YEARS. This was a course of action that was carefully > considered back when the charter process was put in place in 2005. It > was by a narrow margin that such as change didn't happen then, or > shortly thereafter when the first SC was elected. From what I've seen > Merit treats the elected SC like a bunch of well meaning tools and has > been doing so for five years now. I don't mean to be insulting to past > and present SC members, but I'm trying to be honest. OK, In my opinion, this background would have been very helpful if it had been referenced in the original announcement. > The hope when the SC was set up? That Merit would see the SC as the > elected voice of the community and gradually transfer actual authority > to that body. Merit's point-of-view is that they are on the line > financially, so that they can't treat the SC as anything but a > half-baked advisory committee. Ok, I can accept that - they have > fiduciary responsibility. Also understood. Hence my concern that the decision may have been made without prior and thorough financial planning. If the SC has no experience dealing with the fiduciary responsibility of NANOG and has zero dollars, then the financial viability of NANOG in the absence of Merit is a concern, particularly in the event of an immediate split. That's a troubling answer to "Why not now?" for me. > The NANOG SC must be diplomatic about this. I applaud them for that. But > the rest of us who volunteer are under no such compulsion. I think Merit > has done an "ok" job of event planning, a very uneven job of mailing > list management (only good when volunteers took over), and a > questionable job of working with the community. I know that Merit > doesn't agree, but thats ok - we're all grown ups here and we can have > disagreements. And there are many of us who have not been here for years, haven't been involved with the politics, and don't know the story behind the story. > Jay, you keep talking about the Merit members of the SC and PC, for > example. They can't "agree" to a proposal like this, even if they want > to - they are in place as Merit employees. Sure they can. If Merit is aware that its mission differs from that of NANOG, as Merit employees they might very well agree that the time has come to part ways. "This NANOG thing is no longer consistent with Merit's goals, and they want to leave anyway, it's in everyone's best interest to cut them loose." Not all takeovers are hostile. > So far, the greatest effort has been put into getting the core group of > volunteers on board with this process: Current and former NANOG SC, PC, > Communications, and Marketing committee members. Not everyone agrees, > but of the folks I have chatted with, the number is about 90%. The > greatest concern (which I share) is whether we are properly prepared for > this. Give the SC a couple more weeks to get the budget and materials > together - I trust them to have their act together by San Francisco. > They are all very clueful, dedicated people and WE VOTED FOR THEM. I agree. We did vote for them. And I have state repeatedly that I am not necessarily opposed to the split. In light of this background, I am now better informed of the fact that there have been longstanding problems. My objection, and it was and is more of a question than an objection, references the rather obvious appearance that there is a story behind the story, that the need for an immediate split was not and IMHO still has not been explained, and concerns with regard to the adequacy of financial plans for the future and the resources to execute those plans. When ballot measures are presented to the public by elected officials there is a detailed voter pamphlet provided well in advance explaining the reason for the measure, financial impacts, and exactly what it means to the electorate. There are arguments for and against and rebuttals to those arguments. When there is a shareholders' meeting of a corporation in which I own stock, there is a notice of the meeting and a proxy statement detailing the measures which the stockholders are requested to approve. Perhaps something similar will be forthcoming in the next ten days. I don't think anything similar has been available to date. > Sorry to get snippy, but the only coup here is by those who forget who > does the work of NANOG (the volunteers, mostly) and who rides on their > backs. Jay, do you vote in NANOG elections and have you volunteered to > serve? I do vote in the elections. I have not as of yet volunteered. I would be more inclined to do so if I had more information as to what I might be getting myself in to. Thank you for providing some of it. -- Jay Hennigan - CCIE #7880 - Network Engineering - [email protected] Impulse Internet Service - http://www.impulse.net/ Your local telephone and internet company - 805 884-6323 - WB6RDV _______________________________________________ Nanog-futures mailing list [email protected] https://mailman.nanog.org/mailman/listinfo/nanog-futures
