[Chapter-delegates] Message from Internet Society Audit Committee Chair

[Veni Markovski]

John,
I’m not sure I can share decades of chapter experience in a short email
from my phone, but let me as much as I can before my fingers start to ache.

We are on a list, called “chapter delegates”. It consists of all chapter
“officers” (quote intended, as this is how it’s in the database). No one
would argue that the members of the list are among the most active in their
chapter. They have shown interest in following ISOC, contributing to its
development (it’s another question if and how ISOC is actually using this,
not a topic of this thread). While it’s possible that there are other
people in the about 100 countries, where there are ISOC chapters and SIG,
it is safe to assume that the most active folks are engaged via this list.
It would be good to get from ISOC information as to how many of the
previous ISOC BoT have been actually chapter “officers”. That might help
us. From the current four trustees, afaik, all are or have been chapter or
SIG “officers”, but not sure for all the past ones.
Being a chapter officer is not a highly paid job (or is not paid at all).
In many countries, people who become chapter leaders, are using their
personal time for a greater good.
I believe that some of the misunderstanding in this thread is actually due
to cross-cultural differences, which are completely normal, as the US legal
system for NGOs is very different from the legal systems of other nations.
I’ll give you an example - the tax exempt 501(c)(3) principle doesn’t exist
in the same form in Bulgaria.

One also might not understand why there’s an argument about the CoI policy
at all, since ISOC admitted it is not a good policy and have told us it
will be changing it. It would be good to know as to why this list was
informed about this change, since there’s no process in which the chapter
leaders can contribute.

Hope this is helpful and hope that we could learn more from each other, as
it seems chapters have questions, and there are answers that raise more
questions...

Night.


On Sun, Nov 8, 2020 at 20:31 John Levine <isocmember at johnlevine.com> wrote:

> In article <
> CAN7p9b4w3+4+5Qa3aVuiX5_mz76Y6fDBMT7Fg4Zzow5fP+A72g at mail.gmail.com> you
> write:
> >-=-=-=-=-=-
> >
> >It’s not.
>
> Oh, OK. In that case what's the problem? Why is it important for a
> single person to be a chapter leader and a board member at the same
> time?  Why can't one person do one and another chapter member do the other?
>
> R's,
> John
> >On Sun, Nov 8, 2020 at 14:37 John Levine <isocmember at johnlevine.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> In article <CAN7p9b46J4fHuGzu2ZKr1d3f8+B7gP9NWVq7JU2mzY=+
> >> Ujffdw at mail.gmail.com> you write:
> >> >CoI policy, which gives chapter leaders two choices:
> >> >— run for the BoT of ISOC and give up the work they do in their own
> >> >countries
> >> >— never run foe the BoT, and keep work with their chapters foe the
> good of
> >> >the national Internet.
> >>
> >> I understand you to be saying that there are so few people active in
> >> chapters that no chapter can find one person to be the chapter leader
> >> and another to run for the board.
> >>
> >> If that's not what you're saying, please clarify.
>
-- 

Best regards,
Veni Markovski
http://www.veni.com
pgp: 5BA1366E veni at veni.com
<http://www.veni.com/>

The opinions expressed above are those of the author,
not of any organizations, associated with or related to
the author in any given way.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/private/chapter-delegates/attachments/20201108/f87cd284/attachment.htm>