Executive Committee
Meeting Minutes 00-02
ISOC DOcument Title: Minutes of Conference Call of ExComm, ISOC Board of Trustees Author(s): Martin Burack Date: 2000.3.31 Committee: Executive Committee of BoT Document: excom-00-02 Revision: Supersedes: Status: DRAFT Maintainer: Martin Burack Access: Unrestricted
The meeting was called to order by Geoff Huston, Chair, at 8:30am, EDT.
Participants
Geoff Huston
Kees Neggers
Marty Burack
Don Heath
Lynn St. Amour
Torryn Brazell
1. INET2000
Sponsorships The Japanese have obtained US$2.5 million in commitments, of which $1.7mm has been invoiced. Some of the money may be late in being paid, due to accounting timings in Japan. The U.S. has raised US$316K (vs. a $300K goal), of which $205K has already been collected.
Program The program was expected to be posted on the web by Friday, April 7th.
Marketing/Publicity A mailing will be done to targeted orgs, the week of April 3rd or 10th. New organizational material will be included. A press release is in the final stages, and another one geared towards sponsorships is being started.
Registrations We have about 160 people registered, towards a goal of 1,200. We did not achieve any significant boost in registrations at the end of our first price discount period. We will probably need 900-1,000 for the conference to break even. We are ahead of the past two years. However, Geneva achieved a huge spurt in registrations at the equivalent of roughly a couple of weeks from now.
2. INET2001
Glascow has submitted a good bid, and there will be a site visit shortly. Paris has a good bid for the logistical parts, but needs beefing up on the sponsorship side. It is expected that they will show enough improvement for there to be a site visit. Stockholm submitted a weak bid, and has been asked to strengthen it significantly. A proposed selection is targeted for submission to the Board by the end of May.
3. INET2002
There was some discussion about the possible regionalization of INET that might eliminate INET2002 in its currently planned form. It was pointed out that the current form of INET would have a much better chance of being profitable if changes were made that could drastically reduce the US$600K being spent on the Gala Reception, the Welcome Reception, and the conference center. Staying with the current format would not stop ISOC from starting up additional specialty mini-conferences (perhaps in partnership with others) such as we do in security with NDSS.
David Lassner has said that the group that supported INET'95 would like to host INET2002 in Hawaii. Sufficient free meeting space could probably be obtained in two hotels, if we have enough registrants staying there. The 2001 RFI had suggested the use of hotels for meeting space, but it is difficult to find hotels in Europe with sufficient space to eliminate the need for a conference center.
David will be meeting in Amsterdam in three weeks with the IWWW conference people to see how strong their interest is that they've expressed about the possibility of holding the two conferences together in 2002. To do that, both groups will probably have to alter the usual dates by a few weeks.
4. NTW2000
Funding has been committed by two Japanese government agencies, that will enable us to have at least 120 students. Jun Murai had personally guaranteed US$450K so that planning could continue and a program put in place. If more funding can be obtained, we may have 140 students. There will be five English language tracks and one in French. One English track is new: High-level advanced networking, and is expected to have about 10 students. There will be a concurrent NTW held in Mexico City, and it is expected to have about 200 students. If a small surplus can be obtained from NTW2000, George Sadowsky hopes to be able to bring the instructors from the Japan, Latin America, and French trainings together to discuss the future of the NTW.
5. ISOC FUNDING
Don and Lynn reported on organizational recruiting.
Org Memberships AT&T has dropped out and we need to get them back. Telia and Quest have downgraded to Executive level. So we have $130K less revenue, annually, from those three organizations. The Geneva office has brought in some Gold (e.g., GTS WorldWide), Executive and Start-Up level org members. Work is proceeding on the industry outreach program, focusing primarily (at present) on oil& gas (Chevron is expected to join), banking, PR, and large consulting firms. As part of this, ISOC is co-sponsoring conferences in two industries.
Org membership continues to be time consuming and takes away from other responsibilities. Don expects to have a light schedule in May and will be able to devote more time to recruiting. He expects to contract a person, on a draw against commission basis, to do org membership recruiting.
Cash Flow Don reported on ISOC's cash flow and P&L. Cash flow is an ongoing problem but continues to be manageable. The P&L shows a $200K profit for January. However, this may be misleading because of the timing of revenue and expenses. We may lose money, on the books, this year unless we bring in sufficient org revenue early enough This also is because of the way revenue is accounted for on the books. We should, though, finish cash positive positive.
6. POSSIBLE BOARD RESTRUCTURING
There were concerns expressed about how to cement ties to various ISOC constituencies: the IETF, chapters, and organizational members. e.g., There has been some difficulty getting business oriented people on the Board. So Don has proposed a restructuring of the ISOC Board, which would include having the above groups appoint members of the Board. After some discussion, it was agreed that Geoff would present the proposal to the full board for discussion.
7. PUBLIC POLICY POSITIONS
There was some discussion on the need to articulate ISOC positions on various Internet related issues: If that were being done on a regular basis, it would be easier to attract industry leading lights to the Board and to get more members. We would not need to get bogged down in extensive analysis. It would be sufficient to disseminate something akin to "sound bites" that would get us visibility and recognition for having influence beyond just infrastructure issues without our having to cover every detail in a policy statement. Some of the issues that will have visibility this year are fairly easy to predict (e.g., privacy, and taxes on e-commerce) and we should be able to begin developing and stockpiling positions. Don said he would begin working this when he's back in the office the week of April 10th, with help from Marty.
8. CHINA TRIP
Lynn reported on the status. We have 15+ people signed up, with a target of 20. We might get as many as 40-50 people. Above 25 will require a 2nd delegation to be formed with another tour leader. Lance Laack, ISOC's webmaster, will be on the trip and sending back daily text and pictures for posting so that the ISOC membership can "participate" virtually.
