Dear Simon, others,

On Wed, Apr 22, 2026 at 11:36:36AM +0100, Simon Lockhart wrote:
> On Wed Apr 22, 2026 at 11:41:07AM +0200, Andreas Grabm?ller | QuarIT GmbH
> wrote:
> > There have been calculators during the discussions, in Excel form.
> > Personally, I dislike the calculators. They reinforce the mindset of "I'll
> > vote for what allows me to pay the least".
>
> This is a strong point to flag here - with the category pricing as proposed,
> the majority of members will pay less, therefore if they're not sleeping
> through this process then they'll all vote for it. The <50% of members who
> would end up paying more cannot in themselves stop it happening.

FWIW, I agree with you that voting options that might lower one's cost
can be expected to attract a cohort of voters for that reason alone, but
I think there also are second-order effects to consider when preparing
to cast a vote one way or another.

For exampe, it is not too hard to imagine that a probable outcome of
lowering the financial barrier-to-participate-as-a-LIR would be an
increase in the number of people that then can participate in the
RIPE community (and consequently the global Internet infrastructure
community). Signing up as your own small LIR is an excellent way to
get some hands-on experience with IP & AS assignment procedures and to
obtain global Internet number resources & RPKI certification services,
all under one's own full control.

A "smaller pricetag for the smaller category" in some ways could be
seen as a vehicle to support the creation of more affordable self-study
opportunities for others, perhaps to help them prepare for what
otherwise can be hard-to-enter "experience required" jobmarket segments.
Category-based billing might be a way to better socialize the cost of
the community's hands-on educational facilities.

Perhaps in two years' time we can trace a spike of interest from a
younger generation to actively participate in Internet engineering
back to this year's charging scheme vote. The association's method of
charging has impact beyond just the immediate financial consequences.

Kind regards,

Job
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