Board of Trustees Meeting Minutes - 15 January 1999 [Archived]

Chantilly, Virginia

The meeting of the ARIN Board of Trustees was called to order at 10:00 AM. In attendance were Scott Bradner, Trustee and Secretary, John Curran, Trustee and Chairman of the Board, Kim Hubbard, Trustee and ARIN President, Ken Fockler, Treasurer, Doug Humphrey, Trustee, Michael Straty, Trustee, and Don Telage, Trustee. Also in attendance was Dennis Molloy, ARIN legal counsel and Mary K. Lee, notetaker. Due to inclement weather, Scott Bradner and Ken Fockler were unable to travel to Chantilly and attended the meeting via teleconference.

Operational Status: ARIN Staffing

Kim Hubbard presented a staffing update to the Board. ARIN is having some difficulty filling the Lead Technical position. Kim would also like to hire someone part-time to help out the accounting department as the workload has increased. Don asked if compensation and incentives are a problem when it comes to hiring technical staff. Kim replied that it is not always a salary issue and that in the recent past it has been the small size of ARIN that seems to be an impediment to potential engineering managers. As a not-for-profit, ARIN cannot offer stock options and some of the other benefits of large, for-profit companies. Don suggested that ARIN consider subcontracting a technical lead through another company. ARIN would pay the markup, but would get the expertise needed for the engineering group. The contract employee would get to keep their options and opportunity in the parent company. Kim will explore this possibility.

Operational Status: Routing Registry

The Routing Registry project is in process and rollout is scheduled for January 29, 1999.

Operational Status: IPv6 Registration Implementation

The implementation for IPv6 registration is also scheduled for rollout on January 29, 1999. Kim has been conducting weekly meetings with staff for both the Routing Registry and the IPv6 registration.

New Business: ICANN

A discussion concerning the formation of ICANN and ARIN’s relationship with ICANN took place. Don motioned that, until such time as ARIN has a formal contractual arrangement with ICANN, the executive management of ARIN will continue its judgement. For specific issues with legal or political overtones, ARIN will seek written concurrence from the U. S. Government Department of Commerce. Scott seconded this motion. There was no further discussion and John called for a vote. The vote was unanimously in favor of the motion.

Action item: Kim will engage in discussion with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

New Business: ASO

The draft proposal for the ASO was sent to the Board and to the AC prior to today’s meeting. Basically, the draft proposes three types of membership in the ASO: Charter, Corporate and Associate. Only Charter members can send representatives to the ICANN board. Kim noted that Bill Darte, AC member, suggested in yesterday’s AC meeting that there be only two classes of membership in the ASO: Charter and “Other”. There would be three seats from each of the three Regional Registries and three seats from the “Other” category, for a total of twelve seats. The arrangement proposed in the draft from ARIN, RIPE and APNIC would also include twelve seats. Don suggested an arrangement with four open seats that would result in at least one non-Registry board member. Don also stated that the three registries should be recognized for their unique operating role and their policies. Eventually, there may be five Regional Registries if LATINIC and AFRINIC are formed.

Action item: Kim will work on another draft proposal for the ASO. This proposal will include two categories of membership: charter and other. There will be an Address Council, which will be a body for gathering consensus on policy. The Address Council will not be a voting body, but will act as facilitators.

Unfinished business from previous minutes: Maintenance fees

Kim presented the “Proposal for Maintenance Fees” to the Board for comments and suggestions. In Phase One, the proposal is to begin charging a fee for in-addr modifications. This fee would only be charged to those organizations that are not paying annual maintenance fees for blocks of address space. Also included in this phase is the recommendation to eliminate charging maintenance fees for ASNs and IP end-users. These thirty dollar a year fees are expensive to invoice and total less than one percent of ARIN’s total yearly revenues. There was some debate over the impact of dropping the fee. It would be a loss of revenue, but would save on staff costs (i.e. the time spent to process and track all the invoices). Don stated that the first principle of billing is to bill minimally and the second is to bundle bill. Kim informed the Board that ARIN intends to use e-commerce predominantly, but we will have to accept some checks.

