Rebuttal to Mr. Weisberg's insinuations

<American civics lesson deleted>

As a citizen of a North American country where the USA is often regarded as
more advanced in the practice of democracy, I'm rather shocked to learn
that the poll tax is part of your recent history. In Canada poll taxes are
seen as part of the distant monarchist heritage, only of minor historical
note.

>Am I part of the Internet community?
>If I am unable to join ARIN because I cannot afford a $1,000.00
>membership, by what right do they represent me?

While all this talk of politics may be interesting, it bears no relevance
to ARIN because ARIN is not a political organization and is not part of any
governmental structures. I'm sure that you aren't a member of the Cancer
Society either and I rather doubt that you complain to people about how the
Cancer Society does not represent you. Or closer to home, what about ANSI,
the American National Standards Institute? Aren't you incensed that they
are developping a standard for object-oriented COBOL without representing
you?

>Shall I set up my own organization and represent you?

Go ahead. It's a free country. Nothing is stopping you from doing this and
I will note that people do this every day. Some people were concerned with
liberty in cyberspace and created the EFF. Some people then became
concerned with liberty in the EFF and created the CDT. Other people decided
the EFF and CDT were missing some stuff and formed the VTW. So don't talk
about it here, just go away and do it. Compete with ARIN in the marketplace
of ideas and lets see how it turns out.

>> >Yes, but the operating officers of ARIN are being taken from NSI.
>>
>> This is not what I see on http://www.arin.net. There is only one operating
>> officer, Kim Hubbard, who comes from NSI and so far no one has come up with
>> any good reason why she should not hold the position.
>
>I'm sorry, perhaps you can direct me to the location at
>http://www.arin.net where it lists an operating officer who is not from
>NSI.

There aren't any operating officers other than Kim Hubbard listed there.
The only set of named people are the Board of Trustees:

Raymundo Vega Aguilar - instrumental in the deployment of the Internet within
                        Mexico and some other latin american countries. He is a
                        citizen of Mexico.

Randy Bush - instrumental in the deployment of the Internet in many African
             countries.

John Curran - CTO at BBN Planet. BBN people built much of the original
              Internet operationally speaking.

Scott Bradner - well known for his work with the Harvard testing lab, he also
                has ties to the Canadian Internet community where he assisted
                in much of the deployment of the Internet in Canada.

Don Telage - someone from NSI who wants to see that the money they are donating
             to ARIN is wisely managed. After all, if ARIN does not succeed in
             becoming a self-supporting independengt organization, then NSI
             will end up cleaning up the mess.

And then there are standing positions for the IANA director who currently
happens to be Jon Postel and for the manager of the registry who currently
happens to be Kim Hubbard.

Only Kim Hubbard deals with operations.

>citizens who would find it easy to work together to violate the rights
>of the "weaker party or an obnoxious individual."

Does this mean that you consider yourself to be an obnoxious individual?

You remind me of a fellow in a Monty Python film about King Arthur...

         Help! I'm being oppressed...

Fortunately, American jurisprudence has greatly advanced since the days of
Madison and now it is a routine occurence for bouncers to remove obnoxious
people from bars etc...

P.S. seeing as how ARIN is supposed to allocate IP addresses for all of
North America can you give me any good reason why Canadian political
traditions should not take precedence over the American political
traditions you are espousing?


********************************************************
Michael Dillon                    voice: +1-415-482-2840
Senior Systems Architect            fax: +1-415-482-2844
PRIORI NETWORKS, INC.              http://www.priori.net

"The People You Know.  The People You Trust."
********************************************************