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Registry Advisory Council – working group announced

Discussion in 'Nominet General Information' started by Acorn Newsbot, Mar 9, 2021.

  1. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    • This is an advisory position, NOT the final Registry committee. My role is to help design what a successful Registry Advisory Committee would look like. And that to me is one that listens to you.
    I have not yet decided if I will stand for a RAC role but I am listening and both my own complaints and your own WILL be heard. If you would like to put yourself forward Sean or anyone for that matter, happy to hear what you think an RAC should look like. Ultimately, we could be in the same position again in a few months time. New board doesnt solve anything if you simply discount ourselves a voice from the get go.

    The only thing I will not accept is others on this thread having a pop at me for trying to help, whether this is now or in 2 months from now. I also know when my help is not appreciated. If I get this impression upon the formation of the RAC ill simply stand back and in my place you will get the usual candidates. Choice is yours guys.
     
    Last edited: Mar 11, 2021
  2. Domain Forum

    Acorn Domains Elite Member

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    IWA Meetup
     
  3. DJ

    DJ Well-Known Member

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    You might be climbing onboard a sinking ship here. The support is now nearly a quarter of the membership as namecheap have pledged also now. I don't understand why the board don't do the honourable thing and follow Piers Morgan and fall on their swords.
     
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  4. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    Im not climbing above a sinking ship Im simply trying to figure out the best way for us to communicate with Nominet both now and in the future. If the EGM is successful, we still need a voice in the future. This voice could even be yours, but 1st we need to figure out the best way to communicate with the current or future board which isn't throwing a EGM every 6 months. There are clearly problems which need to be addressed and as you point out if Namecheap have also thrown their name into the hat, the current way in which we communicate isn't working, hence why I believe it would be far more constructive both now and in the future if we had a working group that collects these issues and puts them forward in a monthly call.

    To reiterate this point once again, I am NOT part of the final RAC, I just wish to ensure during the design stage we have a way to make our often valid points in a non destructive way.
     
  5. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    As I said in the response to the email you just sent me accusing me of 'having a pop' - if you are going to make a claim then be expected to back it up. Whether you accept that or not is irrelevant. Concentrate on *this* EGM and stop worrying about what happens afterwards. We don't need to figure out how to communicate with *this* board AT ALL. They will be gone. They had years to communicate with us but chose not to - rather ignore our responses, suggestions, and ultimately close down our communication method. Why you want to try and appease them is really beyond me. The reason you are encountering hostility quite frankly is because we've had our fair share of collaborators. Your role is unnecessary and unwanted. That's just the reality.
     
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    Last edited: Mar 11, 2021
  6. DJ

    DJ Well-Known Member

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    If the board manage to scrape through this EGM they will feel invincible and will treat the membership with even more disdain and contempt then ever before.

    IF THEY WIN IT WILL GET WORSE NOT BETTER!!
     
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  7. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    Robert. I am not collaborating with dictators I am trying assist in the design of the RAC so we can shape a better Nominet both now and in the future, even if the EGM is successful. I dont see what is wrong with this.
     
  8. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    So how do you suggest we communicate?
     
  9. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    EGMS every 6 months because we haven't bothered to get a seat at the table?
     
  10. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    I don't. I suggest we finish this EGM and then with someone FAR more efficient in place we will discuss with them how to communicate. You assume that any replacement is going to be as self serving and arrogant as Russell. Why do you want to communicate with him so badly when he has made it clear over the years he doesn't want to?
     
  11. DJ

    DJ Well-Known Member

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    It is quite apt that they went for the acronym RAC as this is a car crash waiting to happen.
     
  12. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    And your evidence that the new board is more efficient?
     
  13. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    FUD doesn't work here James. Don't be so afraid of change.
     
  14. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    The track record of Russell vs Sir Michael speaks for itself. But it's irrelevant anyway. Either this board will be gone (remember...not fired sadly)... or they will remain and punish everyone from their position of untouchability. NEITHER will result in better (or any) communication with the current setup.
     
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  15. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    Im not afraid of change, but fear what change may look like.
     
  16. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    Well that's really your own problem and is illogical. 415 members disagree with you. After this EGM talk to us again and we'll see what we need with regards to communicating with a NEW board.
     
  17. JamesTuplin Germany

    JamesTuplin Active Member

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    Look all I'm saying is this. Dont have a pop at me for trying to help you guys communicate. You may think you don't need my help designing this, but I don't see any other takers? What if the EGM fails? What if the EGM is successful and there is an RAC anyway and WE, yes WE as I am on your side with most of the points, WE don't have a voice. Just stop being so aggressive and take a step back and you will see you are fighting the wrong person here.
     
  18. ukbackorder

    ukbackorder Active Member ukbackorder.com
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    I'm not 'fighting' anyone and I apologise if you think I'm personally attacking you. I'm not - I don't know you. Pretty impossible with just words on a forum. I *am* however attacking your position on the matter. You have made yourself out to be some kind of victim and clearly perceive yourself as a 'saviour' - 'You may think you don't need my help designing this, but I don't see any other takers'. Nobody asked for the RAC. We don't need it. Most of us are not fooled every time nominet *pretend* to throw us a bone.
     
    Last edited: Mar 11, 2021
  19. super-whois

    super-whois Active Member

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    Wasn't this your silly idea?
     
