[chapter-delegates] Results of the board discussion on membership (redux)

[James M Galvin]

Carlos,


--On Tuesday, April 12, 2005 6:54 AM -0500 Carlos Vera Q 
<cvera at interactive.net.ec> wrote:


> 1. One Member One Vote

This is a difficult to achieve, even if we did not have individual 
members.  Consider that individual members are permitted to join more 
than one Chapter.  In fact, there is no limit to the number of Chapters a 
member can join.  Thus, a member could, in principle, vote in many 
Chapters.

This means that if we used Chapters to identify members, we would need 
some way to reconcile those members identified by more than one Chapter.

We could choose to ignore this issue, but then I would be curious how 
that is different than letting paying members vote as well as Chapter 
members?

Membership really is not about voting.  Membership is about supporting 
the mission and purpose of ISOC.  ISOC supports membership because 
membership supports ISOC's mission and purpose.  Otherwise ISOC would be 
a different organization entirely.

Yes, voting is a benefit of membership, a benefit extended to all members 
(individuals, Chapters, and Organizations), but ISOC is about ensuring 
the Internet is for everyone.  It is not about creating an organization 
in which each member gets one vote.  Voting is present so that ISOC's 
significant communities can have a voice in its governance.  But 
governance is not how ISOC successfully executes its mission and purpose. 
Individuals become a member to partner in the successful execution of 
ISOC's mission and purpose.

Individuals have a fair amount of autonomy to execute ISOC's mission and 
purpose in ways that are meaningful to them.  Chapters are the best way 
to do this but not the only way.

We want to provide several ways for individuals to work with ISOC.


> 2. Every member has a Vote

This is true today.


> 3. No privilegies in Votes for Money

I am not sure how to respond to this suggestion.  Chapters are the only 
group that do not contribute money directly to ISOC.  Are you suggesting 
that no other group of ISOC members should contribute money to ISOC?

While that is an admirable goal, how would ISOC support itself?  And 
before you think that PIR will fund ISOC, keep in mind that ISOC is more 
than PIR.  Thus, while it gets money today from PIR, ISOC's long-term 
strategy is not to depend on PIR.  This is as it should be since, however 
unlikely, ICANN could always pull the .ORG registry away from PIR.

It is also important to recognize that offering a paying membership is 
not about the money.  The total money budgeted to be collected this year 
is just over $50,000 USD.  That barely justifies a line item in the ISOC 
budget.

There are people who want to be recognized as a different kind of member 
for giving money to ISOC.  And they do not want to be donors, they want 
to be a member.  There are not a lot of these people, but they do exist. 
ISOC wants these people as members.  As it turns out this category of 
membership is also convenient to offer the privilege of directly voting 
for a Trustee, which is also something that ISOC has always had and wants 
to continue having.


> As some members state, there would be several ID mechanism

I would like to visit each of these suggestions in detail.  I know that 
in all the email that has passed there have been a few suggestions here 
and there, but to date I have been trying not to reply to people point by 
point.

So, if folks would like to start a thread (create a new message with a 
relevant subject line) for each ID mechanism you want to consider, it 
would be my pleasure to discuss each in detail.

If we can find something that would work for ISOC, with all the necessary 
controls to ensure there is no abuse, then we will implement it.


Jim Galvin
VP Chapters