I haven't meant to establish the fee schedule. I just gave an example of how this could work. The pricing formula and the different services one might want to offer would have to be studied more. To me it is just good economic principle to offer different rates and different services and that the money gotten goes toward these services. As far as EU is concerned, yes I am aware that RIPE takes care of more than EU but I don't think it is an obstacle. In fact I think EU has to spend money for Africa for instance and a non profit organisation should be a good candidate for grant. I also think that EU conditions are not something to be worried about. Being blind about what their conditions are would be crazy but it is just as crazy to be an EU wide organisation dealing with a subject that is one of the factor of economic growth and not have a financial support from it. EU spends zillions on things which to me are much less important than what the RIPE can do and which surely aren't a key component of growth. And even if we forget about growth but only talk about social activities, the internet is also a factor of social welfare. Lately on the different mailing lists there has been a lot of talks about RIPE costs, Fees, economics, internet being more and more a factor in the economy, etc yet at the same time I see little discussion on marketing aspects, sales, normal accounting practices (analyzing what income comes in, for what and what are the real costs). I sure don't mean to be over critical because I appreciate the RIPE and what it does but it seems to me that non-profit is viewed as non-business. That is not the case, one can be non-profit yet deal in costs and pricing issues, marketing, etc and ALSO financial relationship with government institution. In short be a full fledge business which makes money that is reinvested in its operating and not distributed as profit. Pascal Julienne EURO CONNECT SA 130, rue du Bourg-Bele - BP 21099 - 72001 LE MANS Cedex 1 - FRANCE Tel : (33) 02 43 14 12 76 - Fax : (33) 02 43 14 12 77 http://www.euroconnect.fr -----Message d'origine----- De : ncc-services-wg-admin@ripe.net [mailto:ncc-services-wg-admin@ripe.net]De la part de Joao Luis Silva Damas Envoye : jeudi 11 septembre 2003 12:56 A : Pascal Julienne Cc : 'RIPE NCC Services WG'; Marlene COUILLEAUX (E-mail) Objet : Re: [ncc-services-wg] Re: [dns-wg] Re: dnsmon / .org On Thursday, September 11, 2003, at 10:56 AM, Pascal Julienne wrote:
David,
You can't talk about monopoly when you refer to a non profit organisation. If I follow your line of thought then many other European organisations are also monopolies and should draw attention. In that case, we better all go to Cancun instead of the next RIPE meeting.
I think the real question is how could the RIPE catter to ALL of its members.
So say:
1) You have a basic fee for a basic service 2) You have options which you can subscribe to or not - for instance if you want informations on traffic then you have to participate financially.
This would mean that as far as IP registering all members would pay a comon fee (which still could be separated in small, large, etc.) and that the money obtained from this would go to registery services and a bit of the overall RIPE structure.
Under this suggestion, would one be able to pay only for the co-ordination services and not the registration ones? Suppose I want to support the RIPE Routing Registry, plus dnsmon and possibly attend a dnssec course but I am not interested in registration services (because, for instance, the current policy does not allow me to get addresses from the RIR function of the NCC). The NCC has more to offer than just registration services, in the area of co-ordination. Co-ordination usually requires a party that is not one of the co-ordinated ones.
For the rest of the services, they would have to be financed by those who want them. Again what is paid by those would go into a separate slot and would finance their needs.
However, if the RIPE is also recognized by EU institutions as THE central body then some grants should be obtainable from the EU to work on EU projects related to services the RIPE can offer. If such grants are obtained, then it is tax money from all EU citizens which finance some overall EU/RIPE activities which the RIPE is probably the best body in EU to do.
In general, EU money tends to come with EU conditions. Careful consideration should be given to something like this. In addition, the RIPE NCC service region is broader than just the EU, something that sometimes is forgotten by all involved. Joao