[Chapter-delegates] Chapter advice on live streaming

[Eduardo Diaz]

Barry,



I appreciate your insights regarding the responsibilities of the Board of
Trustees for the entire Internet Society. However, it is crucial to
recognize that most of the Internet Society's composition consists of its
chapters. The ISOC chapters serve as the organization's foundation; without
them, ISOC would face considerable challenges in effectively communicating
its message. With approximately 128,000 members, the chapters are essential
in mobilizing and engaging the broader community. When individuals join a
chapter, they become ISOC global members before selecting their preferred
chapter, emphasizing the chapters' importance in representing the entire
ISOC community.



The Chapter Advisory Council (ChAC) was established in the ISOC bylaws to
ensure a unified voice for all chapters, allowing them to present issues
pertinent to their members. Consequently, when the Board receives formal
advice from the ChAC, it should be regarded as a collective perspective
from its chapters. Given that the Board does not engage in operational
matters, it would have been prudent to thoroughly review the ISOC strategic
documents to identify areas where the functionality explicitly requested by
the chapters could be integrated into the strategy and then request the
ISOC CEO to implement it. I believe this consideration needed to be
adequately addressed by all the trustees, particularly given the informal
way it was discussed. The Board's request to present this issue to the
staff has been interpreted as a lack of concern for the chapters.



So, I would like to ask whether the trustees are willing to consider a
bylaw change that would allow the ChAC to send formal advice to the ISOC
CEO regarding matters deemed operational. Absent such a change, staff may
overlook valuable advice, resulting in a lack of incentive for them to
respond or take official action, and the chapters will have no other avenue
to voice these concerns.


-ed

Just an ISOC member



On Wed, Sep 18, 2024 at 10:51 AM Barry Leiba via Chapter-delegates <
chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org> wrote:

> I'm responding to something in Luis's note, but it's not really a
> response to Luis -- it's a clarification of what the roles are.
>
> >  Our BOT elected members (and of course, IETF and OMAC ones if isolated)
> are a minority in the Board
> > and they are promptly remembered that they are not representing a sector
> but the Internet Society as a
> > whole, as written in the legal framework.
>
> For the record: I'm a trustee who was elected by the Organization Members.
>
> First, on the "minority" point, I want to highlight that the
> Organization Members used to select half the board, six members.
> Three each were selected by the Chapters and by the Standards
> Community (the IETF, trustees appointed by the IAB).  This change
> around ten years ago to the current balance -- one Organization
> selection was transferred to the Chapters, and one to the IETF -- so
> we now have each of the three communities having an equal say (four
> trustees each) in the constitution of the board.  We also have a
> thirteenth trustee now (Funke Baruwa), who was appointed by the board
> itself and whose background lies outside all three of those
> communities.
>
> Second, as Luis said and which can't be stressed enough, once any of
> us becomes a trustee we are not representing the community that put us
> here: we are representing the Internet Society itself and acting in
> the interest of the Society as a whole.  We have both a legal and
> moral responsibility to do that.  Of course, we each come with our
> respective individual backgrounds and experience, which certainly
> affects our individual views, and that diversity is crucial in getting
> a broad global perspective.  Sometimes that means that we have
> different views of what is best for the Society.  But it doesn't
> change the basic truth that we are all acting not as representatives
> of the communities we came from, but as trustees of the Internet
> Society.
>
> Third, the board's role is never to manage operational decisions for
> running the Society -- that's the job of the Internet Society
> management.  It is to work with the Society to set strategic
> direction, to oversee the mission of the Society.  A board that would
> micromanage things would be overstepping its role and would be toxic
> to the health of the organization, whose management has to have the
> freedom and flexibility to handle day-to-day operations as it sees
> appropriate, within the strategic plan that we worked with them to
> create.
>
> Barry Leiba
> Internet Society trustee
> _______________________________________________
> As an Internet Society Chapter Officer you are automatically subscribed
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> Chapter Portal (AMS): https://community.internetsociety.org.
> -
> View the Internet Society Code of Conduct:
> https://www.internetsociety.org/become-a-member/code-of-conduct/
>


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