Council Minutes - 29 February 1996

Status: These minutes have been approved by Council, except that this published version omits four paragraphs to be found in the approved minutes.

PRESENT:

• Roger Hicks (chair), Stephen Bell, John Hine, John Houlker, Colin Jackson, Neil James, Andy Linton, Simon Lyall, Frank March (late), Donald Neal, Elizabeth Probert, Jenny Shearer, John Vorstermans, Celia Wade-Brown

APOLOGIES:

• Jim Higgins, Phillip Lindsay, Arnim Littek, Brenda Lobb, Ian Mitchell
• Observers: Steve Barr

Meeting opened 11:04am.

Roger Hicks opened the meeting, introduced Steve Barr as an observer, and sought the leave of the meeting to deal first with Steve Barr's letter to the Secretary. As the chairman referred to in Steve Barr's letter, he then left the chair, which was taken by Celia Wade-Brown.

CORRESPONDENCE

Letter from Steve Barr re 1995 ISOCNZ Council Election

Motion: That a letter be written to Steve Barr as an individual apologising for procedural deficiencies in the election.
/Wade-Brown

CARRIED U

Input to Council by particular individuals and/or organisations was then discussed in more general terms. It was suggested that subcommittees propose people who might be invited to attend council meetings.

Frank March arrived 11:36.

Motion: That the membership be advised that any member may apply to the chair to attend a council meeting as an observer. Such applications will be looked on favourably.
/Hicks

CARRIED U

It was also decided that council meeting agendas will in future be published, with the exception of items the chairperson wishes to be discussed with the public excluded.

Steve Barr was then invited to return to the meeting, and was told of the motions which had been passed. He left shortly afterwards.

Roger Hicks resumed the chair at 11:56.

Minutes of the Council Meeting of 19 October 1995

It was noted in discussion that the official minutes of an email meeting consists of the archive of all postings made to the meeting mailing list during the meeting.

Motion: That the minutes of the meeting of 19 October 1995 are a true and accurate record.
/Jackson

CARRIED
NC, Abst: Linton

Matters Arising from those Minutes Not Otherwise Covered in the Agenda

One motion from that meeting was removed from the table and passed:

Motion: That the media subcommittee be authorised to spend up to $1000 to have a logo designed.
/Mitchell

CARRIED U

Matters Arising from the Email Meeting of December 1995 - January 1996 Not Otherwise Covered in the Agenda

John Hine asked that all postings for an email meeting be archived in a single file.

Donald Neal agreed to prepare an unofficial precis of this email meeting.

The memberships of subcommittees were briefly reviewed, and three changes made. Elizabeth Probert is no longer a member of the Relationships and Strategy subcommittee. Celia Wade-Brown is not a member of the Media and Education subcommittee. Frank March is to chair the Events subcommittee.

FINANCIAL

The treasurer, Colin Jackson, addressed the meeting.

The society has approximately $23000 in account balances, made up of $7000 in paid-up individual memberships, $14 000 in paid-up corporate memberships and a $2000 surplus on the 1995 forum.

GST registration is being pursued, to be effective from 1st March 1996.

The Society's balance date will probably be 30 September.

Celia Wade-Brown has agreed to act as deputy treasurer.

Frank March raised the matter of a bill for around $800 for an 0800 number which was a part of the work

CARRIED out in starting up ISOCNZ. Neil James noted that Tuia had expected to pay for this.

Motion: That the treasurer be given the authority to negotiate with Tuia to ISOCNZ's best advantage regarding this bill.
/Chair

CARRIED U

MEMBERSHIP

In the absence of membership Secretary Brenda Lobb, Colin Jackson gave an informal report.

There are around 110 individual members, with approximately fifteen other individuals whose financial status remains to be ascertained. There are fourteen paid-up organisational members, with another three organisations having expressed interest in joining but not paid.

There was some discussion of means of communicating with members.

