[arin-discuss] No quorum in last election

>-----Original Message-----
>From: arin-discuss-bounces at arin.net
>[mailto:arin-discuss-bounces at arin.net]On Behalf Of Dean Anderson
>Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2008 7:03 PM
>To: Ted Mittelstaedt
>Cc: arin-discuss at arin.net
>Subject: Re: [arin-discuss] No quorum in last election
>
>
>[ARIN agrees that discussion to recall Board members, to conduct
>investigations of ARIN expenditures, and to stop certain ARIN
>expenditures does not violate the ARIN AUP.]
>
>On Thu, 31 Jan 2008, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
>
>> I would like to request that the membership list be reviewed before
>> any further voting.  It is my belief that the membership list is
>> inaccurate and that at least 990  (nine hundred and ninety) of the names
>> on the membership list belong to people who are no longer employed by
>> their organizations and belong to organizations that are defunct,
>> and thus are no longer qualified to be on the list of members.
>
>Where did you get this list of people?

The Tooth Fairy visited me and told me that 990 of the names are fraudulent
paper companies installed by the Taliban.  I can't share who they are
because
I'm afraid the London Bankers who control the world government
will come after me if I do.  But, ARIN can find out who they are by calling
everyone
on the membership roles - as I have requested.

>The list on the website does not
>list the names of people, but the names of companies.
>But even if the people on whatever list you have are no longer employed,
>their former company is still an ARIN member.

The member company must supply a person who is a contact and
represents the company.  Voting for example requires that the
company make a vote, this is done through the designated contact.

If every member of ARIN failed to supply a contact name, votes could
not even occur at all.  Members must be
contactable.  That is the mechanism for a member to conduct operations.
If they are not they must be purged or moved to an inactive status where
their membership does not count in the quorum calculations.

>So your claim about
>people "no longer employeed" doesn't seem to have merit.  But I'd like
>to know where you found a list of names.  Contact names and member
>postal addresses are a necessary part of the right of members to contact
>other members, but ARIN doesn't seem to have that data on the web.
>
>It seems strangely coincident that you think 990 (exactly the number
>that must be removed to make a quorum with 196 votes) should be removed
>from the membership roll.

Yes, it is interesting.  I noticed that myself and asked the Tooth
Fairy about it.  He told me to go find Deep Throat and ask about that.

> Where did you get this number? Please post the
>990 names you've collected.
>
>> Regardless of whether a network or business paid dues or a fee at one
>> time that put them on the membership roles, if they are bankrupt or
>> defunct or have ceased operations, they no longer exist as an entity,
>> and a nonexistent entity cannot be a member.
>
>Merely being in bankruptcy or having ceased network operations doesn't
>terminate membership.
>

No, but bankruptcy laws require that the organization in bankruptcy
supply the contact name of someone who can bring the business to an
orderly closure.  Those members are not a problem since their proxies
are still reachable.  However, companies that have gone bankrupt and
have disappeared off the face of the earth, leaving no contact behind,
or companies that have simply gone out of business and don't exist as
a legal entity any longer, these must be purged.

As I said, a non-existent entity cannot be a member.  If it could I could
submit the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus as ARIN members.  Actually, I
think that both of them are on the list of 990.

>> Suggestions to make changes to the bylaws are not appropriate at this
>> time.  Bylaw changes require an existing board, and since the
>> legitimacy of the existing board is at question, it cannot make bylaw
>> changes.
>
>Bylaw changes do not require a Board under the Virginia statute. The
>membership can vote bylaws in directly.

Except as you have already pointed out not enough members are voting to make
any vote valid.  Thus that isn't an option.

>The Board can make changes only
>to those bylaws that the membership has not exempted from change by the
>Board. It doesn't work the other way around.
>

And nothing in the current rules prevents the Board from purging nonexistent
or non-contactable, or fraudulent members from the roles.

You know, the ironic thing here is that some months ago during the
IPv4<->IPv6
debates, I suggested that ARIN start proceedings to review the IPv4
assignments
it had made to see if they were still in use - and pull back the unused
ones.
I got shouted down because people waxed eloquent about how the small number
of IPv4 recoverable through reclamation efforts wouldn't be worth the
effort.

How, you have come along and with one fell swoop you've now forced the
issue.
ARIN will have no choice now but to purge the roles and start reclaiming
abandonded
IPv4 - which is what I wanted all along.  Thanks, Dean! :-)

Ted