Subject: Re: What to incorporate (Re: Options for IETF administrative restructuring)

From: [email-masked] (Scott Bradner)
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 07:26:48 -0400 (EDT)

Harald sed:
   scenarios C and D envision incorporating the *support function* for the 
   IETF. The IETF would remain an undefined entity under these scenarios.

   I've had another suggestion that the IETF (the real technical process 
   entity) should become a formally recognizable entity of some sort (possibly 
   an unincorporated organization). But that's distinct from the idea of 
   incorporating the support function, and is NOT described in the current 
   document.

imho both C & D would be seen by most or the world as incorporating 
*the IETF*  - if there is confusion within the IETF over the
difference between incorporating the *support function* and 
incorporating the whole IETF the difference would be totally lost
by non-IETFers (and most IETFers is my guess) - in any case, the 
target of any legal attack on the IETF would be the corporation with 
IETF in the name if one existed - about the only way I could see that
there woudl not be confusion wiuld be to call the corporation "The
Corporation to Support Internet Standardization" (TCTSIS or TCSIC) and
not have the IETF name in it.

Scott

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From: Carl Malamud <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2004 06:55:49 -0700 (PDT)

> not have the IETF name in it.

Perceptions are always important.  Under Scenario's A and B, likewise,
the Internet Society probably gets to be a target.

On the other hand, one benefit of incorporating an entity, such as
an administrative support structure, is you can, to some extent,
insulate yourself from frivolous attacks.  You can also limit
liability on non-frivolous attacks.  Just as importantly, you
have standing to enforce agreements, such as contracts with
support organizations.

Harald mentioned some other structures available.  One possibility is
the "unincorporated association" on which I've been doing some research.  It
will be in my next rev of the report, but people are always welcome to look
at the work in progress:

http://public.resource.org/adminrest/

-01 is the unpublished work in progress.  "Scenario E" discusses the
concept of the unincorporated association.  Comments are welcome.
I expect to put this next rev into the i-d queue on Monday.  I still
have some cleanup to do to incorporate comments by Bob Kahn and
Brian Carpenter, and am trying to clean up the RFP stuff to make
it a bit clearer.

Regards,

Carl

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From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2004 09:12:02 -0700

>the Internet Society probably gets to be a target.

The ISOC is a target anyway, as the RFCs have a copyright notice in them 
with ISOC's name in it.