RIPE hostmasters visiting LIRs

Hello,

Last time I brought this subject up I had some very positive response
from people on the lir-wg mailing-list, and some concerns as to whether
it would ever be possible to put into practice what seems like a good idea
in theory.

If people are willing to read/listen I would like to raise the subject 
once more, as I think it may be possible to work through some of the
issues raised.

What was proposed was some kind of scheme whereby RIPE hostmasters are
able to visit some of the LIRs that they deal with. The idea was that this
would benefit the RIPE community at large by keeping hostmasters in touch
with practical matters in the LIR world (and therefore, in most cases, the
world of commercial IP). Once gained, this greater understanding would
allow hostmasters to further improve their work in dealing with these, and
other, LIRs, thus being of benefit to the community at large.

One of the issues addressed in the original mail was that of neutrality -
if such a scheme were to be organised then it would have to be designed in
such a way that there were no neutrality implications for the NCC or LIR.
This would mean that the process by which participant LIRs were selected
would have to be such that it was agreed that no LIRs or set of LIRs were
shown favour in any manner whatsoever.

With this in mind I'd like to raise (and generate some discussion on)
some points, perhaps with a view to coming up with an outline which could
acceptably be put into practice:

1. Selection of participating LIRs.

I think some people got the impression that this would be a scheme to
visit all LIRs - I really don't think this would be workable unless given
a very large amount of money from member contributions or unless paid for
by individual LIRs. So, how about keeping the number of visits to a very
small selection of LIRs? You are then faced with the problem of how to
select them - obviously this is very open to discussion, but one method
might be:

a) The RIPE NCC divides all LIR membership into operational area and into
registry size, then picks LIRs at random from within these divisions.

b) The NCC then approaches these LIRs to ask whether they would be
interested in participating (assuming certain conditions of
participation). Should they wish to be visited, this is arranged. Should
they not wish this to happen, then the NCC picks another LIR from the same
region/size grouping.

c) The visit occurs - if appropriate, then hostmasters with language
skills suitable to the LIR's operational area make the final arrangements
and pay the visit.


2. Financing.

A point was raised before by Jan Czmok of Gigabell and added to by Amar
from Telia about financing - they came up with some suggestions on a
financing structure. One of the points made was that, should this lead to
an increase in registry fee, then it would not be popular. 

I think it would be possible to visit a small number of LIRs (as suggested
above) without needing any extra contribution. The main point here is that
enough LIRs are visited so that hostmasters gain experience to help them
with their job, and not that all LIRs are visited. Obviously, there would
be a need to work out projected costs and see if this fits in the existing
budget.


3. "Lobbying".

It should be made clear to participating LIRs that under no circumstances
would a visit from RIPE NCC hostmasters provide any opportunity for an LIR
to express any "political" views about their relationship with the RIPE
NCC or the community in general, and that no behaviour should take place
which could compromise the neutrality of the RIPE NCC and its
representatives towards all RIPE members. Examples of such behaviour might
be (?):

- too much reference to any problematic issues which have occurred
previously in that LIR's relationship with the RIPE NCC or with other
LIRs.

- any attempt to gain "extra" service compared to other LIRs in the RIPE
community.

In this case I believe that the RIPE NCC should cover any hotel and
transport costs as part of the budget for a visit such as this, but that
provisioning of drinks and meals such as lunch and some evening
entertainment would be acceptable. What do other mailing-list recipients
feel? 

I think untoward behaviour would be unlikely to happen as most LIRs in
the RIPE region are very aware of how solid the impartiality of the NCC
staff is, and would be unlikely even to attempt to affect this.


4. Inspection/Audit.

There was a suggestion earlier that this kind of visit be used to help
those LIRs experiencing problems with consistency. I don't believe that
this would be appropriate, and that to do this would be to move away from
the aim of the project - to benefit the entire community by allowing
individual hostmasters to become more familiar with the way RIPE members
operate. I think it would be a good idea to stress that any experience
gained would be under an informal (or formal if required) non-disclosure
setup, and that even should hostmasters witness the worst kind of IP
practice in an LIR, there should be no consequence for the relationship
between LIR and NCC, nor would any record be kept of the nature of these
practices.


I'd like to try and move this forward in discussion - I still think it's
quite possible to get some kind of limited visiting scheme up and running,
provided other members and the NCC agree on the structure, and I feel it
would be of benefit to everyone if properly structured. I would welcome
all comment on this list both from LIRs and representatives of the NCC.


Apologies for the long mail!!


Best wishes,


Sam


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samc at uu.net
Tel: +31 20 711 6082
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