BCOP Task Force
RIPE 90
12 May 2025
Main hall
6 p.m.
JAN ZORZ: Hello everyone, we should start the BCOP Task Force meeting. If everybody can get their seats, they will ring the bell outside. Let me go and do the slides.
Do we maybe have Benno online?
So, we will have opening, then we will have the ISPs in Ukraine, lessons to learned. And then we will have Sander talking about the idea that we had in the past, we had the NOG presentation, how to start, sustain and how to run your NOG. TTL why the idea is that he take the information out of that presentation that I did many times around the be /PHRAEBT planet and actually make a document out of it. And then at the end. We will report on a consensus building document that we started last time, we were in Prague. And then we will have the Open Mic for new ideas, if you have any. If you want to do some work, and then we will close because we will be standing between you and the beer.
So, with that, we'll start.
SPEAKER: Hi, all, my name is, I am co‑founder of NOG UA, a conference which was held last year in, it was really very difficult and Yourtchenkoing times for Ukraine, but in that time, we unite our community for, first of all, for supporting our colleagues from frontline zones, and at the RIPE 86 during the BCOP Working Group session, the community initiated a task force to document the war time experience and it was titled "The best operational practice for survival during natural disasters or war" and which will serve as a guide, and inregistration inspiration for operators around the world facing crisis conditions.
So I am produce proud to introduce two very special students, Eliza Rohotska and Solomnia Yanemenko from the Kyiv‑Mohyla Acadamy, who is studied the NOG UA material deeply, and they have prepared the presentation titled "ISPs in Ukraine lessons to learn." Please welcome them.
SOLOMN YANEMENKO: Thank you, thank you. Just before we start, I would like to check in and ask if you can hear us well and if you can see us?
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Okay. We'll take it as yes, so then I think you can start.
ELIZA ROHOTSKA: Good evening everyone. Thank you for joining us today for this presentation. Today my colleagues and I will be sharing insights about how Internet service providers in Ukraine have managed to maintain connectivity despite the challenges and the ongoing war.
This presentation is based on the our research and several interviews with providers operating in some of the most war affected regions.
So, can I ever the second slide?
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So, first of all, we'll be covering the current state of Internet connection in Ukraine. Then we'll talk about the impact of three years of conflict, the network and equipment damaged faced by the providers (network) power outages and blackouts and their effects. Then so many an is going to do give you more information about the most important insights, and as well as best business practices. And we'll summarise our presentation with what makes Internet service providers able to stand despite the challenges and lessons learned that may be applicable in other regions.
So, for this research, we have conducted eight in‑depth interview views with small and medium side network operators across Ukraine. These operate in some of the most challenges environments including territories which experience intense fighting in the first early stages of the full scale invasion, then there are areas that continue to face relevant attacks, the ones near the northern border and the ones closest to active frontline in the east. This covers how war has affected the operations, how they dealt with power blackouts, specific challenges they faced, and their current operational status.
So, the damage to infrastructure has been substantial. Just we discovered not only through the interviews but in our own experience without studying with electricity. Getting back to the providers they faced continues destruction across the infrastructure. There is complete network outs in some areas. One company that lost all subscribers in occupation has built 280 kilometres of fiber optic in seven months. Despite each kilometre requiring at least 3 costa coouplings. Some providers were placing up to 40 kilometres of cable monthly and can you imagine that in frontline areas, teams often restore connections in the morning only to find new damage by the afternoon.
Moreover, there are lots of tactical challenges. Some workers have to operate overnight to avoid detection with no protection when drugs appear over their heads, and others are put into constant danger because of artillary strikes, sometimes where it takes just three seconds to hit targets and it make the repair work extremely dangerous. Someone provider near the reek row river has been literally rebuilding their network daily for two years under constant artillary fire.
ISPs in Ukraine are also suffering from deliberate targeting where where Russian forces destroy TV powers, transformer stations and damage network components systematically and in occupied territories troops have wounded officers and confiscated equipment at begun point.