  20. CreativeMix

    CreativeMix Guest

    James, I wouldn't be so arrogant as to suggest I know you BUT we have had dealings in the past and my impression of you is that you're very professional and agreeable and I worry that being agreeable is why you've been "chosen". You must see that the "RAC" is a pure PR stunt designed to give the illusion of listening but the problems at Nominet are deep seated and go back many years, they won't be fixed by anything other than a move back to the companies core values and that's at odds with the current CEO's ambitions.
     
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    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 11, 2021
  21. Siusaidh

    Siusaidh Well-Known Member

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    Nominet announced: “The RAC will be live in June.”

    Let me correct that.

    The RAC will be live in June, IF the new leaders of Nominet want it to be, but alternatively they may ask members to propose what kind of member representation they want.

    This RAC concept was the brainchild of a leadership that is desperate to control and contain member output, filter it, and channel it through their own ‘in house’ mechanism, which I predict will be dominated once again by the largest registrars.

    There is also a danger that when the RAC has been properly installed, that might in the future be used as a pretext to remove NED directors from the Board, “as we have the RAC now, with balanced representation for all the segments” (they might say).

    At such a point, about 4000 members would get 1 of 4 places on the RAC, with the other 3 of 4 going to other segments - and all this in a body which is purely advisory, leaving the good ship Nominet to keep sailing gaily on its way, regardless of where members actually want it to go.

    If Nominet genuinely want to listen to members, then why are they vilifying the reasoned voice of members for this EGM?

    I just don’t think they want to hear what members are actually saying. I think they want the ‘appearance’ of engagement, but in fact they want to be able to keep going the direction they choose and, as such, the RAC is a potential trap and rubber stamp to say engagement has been done.

    At the very least, Nominet should have run a consultation of members to ask *them* what structure they wanted for the representing of their own views, and what interface they preferred for interacting with them.

    Instead of having the RAC imposed on members to suit Nominet’s methods of controlling engagement, the vast majority of members might prefer to develop their own Members’ Constituency for themselves, on their own terms, even electing their own members to represent them if they want, and making that the interface Nominet needs to use if it wishes to engage. The point is: we were asked our opinions AFTER the company had decided to build the RAC. Why weren’t members consulted BEFORE the structure was adopted?

    The reality, I think, is that Nominet wants to diminish the voices of the vast majority of members, because they are perceived as “trouble” (how I think Mark has been portraying the 419 signatories of the EGM). The RAC will use the ‘segmentation’ language to justify making sure that the vast majority of members (1000s of them) get sidelined in one tiny segment, while the powerful large tech companies and the Company carve things up together in their own best interests.

    I respect James Tuplin for wanting to be an influence for good - that's honest and I 'get' that. Personally, I contributed to the opening request for views, and I guess I could have been invited like James, but my advice was obviously not what they wanted. I've been asked why I'm sceptical about the RAC: I don’t believe in disenfranchising myself and thousands of others, and being sectioned off in a tiny segment, while the usual suspects (like GoDaddy) end up calling the shots. And it lends the Board a front of engagement with members, while actually disempowering them further, in their 'segmented' subordination to the other segments in the set up, and the merely 'advisory' function, except for its chair, which looks like being James Bladel of GoDaddy, who is likely to be in that position and hence on the Board, even after he ends his NED 3-year period. It's pretty obviously as a control mechanism, to segment off the views of the members in a small corner of the process, which can always be over-ruled by the other segments. Yes, Nominet are letting one or two people tinker with the details of their own masterplan. But that masterplan was to control, filter, and channel dissent. Seen it all before at ICANN years ago.

    If Nominet genuinely wanted to engage, they should have held a consultation before foisting the RAC concept on everyone. But then again, if Nominet wanted to listen to members, they wouldn’t be vilifying 419 of the most engaged members as if they were ‘enemies’ of Nominet threatening it's 'destruction' (as Russell said this week). But to the present leadership, they are. That's why the forum was deleted: they didn't want to face the dissent.

    To associate with this, in the midst of an EGM, when the new leadership may choose to act differently, would have lent credibility to a process that is an instrument of the Russell/Mark regime: all the matters of membership engagement can be sorted after the EGM, because in all honesty - with the trashing of the members’ forum, and the criticism of 400+ members for disagreeing with them - what grounds are there for trusting the initiative under the present regime?

    For all these reasons, I favour a member-run, member-framed, member-structured Constituency, run external to the Company, but representing the voice of Nominet members. If that is how we wanted to engage, then frankly Nominet should respect that, but they won’t. I’ve seen all these games play out before at ICANN. The name of the game is control and boxing in constituencies you see as threats to your Board autonomy.

    But even if my own preferred approach wasn't adopted, I think it's best to resist participation until after the EGM. There's a collapse of trust in the present regime. A perceived malaise. And that goes back years, but now things have come to a head. At present, the RAC is a propaganda tool for the embattled Nominet Board (the same Board that trashed the forum of the members). But in many ways, what we're watching reminds me of that 'Downfall' meme. The downfall of a regime, and the desperate measures of an old order, operating from the Nominet bunker in their final days. 'Mein Fuhrer, Namecheap have surrendered, Iomart is not answering the phone, and the enemy are only 2 kilometers away.'

    The EGM is the issue right now, not the RAC.

    My assessment could be wrong, but that’s my analysis, take it or leave it.
     
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