I have been forwarded a letter from stating that you would like sign
the MoU as a representative of ISPA UK, be a proxy representative for
the 83 members, and thus have 83 votes in PAB.
A similar issue has come up before in PAB -- Amadeu Abril y Abril
asked if he could have multiple votes, based on the fact that he
represented 4 actual signatories (not just proxies). This question
was discussed by the general membership, and a clear consensus
emerged.
According to the MoU, PAB is supposed to operate according to "rough
consensus" principles -- section 5c:
c.The PAB shall apply rough consensus modes for determining its
recommendations to the POC.
The clear source for this clause is the IETF rough consensus model.
The question of representation under such a model has been addressed
in the IETF. For example, the IAB charter (rfc1601) says the
following:
Members of the IAB shall serve as individuals, and not as
representatives of any company, agency, or other organization.
When Amadeu posed his question I wrote a position paper on this topic, and
presented it to the list. There was no significant dissent. The
principle adopted is as follows:
- any signatory of the MoU may designate an individual to
serve on PAB
- each individual in PAB gets one vote
One person, one vote. This rule falls directly out of the "rough
consensus" mandate.
Further, size or composition of the signing organization make no
difference. PAB has no reasonable way to accurately and independently
evaluate those things. Nor do we have any way of evaluating the
significance of claimed representation -- for example, you claim to
represent 83 ISPs. But you may have been voted in by a 42-41
majority. In general PAB has no way of evaluating the legitimacy of
such claims.
Nor does PAB make any special distinction about what kinds of entities
are entitled to representation -- ISP's, advocacy groups, other
businesses, other organizations -- all interested parties may claim a
variety of constituencies that have some kind of weight. Once again,
PAB has no objective way to evaluate those.
Be that as it may, I strongly encourage you to sign, and to get as
many others to sign as possible. It may surprise you, but many of
the ideas you have expressed publicly (a "MoU-lite", for example)
have floated around on PAB for a long time, and, under present
circumstances, a persuasive voice could be decisive.
Kent Crispin
PAB Chair
-- Kent Crispin, PAB Chair "No reason to get excited", kent@songbird.com the thief he kindly spoke... PGP fingerprint: B1 8B 72 ED 55 21 5E 44 61 F4 58 0F 72 10 65 55 http://songbird.com/kent/pgp_key.html