Meeting of the ARIN Advisory Council - 21 February 2013 [Archived]

Teleconference

Advisory Council Attendees:

• John Sweeting, Chair (JS)

• Dan Alexander, Vice Chair (DA)

• Cathy Aronson (CA)

• Kevin Blumberg (KB)

• Owen DeLong (OD)

• David Farmer (DF)

• Chris Grundemann (CG)

• Stacy Hughes (SH)

• Scott Leibrand (SL)

• Milton Mueller (MM)

• Bill Sandiford (BS)

• Heather Schiller (HS)

• Rob Seastrom (RS)

• John Springer (JS)

Minute Taker

• Thérèse Colosi

ARIN Staff:

• Michael Abejuela, Assoc. General Counsel (MA)

• Einar Bohlin, Sr. Policy Analyst (EB)

• John Curran, President & CEO

• Nate Davis, COO (ND)

• Leslie Nobile, Director of Registration Services (LN)

ARIN General Counsel

• Steve Ryan, Esq.

Regrets:

• Bill Darte

1. Welcome

The Chair called the meeting to order at 4:10 p.m. EDT. The presence of quorum was noted.

2. Agenda Review

The Chair called for any comments. RS joined at this time (4:10 p.m. EDT). OD suggested moving Item 9 before Item 5. The Chair stated he preferred to discuss the results of the recent ARIN Public Policy Consultation (PPC) per each draft policy discussion, as these draft policies were presented at the PPC. All agreed.

3. Approval of the Minutes

It was moved by OD, and seconded by CG, that:

“The ARIN Advisory Council approves the Minutes of 25 January 2013, as written.”

The Chair called for objections. There were no objections.

The motion carried with no objections.

4. Ratification of Draft Policies

ND stated, for information, that the ARIN Board of Trustees at their meeting on 15 February 2013, per the AC’s recommendation, adopted the following policies:

• ARIN-2012-6: Revising Section 4.4 C/I Reserved Pool Size
• ARIN-2012-8: Aligning 8.2 and 8.3 Transfer Policy

5. Draft Policy ARIN-2012-2: IPv6 Subsequent Allocations Utilization Requirement

HS stated that the revised text was sent to the AC’s list, and it will be sent to the Public Policy Mailing List (PPML). The suggested revision from staff was simple, and the rationale was edited.

RS, who attended the ARIN PPC in Orlando during NANOG 57, reported that this draft policy (DP) was presented at the PPC. He stated he that the reception was mixed. CG also attended and agreed. He stated that participation was low in general to begin with, and there was not a strong response either way.

6. Draft Policy ARIN-2013-1: Section 8.4 Transfer Enhancement

RS stated that the enhancement to Section 8.4 was to allow ASN transfers to other regions, as is done for IPv4 number resources. He noted there were two attitudes at the PPC: 1) that it did not need to happen because scarce resources were not prevalent; and, 2) people are going to transfer the resources and if we prevent that, we are preventing the WHOIS from being as good and as accurate as it could be. He believed that the DP should be referred to the ARIN 31 Meeting in Barbados for community input; and that not presenting it could be harmful.

CG stated that, at the PPC, the first half of conversations were against the DP, and the second half discussed the rationale as to why to allow transfers. He believed It would do less harm to move the DP forward, than not.

KB stated he had remotely participated in the PPC. He had recently discussed it with the author, and asked of him if the DP was written in regard to all ASNs, or 2-byte ASNs. He stated that the author said he did not have a preference either way. Given this, KB suggested that since IPv4 inter-RIR transfers are allowed, specifying ‘2-byte’ would improve this DP, as they fall under legacy holders, and there will be scarcity in the future.

DF had no objection to KB’s suggestion, but stated that if the revisions were made, Section 8.3 would also need to be revised similarly for within-region transfers, as one is not limited within the region to 2- byte ASNs. He stated he supported the DP, but was not certain he supported recommending it. He noted it was not time critical, and would prefer to take the time to revise it. He supported discussing it at ARIN 31, but not as recommended DP.

