Hello, Last time I brought this subject up I had some very positive response from people on the lir-wg mailing-list, and some concerns as to whether it would ever be possible to put into practice what seems like a good idea in theory. If people are willing to read/listen I would like to raise the subject once more, as I think it may be possible to work through some of the issues raised. What was proposed was some kind of scheme whereby RIPE hostmasters are able to visit some of the LIRs that they deal with. The idea was that this would benefit the RIPE community at large by keeping hostmasters in touch with practical matters in the LIR world (and therefore, in most cases, the world of commercial IP). Once gained, this greater understanding would allow hostmasters to further improve their work in dealing with these, and other, LIRs, thus being of benefit to the community at large. One of the issues addressed in the original mail was that of neutrality - if such a scheme were to be organised then it would have to be designed in such a way that there were no neutrality implications for the NCC or LIR. This would mean that the process by which participant LIRs were selected would have to be such that it was agreed that no LIRs or set of LIRs were shown favour in any manner whatsoever. With this in mind I'd like to raise (and generate some discussion on) some points, perhaps with a view to coming up with an outline which could acceptably be put into practice: 1. Selection of participating LIRs. I think some people got the impression that this would be a scheme to visit all LIRs - I really don't think this would be workable unless given a very large amount of money from member contributions or unless paid for by individual LIRs. So, how about keeping the number of visits to a very small selection of LIRs? You are then faced with the problem of how to select them - obviously this is very open to discussion, but one method might be: a) The RIPE NCC divides all LIR membership into operational area and into registry size, then picks LIRs at random from within these divisions. b) The NCC then approaches these LIRs to ask whether they would be interested in participating (assuming certain conditions of participation). Should they wish to be visited, this is arranged. Should they not wish this to happen, then the NCC picks another LIR from the same region/size grouping. c) The visit occurs - if appropriate, then hostmasters with language skills suitable to the LIR's operational area make the final arrangements and pay the visit. 2. Financing. A point was raised before by Jan Czmok of Gigabell and added to by Amar from Telia about financing - they came up with some suggestions on a financing structure. One of the points made was that, should this lead to an increase in registry fee, then it would not be popular. I think it would be possible to visit a small number of LIRs (as suggested above) without needing any extra contribution. The main point here is that enough LIRs are visited so that hostmasters gain experience to help them with their job, and not that all LIRs are visited. Obviously, there would be a need to work out projected costs and see if this fits in the existing budget. 3. "Lobbying". It should be made clear to participating LIRs that under no circumstances would a visit from RIPE NCC hostmasters provide any opportunity for an LIR to express any "political" views about their relationship with the RIPE NCC or the community in general, and that no behaviour should take place which could compromise the neutrality of the RIPE NCC and its representatives towards all RIPE members. Examples of such behaviour might be (?): - too much reference to any problematic issues which have occurred previously in that LIR's relationship with the RIPE NCC or with other LIRs. - any attempt to gain "extra" service compared to other LIRs in the RIPE community. In this case I believe that the RIPE NCC should cover any hotel and transport costs as part of the budget for a visit such as this, but that provisioning of drinks and meals such as lunch and some evening entertainment would be acceptable. What do other mailing-list recipients feel? I think untoward behaviour would be unlikely to happen as most LIRs in the RIPE region are very aware of how solid the impartiality of the NCC staff is, and would be unlikely even to attempt to affect this. 4. Inspection/Audit. There was a suggestion earlier that this kind of visit be used to help those LIRs experiencing problems with consistency. I don't believe that this would be appropriate, and that to do this would be to move away from the aim of the project - to benefit the entire community by allowing individual hostmasters to become more familiar with the way RIPE members operate. I think it would be a good idea to stress that any experience gained would be under an informal (or formal if required) non-disclosure setup, and that even should hostmasters witness the worst kind of IP practice in an LIR, there should be no consequence for the relationship between LIR and NCC, nor would any record be kept of the nature of these practices. I'd like to try and move this forward in discussion - I still think it's quite possible to get some kind of limited visiting scheme up and running, provided other members and the NCC agree on the structure, and I feel it would be of benefit to everyone if properly structured. I would welcome all comment on this list both from LIRs and representatives of the NCC. Apologies for the long mail!! Best wishes, Sam ******************** samc@uu.net Tel: +31 20 711 6082 ********************