Subject: Fwd: Re: Financial state of the IETF - to be presented Wednesday

From: Margaret Wasserman <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 10:35:48 -0500

Hi Harald,

At 09:10 PM 3/14/2003 +0100, you wrote:
>On Wednesday at the IESG plenary, I'm doing a presentation about IETF 
>financials.

I have a few questions and comments on this presentation.

Do we have a real budget for 2003? Or are the numbers for
2003 based on the projection information (from the slide
labeled "Predicting the Future")?

If we do have a budget, could you make it publicly available?
It would be useful to get more information about where the
money is coming from, and where it is going. Without that
sort of information, it would be difficult to make the choices
outlined on the last slide.

Who decides how much of the ISOC's income is directed to IETF
activities? Do we know what percentage of ISOC's income is
represented in the $500-600K number?

Also, you have omitted at least one possible choice from
the section on options:

We could attempt to increase fundraising for ISOC/the IETF. For
instance, we don't send fundraising requests to IETF attendees
(at least I've never received any). Does ISOC engage a professional
fundraising firm? If not, maybe that should be considered.

BTW, I think that it is good that you're bringing this issue
up now, instead of when the first check bounces.

Margaret

---

From: Aaron Falk <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 08:26:32 -0800

Margaret Wasserman wrote:
> 
> 
> We could attempt to increase fundraising for ISOC/the IETF. 

Good idea.  I suggest a bakesale.  Everyone bring a baked good to
Vienna...

---

From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 08:39:51 -0800

> Everyone bring a baked good to Vienna...

and send coals to newcastle

---

From: Spencer Dawkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 08:49:40 -0800 (PST)

Hi, Aaron and Margaret,

If everybody brought I-Ds that were fully baked, that would
help, too!

Spencer

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From: "David J. Aronson" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 12:28:36 -0500

Spencer Dawkins wrote:

 > Aaron Falk <[email-masked]> wrote:

 >> I suggest a bakesale.  Everyone bring a baked good to Vienna...

> If everybody brought I-Ds that were fully baked, that would help, too!

How about other cooked items -- like the company books?  Some places, 
they ain't got no I-D 'bout nuthin'....

-- 
David J. Aronson, Software Engineer for hire in Washington DC area.
See http://destined.to/program/ for online resume, references, etc.

---

From: Bob Hinden <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 10:02:06 -0800

Harald,

>outlined on the last slide.

I second Margaret Wasserman's suggestion that the 2003 budget information 
should be made public.  The funding funding of the IETF comes from a mix of 
registration fees and ISOC funding.  All of this information should be 
public and made available to the IETF community.

Bob

---

From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 10:12:27 -0800

> should be made public.

i doubt anyone disagrees.  but i am not sure fortec has one.  now that
we actually have back numbers, forward management seems a good, though
not novel, idea.

randy

---

From: Bob Hinden <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 10:35:31 -0800

Randy,

>we actually have back numbers, forward management seems a good, though

Please explain?

Also, I looked for the 2002 expense summary on the IETF web page, but 
couldn't find it there.  It would be nice if it was on the IETF web page.

Thanks,
Bob

---

From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2003 15:44:25 -0800

--On 18. mars 2003 10:35 -0800 Bob Hinden <[email-masked]> wrote:

>> > I second Margaret Wasserman's suggestion that the 2003 budget
>> > information should be made public.
>>

I thought I'd wait until the auditors had stopped changing the numbers.....

---

From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2003 15:42:54 -0800

--On 18. mars 2003 10:02 -0800 Bob Hinden <[email-masked]> wrote:

> should be made public.  The funding funding of the IETF comes from a mix
> of registration fees and ISOC funding.  All of this information should be

I do have a budget from the Foretec president, which is specified to about 
the same granularity as the report on http://www.ietf.org/u/chair/ for 2001.
(actually I have several, based on different projections of attendance; I'm 
using the scenario I consider most likely)

That budget shows the shortfall from the summary slides, and its cost 
distribution is not terribly different from that in the 2001 figures.
At the moment, I want to gauge the mood of the community towards various 
changes we can make, and then see how much we can do of what the community 
favours (whether it's raising the fee by USD 100, scrounging for 
sponsorships, or other things), and what the effect on the 2003 budget is 
likely to be.

I'll make it public when we (the Foretec president and the IETF leadership) 
agree that this is a reasonable budget to go forward with; we agree that 
going forward on the present budget wouldn't be fiscally responsible.

> represented in the $500-600K number?

This could be better answered by Fred Baker - but I think it's about half 
their budget.

> fundraising firm? If not, maybe that should be considered.

I didn't think of that...... fundraising for "professional" matters is not 
a common thing in Norwegian society, being more reserved for humanitarian 
and social causes..... is it commonly done here in the US?

if aimed at corporations, I would think they would consider it as either 
sponsorship or as corporate memberships; I know that ISOC has a quite 
conscious fundraising strategy - but I'll not be the one to ask ISOC to 
start direct-mail campaigns to gather money..... not after they closed down 
their paid individual membership program because it cost them more to 
manage the memberships than what the revenue stream generated....

                   Harald

---

From: "Lynn St.Amour" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2003 21:08:01 -0800

>>represented in the $500-600K number?

The RFC Editor budget is negotiated each year with the IAB chair, ISI 
and ISOC and is based on work chartered for the coming year, ISOC 
then fundraises to support this (plus of course enough to cover the 
costs of fundraising, associated staff support, rent and website, 
etc.).  Discretionary spending for IETF & IAB (meeting and conference 
call fees, etc.) are negotiated each year based on history and 
requirements.  2003's forecast for this plus insurance is $700K - 
800K.

Our other activities are meant to be self funding - that is we get 
grants, sponsorships or membership fees to cover specific expenses, 
this is especially true for education activities.

>>fundraising firm? If not, maybe that should be considered.

actually we do fundraise from the companies that participate in the 
IETF and we regularly get reports of companies and the number of 
attendees at the IETF (assuming some relation between this 
representation of interest and possible support).   But we do not get 
names of individuals for privacy reasons, so there is no direct 
individual solicitation (unless the opportunity presents itself at 
the IETF meeting itself).

All interested parties though are welcome to just reply to this memo.

Lynn St.Amour
President - ISOC

---

From: John Stracke <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2003 12:48:03 -0500

> We could attempt to increase fundraising for ISOC/the IETF.

One risk there: If the IETF became too dependent on big donors, its 
neutrality could be threatened.

-- 
/================================================================\
|John Stracke      [email-masked]                         |
|Principal Engineer|http://www.centive.com                       |
|Centive           |My opinions are my own.                      |
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From: Scott W Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2003 13:38:40 -0500

> neutrality could be threatened.

Ohh, that stirred up a memory of the campus ROTC debates in the 60s!