OD stated that he did not support the DP, however he did support discussion at ARIN 31.

BS joined at this time (4:19 p.m. EDT). DA also stated he had joined the meeting at 4:15 p.m. EDT.

SH attended the PPC and stated that she believed it was not worth the AC’s time. She stated one could not gauge a sense of agreement from a small few raising their hand. She believed the DP was a waste of the AC’s time, and should not be taking time in Barbados. She was not in favor of the DP. The Chair asked staff for a count of participants. EB stated there were 61 participants, with 12 in favor and 5 who were against the DP when a show of hands was requested.

SL believed that the key is that we have some people who think it is good and necessary, and others who believe it to be waste of time. While it may be a pony, it doesn’t hurt for people to see it. It is not at a point in in which we motion to vote on it. We should request staff and legal review, and post it to the Public Policy Mailing List (PPML), then vote on it in our March teleconference to establish its status.

The Chair called for any opposed to SL’s suggestion. MM stated he had the same impression as SL and had not heard any reasons not to do it.

DF stated that he supported the DP, but believed it a bad idea to move forward as it is currently written. He noted that there was not yet sufficient experience with the PPC to judge its effectiveness, and he preferred this DP not be moved forward as ‘recommended’. He wanted to get a sense of the room at ARIN 31 first, to help judge the effectiveness of the PPC. He wanted to understand the new PDP as well, and believe there to be nothing urgent about this DP, until another RIR makes it so in their region.

JS stated that with regard to the PPC, he agreed the PPC may not have been as successful as hoped, but believed for a first time meeting that it was not unsuccessful. He was in support of voting on the DP at the AC’s March teleconference.

RS asked the AC for ideas for improving PPC attendance.

7. ARIN-Prop-182: Update Residential Customer Definition to Not Exclude Wireless as Residential Service

CG reported that there was not much more discussion than what had taken place on the PPML. He noted that no one could figure out what the problem is that this proposal intends to solve. The author thinks it is unfair that residential customers are excluded, but cannot elucidate why it affects them. A colleague of the author was at the PPC, and CG stated there was a fairly large misunderstanding between the Number Resource Policy Manual (NRPM) rationale and what they thought the rationale to be. He noted that that put an end to the discussion, and that no one responded to PPML post he had sent a few days ago. Thus, he believed, at this point, there is no problem to be solved.

The Chair called for a motion. DF suggested the AC accept it and let the community discuss it, then reject it if it works out that way. EB clarified the AC’s options under the revised PDP are to: reject it as out of scope, remand it to the author formally, or accept as a DP for further work by AC. The AC could also keep it on their docket, with no motion made, for further work.

OD believed it needed to be remanded to the author as the problem statement was unclear and to define the problem the author was trying to solve. CG agreed with OD.

It was moved by DF, and seconded by OD that:

“The ARIN Advisory Council remands ARIN-Prop-182, entitled, ‘Update Residential Customer Definition to Not Exclude Wireless as Residential Service’ to the author.”

The Chair called for discussion. SL stated it was important to make clear to the author that the AC does not understand how the text will accomplish what the author wants. The reason needs to be made clear. The Chair stated that, at the PPC, folks tried to several times to figure out the problem statement and the result was that it was ’not fair we can’t get space under cable policy’.

DF stated that statement is clear, but not useful. That is why he believed it needed to be accepted by the AC and be brought to the community for discussion.

MM did not see how doing this would change policy. If it passed and we changed the term to residential customers – how would that change anything? You’d have to tell them that with the language as proposed, we are not clear on what it would do.

CG agreed. He noted that the NRPM section references residential subscribers. This proposal’s language materially affects what kind of customer gets treated under that section. He stated the AC shepherds have gone to the author on multiple occasions, and have received the same response each time. The proposal has already been ‘remanded’ to the author several times. He stated he was comfortable abandoning it, but supported the motion.