Motion: That the council asks the media subcommittee to prepare a membership leaflet.
/Chair

CARRIED U

John Hine expressed willingness to take responsibility for a "nicely laid out, laser printed" leaflet. It was agreed that the Media and Education subcommittee will take responsibility for the society's web pages, which should contain the same information as the leaflet. The leaflet is expected to be in the hands of the Membership Secretary by 11 March.

Report on Council Members' Comments on the use of Electronic Meetings

Colin Jackson proposed a procedure for email meetings:

• At the beginning of the meeting, all must identify themselves. Participants are assumed to check their mail at least once per 24 hours during working days. If they leave temporarily or permanently they must inform the chair.
• There will always be a chair and a secretary. These will check mail frequently through the meeting. They may change, but will always appoint a successor. The chair's decision on a topic is final unless sufficient participants (half council) agree to make a formal objection.
• One topic only should be discussed. Only the chair may introduce a topic.
• Use ADMIN: as a subject header for posts which do not discuss the topic at hand. Better still, use private mail to the chair.
• During the meeting, do not use the list except for the meeting. Send email to the person(s) you wish to contact or to the chair.
• The subject line must be used intelligently.
• Proposals may be passed by voting or by lack of dissent. When asked to vote, members must respond YES, NO or ABSTAIN. Discussion ceases during a vote. Members not voting by the deadline (24 hours normally) will be assumed to have left the meeting and will be advised of this by the chair.
• Quotes from previous posts should be limited severely. Entire paragraphs should not be quoted. Participants should be in possession of previous posts, if they are not they can ask the secretary who will keep an archive.
• Observe normal posting rules such as the 72 column line limit and using ascii only. If it is essential to circulate formatted materials please ask the secretary for assistance.
• Be polite. Robust argument is fine, ad hominem attacks are definitely not. If you feel that such an attack has been made, do not respond in kind. Refer to the chair if necessary. Please also remember that not everyone has the same skill with the technology.

This was discussed, with some speakers defending the existing longer response periods or contending that more than one topic at a time can be discussed if subject lines are used correctly.

There was some discussion of whether electronic meetings should be public. It was agreed that they should not, but that minutes should be made available to the general mailing list. There was some support for the idea of a separate mailing list for meetings.

The Administration subcommittee was asked to develop a policy on the conduct of electronic meetings by the next council meeting.

FUTURE MEETINGS - LOCATION, DATE AND EXPENSES POLICY

Colin Jackson proposed that ISOCNZ reimburse council members' expenses for travel to meetings where reimbursement is not available from another source. This was discussed, with some speakers not wishing a distinction to be made between those whose employers would pay for such travel and those not in that position.

Motion: That council members' reasonable expenses for travel to council meetings will be reimbursed by ISOCNZ on request.
/Chair

CARRIED U

Motion: That this be applied to this meeting and to previous meetings.
/Chair

CARRIED U

There was some discussion of meeting venues. The Administration subcommittee was asked to prepare a timetable of council meetings for 1996 and to that end to prepare a list of meetings already scheduled in which council members are likely to be interested. This is to be completed by 11 March 1996.

ADMINISTRATION BUDGET

This was briefly discussed.

Motion: That the administration subcommittee be authorised to spend up to $1000 without reference to council.
/March

CARRIED U

CORRESPONDENCE

Letters from Rodney Wilson, Patent Attorney, and Glenn Cooper, chair of the TUANZ Electronic Commerce SIG were referred to the Relationships and Strategy subcommittee.

Request for Endorsement (not on agenda)

Jenny Shearer reported that an east Timorese group had approached her seeking the society's endorsement, with which sponsors for a web site might be approached. It was thought inappropriate for the society to endorse political causes, though contact information for suitable helpers might be passed on in response to this kind of request.

REPORT OF THE OPERATIONS SUBCOMMITTEEE ON DNS ADMINISTRATION

Andy Linton addressed the meeting.

He proposed that the costs of administration should be passed on to those who use the system, and that a system should be designed which can scale if necessary to allow a name for each person in the country. He noted that there around 150 000 companies on the companies register, and about 200 000 registrations now in the .com domain.

