[PDB-announce] [PDB-gov] PeeringDB survey with regard to the future of PeeringDB

Arnold Nipper arnold.nipper at de-cix.net
Fri Aug 7 07:46:07 PDT 2015


On 07.08.2015 02:28, Daniel Golding wrote:
> See inline...
> 
> On Thu, Aug 6, 2015 at 8:13 PM, Chris Caputo <ccaputo at alt.net
> <mailto:ccaputo at alt.net>> wrote:
> 
>     I think everyone involved is trying to work from a place of logic and
>     transparency.
> 
>     Some things to ponder...
> 
>     Who are the PeeringDB stakeholders?
> 
>       - admins?
>       - individual users?
>       - organizational users?  (networks? IXes? datacenters?)
>       - donors?
>       - ???
> 
> 
> I suspect networks, IXs, datacenters are the primary stakeholders and
> will likely be the largest donors. 
> 

Theoretically IX information is not longer part of PeeringDB because
meanwhile IX-F DB is _the_ authoratative source for IX information.
PeeringDB only refers to IX-F DB.

Nevertheless IXs as well as IXPAs as well as IX-F probably have a vital
interest that PeeringDB works properly.


Best
Arnold

> 
>  
> 
>     Who should be the Members (the group that elects the Board) of
>     PeeringDB?
> 
>       - admins?
>       - individual users?
>       - organizational users?  (networks? IXes? datacenters?)
>       - donors?
>       - ???
> 
> 
> This is tough and there needs to be input from the community. Does
> membership tie into financing? Are people willing to pay another
> membership fee? Is there a huge risk by just requiring people to sign up
> and not pay anything?
> 
> 
>  
> 
>     How is Membership determined?
> 
>       - free?
>       - fee?
>       - service?
>       - qualifications?
>       - ???
> 
> 
>  "Service guarantees citizenship. Would you like to know more?" /s
> 
>  
> 
>     If part of another organization, how would the interests of the
>     stakeholders be maintained?
> 
> 
> Either the stakeholders would have to be confident in the organization
> or there would have to be a mechanism to ensure that its constituency
> has a strong voice. I think different organizations have managed to pull
> this off. 
> 
>  
> 
>     Would donors who have a problem with or are not a member of a parent
>     organization be dissuaded from donating to a sub-account devoted to
>     PeeringDB?
> 
> 
> Earmarking funds is a common mechanism. Of course, picking a parent
> organization that is not particularly controversial would be important. 
>  
> 
>     How would a parent organization deal with and absorb the potential
>     liability that comes from operating PeeringDB? An example of that
>     liability being when a spammer harvests from the PeeringDB database and
>     gets shut out, they could sue the organization. Or even if they
>     don't sue,
>     will they withdraw support from the parent organization or cause
>     problems.
>     How will that impact future decision making in the interests of
>     PeeringDB
>     versus the parent organization?
> 
> 
> This is actually the benefit of being part of a larger organization. Its
> trivial to sue a PeeringDB-Inc with minimal assets - almost anyone could
> do it and you would just need to outspend PeeringDB-Inc. The reason why
> other organizations like ARIN have large warchests is to forestall this
> - those large pockets might look attractive, but they hire lawyers.
> Professional staff is also important - a lawsuit against volunteers is
> pretty easy, but when you have dedicated staff its easier to defend
> yourself.
> 
>  
> 
> 
>     The answers to the above are challenging. It is thought by some
>     stakeholders that organizing into an independent organization is a clear
>     solution, and that there are enough financial supporters out there who
>     have expressed support and agree, to make it worthwhile. Obviously,
>     there
>     are others who disagree.
> 
> 
> Is there a list of those who have pledged support with amounts? If the
> commits are "hard" and the list is long and trustworthy, then you will
> have answered one of the important questions without any real debate.
>  
> 
> 
>     Re Membership questions posed above: At present there is no good answer.
>     There's a desire to avoid membership fees. There's a desire for
>     representation of both users and admins. The thought by folks working on
>     independent organization effort, so far, was to have an initial
>     membership
>     consisting of the initial Board of Directors. The idea being that these
>     individuals (*) are trusted enough by the PeeringDB community to steward
>     PeeringDB from its present state to one of being legally organized
>     and on
>     a path toward tax-exempt status. The initial Board can then revise the
>     Bylaws to be more inclusive.
> 
> 
> Why avoid membership fees? A _nominal_ fee can be a very handy tool
> against trolls infiltrating the organization. 
> 
>  
> 
>     It could be this should be re-examined in the interest of transparency,
>     legitimacy, and securing a mandate. Maybe PeeringDB voting Membership
>     could be defined simply as those subscribed to the pdb-gov
>     (http://lists.peeringdb.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pdb-gov)
>     mailing list
>     with active PeeringDB accounts. From there, drafts of Articles & Bylaws