SL clarified that if this policy statement does not do what the author says it should do, then it is the AC’s job to fix it; however, if the author cannot articulate what the actual problem is, then remanding is appropriate.

CA believed that the AC needed to be more specific with the author when remanding the proposal to him, with regard to the issue of: ‘how do they have the same problem as others under this policy?’

KB supported remanding, as the AC does not understand the issues. There is the law of unintended consequences at stake.

DF stated that, under the old PDP, there were discussions of this proposal, and they were mostly negative. There was the author and a small number of supporters, but most were against it. While I don’t like the problem statement, I believe it is clear, that “the policy is unfair”, it is not our job to determine that. We need to accept it, have a discussion, and let the community discuss it before we can do anything. He stated however that he supported remanding it formally to the author.

The President clarified that if the AC remands it to the author, under the current PDP, the proposal would have to come back as a new proposal. The problem statement states it is unfair that cable policy does not apply to the author’s class of technology. However, he is not specific about what technology he is having a problem. The community needs a more precise case of what his technology is, otherwise we do not know if this problem exists or not.

DF stated he agreed on that issue, but believed what is being discussed is the merits of the policy more than the problem being clear. He believed it to be clear and the AC needs to accept it, and let community decide yes or no.

CG stated he went to great lengths to get useful language, and had an ongoing conversation with the author. He noted that in the beginning it was unclear what was trying to be accomplished with the proposal. Then the author stated he wanted 50% utilization rate for residential broadband to all mobile subscribers. Why? What we found is that the company he works for has not been denied address space ever, and has been requesting less than what they need. They need to just ask for more. Saying the policy is unfair is not a problem statement.

The Chair called for any one opposed to remanding the policy to the author. There were no objections. RS stated that he too did his best to get the author to elaborate and get a good description of the problem. He supported the motion.

The motion carried with all in favor via roll call vote.

The President recommended that the AC ask the author explain to what technology, specifically, this has been a problem.

8. Discussion of Content of AC Minutes

The President reviewed the portion of the ARIN Board’s Standing Rules on minutes with the AC as a guideline, per their request. BS stated he would very much like to see the AC’s minutes recorded along the same lines as the Board’s. He believed that if an AC member explicitly requested that they be attributed to their own comments in the AC’s minutes, he had no objection.

The Chair agreed with BS but stated an AC member could not request attribution to his or her own comments after the meeting was adjourned, but only during the actual meeting.

JS stated that this would represent a big change in how things are done. The Chair stated it would, and that was why he added it to the agenda for today’s meeting for discussion.

MM stated that he understood the only real reason to eliminate attribution, in the Board’s case, was because the Board is a decision making body and the AC is more of a deliberative body. He noted that reading more detailed minutes allows one to find out more about what the AC was thinking, whereas a simple summary of the decision can be harder to interpret.

BS stated that in other organizations they use a similar method to the ARIN Board. He countered that the AC is a decisive body, however, when the minutes are too detailed, he believed it discouraged frank discussion. He stated he researched other organizations minutes and did not find them to be detailed in nature.

SL stated that MM had made a good point, and for the same reason of reading transcripts of ARIN meetings. We are attempting to represent the interest of the community and it hinders that. He also noted that the best argument against detailed minutes was that transparency is counterproductive because it hurts openness, but he had not noticed AC members ‘holding back’. He stated he was innately suspicious of anyone saying the solution is less transparency. The AC represents others interests, not its own. He was not in favor of attribution of points of view stricken entirely from the minutes.

DA and HS left at this time 5:22 p.m. EDT. HS stated she agreed with SL, and sent her comments to their mailing list.

CG responded to SL stating that there should be evidence if people are holding back. A open more discussion should take place and suggested that the AC should try doing that. He noted that with every final decision that the AC makes, the shepherds of the proposal are required to draft a public justification for the process behind the decision – that is to capture the rationale for the decisions made. These public statements regarding these decisions are intended to capture the results of the discussion. The ‘back and forth’ transcribed discussion may make it harder to understand.

