[arin-ppml] Curious about consensus

[Leo Bicknell]

In a message written on Mon, Apr 25, 2011 at 03:21:47PM -0700, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
> where do we go now?

Back in the 2008-2009 timeframe the AC (and some members of the
BoT) spent a lot of time doing a deep dive into the details.
Resources like Ben Edelman were provided, and the AC had special
meetings just to discuss the issue.  Many details from the common
to the esoteric were considered, and 2008-2 was the result.

At the same time the community (with perhaps the exception of a few
deeply involved individuals) generally wasn't deeply involved.  The
AC did a survey, which was a start, but retrospect I don't think
the AC explained things to the community that well.  I'll take my
own lumps for that as I was on the AC (and even Chair for a year)
at the time.

Which is the basis of the breakdown in my opinion.  The AC was too
caught up in the details, and the community had no context.  I know
there were topics that got hours of AC discussion, and almost zero
community discussion.  

I think the pinnacle was at the Fall 2008 meeting.  Check out
https://www.arin.net/about_us/ac/ac2008_1017.html and read bullet
5.  My recollection is that one item took multiple hours to discuss
and decide.  You see motions to revise, then a motion to last call,
then another motion to revise, and finally abandon.  In retrospect,
tabling it for a few days/weeks and regrouping would have been a
better action.  However by abandoning only 2008-6 was left on the
table, which really wasn't a good place to be.

With that back history, where do we go from here?  Well, I think a
fresh look at 2008-2 is in order.  We can't put the transfer genie
back in the bottle I'm afraid, so the better option is to find the
good parts of 2008-2 and move them forward.  I think AC, BoT, Staff
and community members who were involved with 2008-2 could help
explain why all these things were included.  What corner cases and
abuses we were trying to prevent.  Why the rules and regulations
were thought to be required.

With the community brought up to speed on these issues they may not
be considering I think we can have a much more productive discussion,
and figure out which of these rules and regulations make sense.
They could then be put in a new policy and passed.

The passing of 2009-1 was a beginning, not an end.  Unfortunately
many involved treated it as the end because the issues had become
so contentious.  Maybe enough time has passed we can move forward
again.

The other option, always available, is vote out the AC and BoT members
who were involved, and vote in new ones.

-- 
       Leo Bicknell - bicknell at ufp.org - CCIE 3440
        PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
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