There is a need to make public how a name can be registered, what names can be registered and what dispute resolution procedures exist. It is also necessary to work out what happens when the society ends up in court. We also need to decide when the new scheme for allocating names should start, and when charging should start.

Other questions, he said, are the allocation of IP numbers; and education - "we need to persuade the public that the DNS is not a substitute for directory services". Just adding .co.nz to company names will not scale.

Roger Hicks observed that we need to recover the cost of providing DNS policy.

Roger Hicks also stated that we need to document and publicise existing DNS name allocation policy. Andy Linton is now working on a form in which this can be released. John Houlker proposed publicising this, and saying that ISOCNZ is the place to contribute to changing the policy. Colin Jackson proposed a consultation process, where a discussion paper is written and invites submissions.

Andy Linton suggested that an RFC (a formal Internet standards document) could be produced describing the policy, after several local iterations. He would like to see a web page created which forwards email to the right people, so that applications for names can be made on line.

John Hine urged that when the policy is issued, it should be clear where the authority for the policy comes from.

It was agreed that the current policy would be documented and circulated to council by 8 March. The Media and Education subcommittee are to draft, in consultation with the Chairperson, a press release to be issued no later than 15 March.

John Houlker raised the issue of the use of the DNS as a source of revenue for the society.

Motion: That the New Zealand DNS be run on a self-funding non-profit basis.
/Houlker

CARRIED U

The transition to ISOCNZ responsibility for the allocation of domain names was discussed. John Houlker wished to see this responsibility transferred as soon as possible, largely to reduce his own exposure to legal action. There was some discussion of whether The University of Waikato should implement charging for the service before ISOCNZ sets charges.

Motion: That ISOCNZ assumes responsibility for domain name allocation in New Zealand with effect from 16 March 1996, and that the Operations subcommittee work with existing operators to achieve this using existing policies and mechanisms.
/Linton

CARRIED U

Report of the Operations Subcommittee on the Formation of a New Zealand Network Coordination Centre

Frank March noted that "there's nothing very much to add to the email" already circulated to council members.

Report of the Relationships and Strategy Subcommittee on Strategic Goals for 1996

John Hine listed ten possible objectives:

• Management of the .nz domain
• Production of timely and factual information
• Education - making people available to talk to various groups
• Reach agreement with the international Internet Society on ISOCNZ's relationship with them (this will be pursued at their 1996 AGM in Montreal)
• Promotion of standards - ensuring that there are RFC's on things which happen in New Zealand
• Promotion of new services e.g. fax over the Internet
• Clearing-house for information - possibly as a service for members only
• Act as an Arbitrator or Facilitator
• Explore affiliation with other New Zealand organisations, possibly offering a stream at one or more conferences run by other organisations
• Lobbying political parties to commit to a policy regarding access to the Internet

Roger Hicks suggested facilitating a meeting of ISP's to discuss business issues, such as coordination to manage response to attacks. It was decided that Frank March and Roger Hicks would explore this possibility.

Roger Hicks also raised the matter of possible funding for him to travel to INET 96.

John Hine and Neil James left at 4pm.

Jenny Shearer asked how much support there was among council members for the development of policy aimed at things like generally-available access to the Internet. There was some discussion of this.

Jenny Shearer proposed that the society ask political parties questions relevant to the society's objects, and report on their answers to the members.

Motion: That the Relationships and Strategy subcommittee develop a list of questions to be presented to political parties, relevant to our objects, that list of questions to be circulated to council prior to publication.
/Chair

CARRIED U

OTHER BUSINESS

The Chair raised a number of motions outstanding from the 1995 AGM.

Responsibility for the plaque commemorating the efforts of the society's founders was passed to the Media and Education subcommittee.

The Administration subcommittee was asked to consider the adoption of multiple sub-classes of organisational members. Members of the IAG present were also asked to have the IAG discuss this issue.

It was agreed that the Relationships and Strategy subcommittee should produce certificates to be given to foundation members of the society two weeks after the society's logo becomes available.

The meeting closed at 4.35pm. .

©1997 The Internet Society of New Zealand