KB countered that it is not a ’transcript’. Some things are not attributed and some things are not written down. He stated that he is careful about being frank when he is being attributed. He believed it would lower the amount of ‘chatter’ if AC members did ask for attribution.

OD stated that one issue is attribution and another issue is whether the minutes are descriptive or summarized. He proposed that the minutes summarize the content without attribution. He theorized there were three levels of minutes:

• The first level being the minutes the Board has: focusing on decisive outcomes. He believed this too terse for the AC’s purposes.
• The second level being the type that gets close to being a transcript, which is what he believed the AC has been doing.
• The third level of minutes would be for example: ‘The AC made a motion, the following points were discussed, and this is the conclusion they reached’. He noted the content would be a summary, not a descriptive conversation, no attribution to individuals, and then have the role call vote.

BS stated that level three was exactly what he had in mind: to show that the AC went through the process, discussed the items, and voted the outcome.

JS was concerned that if the AC changes the minutes, he wanted a process to it. He did not want to have a few discussions on changing the way things have been done for years. He supported no change. He believed the AC’s accountability, transparency and frankness are balanced currently. Otherwise he preferred to see an official proposal to change the AC’s standing rules, discuss and understand the proposal, and vote on it.

The President cautioned to be clear on what the AC is looking for in their minutes. The current process is one step below a transcript, and the next steps for the AC minutes would be to include, but not attribute remarks; another option is summarizing the remarks of the issues considered; or simply recording the decisive outcome (which is the process by which the Board now records their minutes).

DF stated this had been an excellent discussion thus far, and believed the AC needed further deliberation of the matter. He suggested, for the March AC meeting: an actual proposal with text that covers the issue, AC to make a decision, then move it to the mailing list, and develop it over the next month.

OD stated that if the AC were changing it, he would advocate a community consultation, as the minutes are for the community, not for the AC.

The President responded that the Consultation Process is available to use for operational matters and can be used for this matter. He would then summarize the results of the consultation, and provide them to the AC. He noted the process is not decisive, but it is a mechanism for gauging the community’s preference.

The Chair stated he would like to discuss the matter on the AC’s list and that he will send a message to them, reiterating this discussion is why he added it to the AC’s agenda for today’s meeting.

BS stated that during the AC’s January face-to-face meeting, this was discussed, and believed that is where this current discussion originated from, in addition to his personal experiences of residing on other organization’s Boards.

9. ARIN Public Policy Consultation (PPC) Report

The first ARIN PPC was held during NANOG 57 in Orlando, FL earlier this month. Attending AC members of the PPC provided a brief overview of their experience.

The President stated that attendance was lower than we had hoped, however, almost as many as we have at times during some Public Policy Meetings. He was open to suggestions as to working with the NANOG Program Committee with regard to holding the PPC with less aggressive NANOG sessions. The stated that the PPC will be more useful to the AC shepherds working on proposals with regard to how to edit text and form the proposal. The PPC will most likely not be used for recommending policies to the ARIN Board, but should be useful as an incremental process used for editing, not advancing, proposals.

The Chair agreed with the President, stating that the shepherds of proposals did indeed use the PPC for working on and figuring out what to do with the proposals.

CG stated that he is on the NANOG Program Committee and stated that they discussed the ARIN PPC, but that the final agenda is up to the Chair. They were conscious of all of the sessions. There may be additional sessions added in the future, so that may be a problem going forward. He stated he would do what he can.

DF believed the PPC was a good first try. Though not as successful as had been hoped, he believed this was not a negative and that anything new needs time to evolve. He was optimistic that the PPC could be turned into what ARIN wants it to be in the long run. The Chair and RS both agreed that the turnout and participation were good.

10. Improve Communications Group (IC) Report

CG stated there was no report at this time.

11. Any Other Business

The Chair called for any other business. There were no comments.

12. Adjournment

The Chair entertained a motion to adjourn at 5:45 p.m. EDT. CG moved to adjourn, seconded by RS. The meeting was adjourned with no objections.