>     can be evolved, along with nominations of initial Board members to be
>     listed on the Articles. I think all of the proposed Board members are
>     happy to step aside in favor of those who receive greater support
>     from the
>     community, myself included.
> 
>     But the first question is, do we organize independently? Hence the
>     survey.
> 
>     Chris
> 
>     *: Aaron Hughes, Matt Griswold, Patrick W. Gilmore, Richard A
>     Steenbergen,
>     and myself.
> 
>     Disclosure: In 2014, Patrick retained me to help get PeeringDB organized
>     into a non-profit U.S. IRS 501(c)(6) due to my experience with the SIX
>     (Seattle IX). He asked me to do so by being a Board Member and
>     Secretary/Treasurer of the proposed organization. Not expecting this
>     process to take so long or be divisive, I put those positions on my
>     Facebook and LinkedIn profiles. I hope doing so did not cause additional
>     confusion or appearance of presumption. They have now been removed.
> 
>     On Thu, 6 Aug 2015, Daniel Golding wrote:
>     > Peering DB Community,
>     >
>     > Just to provide some additional color from one of those who
>     believes more
>     > transparency and logic should be applied to the situation....
>     >
>     > A number of us in the community are skeptical of the need for yet
>     another
>     > organization with resulting overhead (which is significant). In
>     addition,
>     > there is concern regarding the initial makeup of any proposed
>     PeeringDB
>     > board - namely, that it may not be representative of the largest user
>     > groups and potential contributors to PeeringDB. There is concern
>     about the
>     > degree of transparency to this point - that most decisions are
>     being made
>     > on a closed "admin-only" list.
>     >
>     > PeeringDB will be funded, theoretically, by contributions or
>     memberships.
>     > For this reason, its vital that the Board be representative of the
>     > potential contributor base, as well as absolutely free of potential
>     > conflicts of interest.
>     >
>     > Of course, one way to avoid these unpleasant issues is to
>     associate with
>     > another, better funded organization, to operate in a semi-autonomous
>     > manner.
>     >
>     > Thanks,
>     > Daniel Golding
>     >
>     > Disclosures: I work for Google and we have a vested interest in
>     the success
>     > of PeeringDB. I am Chair of NANOG, and NANOG is one of the choices
>     on the
>     > Survey, but I'd be just as happy to see this activity under OpenIX
>     or the
>     > Internet Society.
>     >
>     >
>     > On Thu, Aug 6, 2015 at 12:05 PM, Aaron Hughes <aaronh at tcp0.com
>     <mailto:aaronh at tcp0.com>> wrote:
>     >
>     > > Fellow PeeringDB Community,
>     > >
>     > > It has come to our attention that several community members
>     believe more
>     > > transparency and logic could have been applied to the initial survey
>     > > regarding where PeeringDB functions should live. We respectfully
>     request a
>     > > poll from the community with a more formal survey in order to
>     keep with the
>     > > spirit of PeeringDB transparency and bottom up.
>     > >
>     > > PeeringDB has been operating for years with no official
>     corporate umbrella
>     > > or liability protection. There has been much discussion in
>     recent months
>     > > about officially organizing into an IRS non-profit, so that
>     users may
>     > > contribute funding and be assured that their contributions will
>     best serve
>     > > PeeringDB's evolution.
>     > >
>     > > Please review and complete the following survey:
>     > >
>     > > https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ZDM6RNK
>     > >
>     > > This survey will close on 15, Aug 2015 2359h UTC
>     > >
>     > > Sincerely,
>     > >
>     > > PeeringDB Admins
>     > >
>     > > --
>     > >
>     > > Aaron Hughes
>     > > aaronh at tcp0.com <mailto:aaronh at tcp0.com>
>     > > +1-703-244-0427 <tel:%2B1-703-244-0427>
>     > > PGP Public Key ID: 0xF6B1DEC2
>     > > Key fingerprint = 6486 43A5 1692 502C DCFC  8446 C714 E317 F6B1 DEC2
>     > > http://www.tcp0.com/
>     > >
>     > > Request a meeting with me: https://doodle.com/aaronh
>     > >
>     > > _______________________________________________
>     > > Pdb-announce mailing list
>     > > Pdb-announce at lists.peeringdb.com
>     <mailto:Pdb-announce at lists.peeringdb.com>
>     > > http://lists.peeringdb.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pdb-announce
>     > >
>     > >
>     >
>     >
>     > --
>     > Dan Golding | Data Center Strategy | Global Network Acquisition |
>     > dgolding at google.com <mailto:dgolding at google.com> |  +1
>     202-370-5916 <tel:%2B1%20202-370-5916>
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Dan Golding |	 Infrastructure Engineering and Strategy |
>  dgolding at google.com <mailto:dgolding at google.com> |	  +1 202-370-5916
> 
>>  
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Pdb-announce mailing list
> Pdb-announce at lists.peeringdb.com
> http://lists.peeringdb.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pdb-announce
> 


-- 
Arnold Nipper
CTO/COO and Co-Founder

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