The insight here is that the damage pattern reveals infrastructure isn't just collateral damage but it's a strategic target.
The most valuable components are overhead lines, fiber optic cables, also connection pillars and other systems support supporting network nodes. There was an adaption response. Providers have shifted to using different cable types based on the location risk. Today they prioritise critical infrastructure connections and fill the gaps where major operators, for example like Vodafone cannot maintain service. So small local providers fill this connectivity gap, often while under direct fire, and despite losing up to 80% of subscribers in some areas, they continue serving frontline communities, where national operators cannot operate for periods which lasts more than just last three years.
What we are witnessing is not just infrastructure damage, but it's a battle over connectivity itself with Ukrainian providers building faster than the networking can be destroyed.
Also, about the proper availability which has become a critical issue for Internet service providers ‑‑ so, during regular outages, areas may be out electricity from 2 to eight hours and during targeted attacks on energy infrastructure causing blackouts, there is no maximum duration at all. Some areas have gone days an even weeks without stable connectivity, and it these issues have led to the burn out network nodes, destroyed telecom bases that cannot be replaced that quickly, and also, general equipment shortages which occur due to disruptions in supply chains. When providers can't operate, communities host service in other communication channels which creates dangerous information vacuum in conflict zones. So with that in mind, I'll pass the floor to my colleague to present the most important insights from our perspective.
Spoke spoke basically, while we were examining and going deeper into what the Internet service providers were telling us, were telling the NOG community during the interview, is that diversification was the key behind all successful operations, up and I am pretty sure that it is no surprise that diversification plays an important role, but it's just a great example of Ukraine that shows that Internet resilience and viability during the full scale invasion helps Ukraine go through the dark times for instance, and to provide you with the war probably context in terms of Ukraine, we have to understand that a lot of connection of the backbone data networks in Ukraine are decentralised and we might see that most Internet service providers in Ukraine manage their communication networks independently which allows those Internet providers to serve in different regions respond quickly even if someone is out of the game.
And moreover, we might see that to enable Internet service providers to exchange traffic from their networks and also connect to the global Internet which is necessary, we witness at least 23 Internet Exchange points in Ukraine that are operating at the time of the full scale invasion.
Moreover, here I found data from an open source which is created by the decentralisation office in Ukraine that highlights the number of members of the ICP ‑‑ ISP market. Unfortunately, it is only available in Ukrainian but I'd be glad to present this information to you and I might show that as we take a look at the upper chart it shows that in, between 2001 and between 2021 and 2024, the number of Internet service providers which were officially registered has been fluctuating but didn't change much and was approximately and even over 2,000 different Internet service providers on the market. Moreover, the difference between the blue and yellow line shows that the blue line are entrepreneurial persons, so natural persons that have their entrepreneurial accounts and the yellow one features legal persons. So also some very, very legal Internet providers service providers which might consists of one person, and we understood that in one of the regions, there was an Internet service provider entity that existed of two people only existed. Moreover, what is interesting that half of those Internet service providers that are officially registered in Ukraine right now are operating in the rural area. So, it heeds 1,000 user ‑‑ it heeds 1,000 entrepreneur yell accounts in between 2021 and 2024
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This unfortunately is not translated in English as I have mentioned but it directly shows that the Internet service providers are, there are many factors on the Ukrainian market. Moreover it's fascinating to see that half of those Internet service providers are acting in the rural areas and supplying Ukraine.
So, now, I'd like to show you several interview quotes that support what me and my colleague has mentioned. One of the Internet service providers which is operating in assumey region which is actually Taoiseach at a target of massive shelling and strikes showed that the more players are in the market, the stronger the connection is. And the interviewee who was providing these answers also mentioned that that is what happens Ukrainian service providers in the areas of constant danger support each other and definitely continue providing high and stable Internet, although sometimes with a disruption in the times of blackouts or various damages happening to the networks.