John stated that Kim has two proposals for the Board’s consideration. The first is to charge scheduled fees for in-addrs and the second is to develop an e-commerce system. Don recommends that ARIN investigate using a service bureau rather than developing our own software and system. The cost benefits may improve if the work is outsourced. A theoretical question was posed “what does each Trustee see looking out 1-3 years”? Don said he expects that in one year ARIN would be sending a bundled bill for services. If ARIN provides a service to you, you will be billed. Different amounts would be charged for different services. Mike gave a for-profit perspective. For $30 USD a year, send a bill every three years or allow credit card payment. The company being billed also has processing costs to consider. Scott sees two types of bills. The first is for in-addrs and the people who have IP space allocated to them. The second is for ASNs.

One of the concerns about e-commerce is the three percent fee that goes to the credit card companies. Mike stated that it is difficult to forecast what kind of fees ARIN will need to charge in one year and that ARIN needs to budget money for ICANN and other possible expenses. John wondered if it’s appropriate to charge a fee per change or something more along the lines of a one-time fee. Mike asked what the projected rollout for e-commerce is and Kim replied about six months. Kim suggests charging a fee per modification and giving ARIN customers a six months notice. Scott thought that it might be a good idea to announce that ARIN is looking at an annual fee.

Action item: Kim will look into an e-commerce system.

Maintenance fees continued

Kim raised the subject of the elimination of maintenance fees for ASNs. ARIN would like to distribute costs of service among everyone who gets services from ARIN. Kim stated that it is not fair to charge some groups and not others. Kim moved that the Board accept the proposal in front of them, relative to the elimination of maintenance fees for ASNs and IP end-users. John seconded this motion. After further discussion ensured, John suggested that this motion be tabled until the next meeting in order to provide each Trustee time for individual consideration. There was no objection to tabling the motion.

Scott moved that the Board accept the proposal relative to the charging of fees for in-addr modifications, with the contingency that the President find a cost efficient way to collect this fee. Don seconded the motion. John called for a vote. Scott, John, Doug, Mike and Don were in favor. Kim abstained. The motion carried.

Unfinished business from previous minutes IPv6 fees

The Regional Registries have been drafting the IPv6 allocation guidelines. The proposed fees include charging an annual registration fee of $2500 USD for the initial allocation to a TLA Registry. It is further proposed that an annual registration fee of $20K USD be charged to any TLA Registry justifying additional address space over the initial /35 allocation. Scott motioned to accept the proposal and Don seconded the motion. The vote in favor was unanimous. Don departed at 3:30p.m.

New Business: IPv6 policies

Kim presented the IPv6 Policy Document to the Board for their information. The plan will be sent to ARIN members. The Board recognizes the plan.

New Business: Issues raised at AC meeting

The AC recommends to the Board that the general allocation boundaries be moved down one bit, from a /19 to a /20. This does not include the multi-homed allocations. Mike mentioned routing ability problems. This is addressed in detail in the agreement each entity signs with ARIN. Scott motioned that the Board accept this recommendation and Doug seconded the motion. Kim, Mike, Doug and Scott were in favor. John abstained. The motion carries. The next question is how do we publicize. Suggestions included a press release, an announcement to the NANOG mailing list, an announcement at the NANOG meeting scheduled for January 31 through February 2 and an announcement on the ARIN website.

Issues raised at AC meeting continued

After input from the AC yesterday, John rewrote the policy and working group draft document for the Advisory Council. It is proposed that there be two types of groups: Working Groups (WGs) and Policy Groups (PGs).

Schedule next Board meeting

This will be discussed on the Board mailing list.

Scott motioned to adjourn the meeting and Kim seconded this motion. The meeting was adjourned at 4:00p.m.