[arin-discuss] Legacy RSA

[Dean Anderson]

On Tue, 6 Nov 2007, Hutchison, Tine wrote:

> I think there's an underlying issue that you're failing to address (in
> the specific case of the expanded travel and outreach budget.)  The
> issue is "is VON contrary to the stated purpose of ARIN?"

Not exactly.  There are several issues supported by evidence cited in
previous messages. Let me try to summarize them without any drama:

First issue is "is having a staffed Booth at VON and other end-user
(lets say 'people/applications working above layer 3') oriented
tradeshows a proper expenditure of ARIN funds"  The answer is no.  
People who work and buy products above layer 3 don't have any choice
about layers 1-3. Educating them about ARIN's purpose in layer 2 isn't
productive for ARIN.

The second issue is "Was there proper justification for giving $50,000
to NANOG?"  This issue depends on 2 questions:
      1	Was something of like value received in return?
      2	Were there conflicts of interest?

1st question: Did ARIN get $50,000 worth of 'educational outreach' from
NANOG?  $50,000 will pay for a year at MIT or Stanford. It buys a lot of
"educational outreach". Its a lot of money.  ARIN did not get $50,000 in
'educational outreach' in return from Nanog.  Did this $50,000 gift to
NANOG benefit the ARIN membership in advancing the purposes of ARIN by
$50,000?  No. It didn't.

2nd question: Did ARIN Board Members have close involvements with NANOG
that presented a conflict of interest?  Yes, they did.

Therefore, in answer to the second issue, there was not proper
justification for the transfer of $50,000 to NANOG.


The third issue is whether Board Members should resign or be removed.  
That question depends on their credible ability to act as fiduciaries. A
fiduciary needs to act in the interests of someone or thing else. They
are entrusted with a large amount of money and assets that does not
belong to them.  Fiduciaries cannot be conflicted by self-interest.  
When they are conflicted, they need to be able to scrupulously separate
their own interests.  Failure to be scrupulous about the separation and
avoidance of conflict of interest is a disqualifying event. Fiduciaries
cannot associate with disreputable persons.  Fiduciaries need to have
the highest moral character and unassailable integrity.  People who are
credibly (as in Temporary Restraining Order obtained) charged with
intentional and negligent misrepresentation, extortion, and organized
crime are not really suitable as fiduciaries.

Are ARIN Board Members associated with persons previously suspected of
ties to organized crime?  Yes, they are.

Are persons with ties to organized crime, who have acted with conflicts
of interest, who have misled the internet community in the past,
suitable to be the fiduciaries of ARIN?  No, they aren't.


> Two of ARIN's purposes, as stated in their articles of incorporation
> (http://www.arin.net/about_us/corp_docs/artic_incorp.html) are:
> 
> 1) to increase and diffuse knowledge to the general public about the
> Internet in its broadest sense;
> 
> 2) to educate industry and the Internet community in order to further
> their technical understanding of the Internet;
> 
> These two lines - which are so critical as to warrant being the first
> purposes listed - seem to indicate that ARIN is justified in spending
> money to go to nearly any event where "the Internet community" or even
> "the general public" might attend.  
> 
> While this would justify ARIN going to pretty much any event, they seem
> to be restricting themselves to events relevant to people who operate
> the Internet.

Your reading of these as meaning "any event justified" is precisely what
shows that your reading is over-broad and uncontrolled.  Not every event
is a justifiable expense for ARIN.

> Your presence at VON proves that VON is in the range of relevant
> events.

_MY_ presence at VON was to assist a consulting client who does VOIP
carrier services. That had nothing to do with ARIN. My presence also had
nothing to do with Av8 Internet. I was at VON on my client's expense,
because I have experience with VOIP programming, billing, and other VOIP
engineering. I was not there on AV8's business.  And I saw no one else
there from even local ISPs who might deal with ARIN.

> Other people on the lest chiming in that they were also there
> reinforces that.

The "chiming in" of a few people is not a justification for the
expenditure of $1.2 million (~10% of the total budget) per year. It is
not a justification for even one staffed booth at one show.  You can't
spend money only because a few people want to. Something more
substantial is needed. It has to be in the reasonable interests of the 
organization to spend the money.

		--Dean

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