Another interview was conducted by the provider operating in the deliberated, in the liberated hers son region, and the question that was asked to be interviewee sounded like: If you received no help from government donors or volunteers, how much will it take for you to completely cease your operations? And the answer was again pretty astonishing, the interey said that the other Internet service providers will help and the interviewee also mentioned that their network is not only in Herson region, so maybe they'll move somewhere else to help, and this these answers are not just about probably uniting in the dark time, it's also about how necessary it is to keep infrastructure diversified and independent modern to make sure that something disrupted other packets work.
Now, I'd like to give another attention or draw more another attention to Ukrainian legislation, the main change that was done in terms of legislation regarding Internet service providers revolves around the law that States that Ukrainian Internet service providers shall immediately ensure the provision of electronic communication services for at least three days. So, if any power outage or any power blackouts come, the government entitles the Internet service providers to be responsible for granting good access to Internet for at least three days. So this shows how important it is for Internet service providers to be prepared for any urgent situations and this is exactly what, for instance, helped Ukrainian, well let's say infrastructure work during the full scale invasion, and this is probably something that the Ukrainian government thought would be necessary to make sure that any Internet service provider can work independently for at least three days in a row.
However, if we talk about the legislation change, I think that we might learn a lot from Ukraine as well as we do mistakes, and one of the summation, or potentially one of the steps that has been widely criticised for Internet service providers is the abolishment of the simple taxation system. For a small business in Ukraine, there, the possibility to be part of the simplified taxation system and be released or eased from various taxation fees, and unfortunately in September, October 2024, the tax ‑‑ the State tax service decided to abolish this system and as we go back to the slide where I was telling about the market of Internet service providers, we might see that many of them are small Internet service providers operating in small rural areas and once the taxation system is not flexible to such critical actors during the blackouts and energy independence, they might simply stop and cease their operations and do not were return on the market, so probably this is another lesson remight learn that Internet service providers are critical actors and the taxation system must be liberal to them during various urgent cases.
And with that in mightn't mind I'd like to pass the floor to my colleague.
Maybe, probably, while it's taking sometime, I can cover it for her.
We see when we talk about Internet service providers, the key aspects that we have discovered so far is first, the diversification that plays an important role, and it's definitely not we who knows it better than you.
Then it's obviously interconnection, because ‑‑ I think she is back.
ELIZA ROHOTSKA: Just, understand the situation that for Internet service providers to comply with the standards, Solomiia also stated that part is three key elements are the diversification, inter‑connection and bravery, and we wanted to elaborate also on the question: Is there a way out of the situation? So, one when considering those sustainable solutions for Internet connectivity in conflict zones, we can express that as an equation, where the way out equals effort divided by assistance. And this simple equation means that success depends on first of all the effort put forward by Ukrainian ISPs themselves who have shown remarkable resilience, it included technical innovations and operational adaption, folks like using alternative power sources when conventional electricity failed. Also it included risk assumption, sometimes and quite often financial sacrifices, and so of course the collaborative spirit.
However, it means when there is no assistance from various stakeholders, including State and non‑State actors. And there is a huge role of civil society, for instance, The volunteers who are helping to distribute and alternative connectivity solutions and also the platforms which are based on experience.
Finally, all of us should understand that Ukraine's experience to date may be relevant to other regions tomorrow. Or even was relevant some weeks ago. There is the recent blackout in western Europe was such an example of such a situation because sustainable connectivity requires both brave and prepared local efforts and coordinated external support and it is a lesson that extends far beyond Ukrainian current crisis.
So summarising it. Our research has yielded three key lessons. The first one is legislation review. Regulatory frameworks must be adaptive during crisis and if there are any policy makers here, you should keep in mind that it is crucial to establish a legal environment that will help the ISPs work for the sake of the State's connection and not create additional obstacles.
Constantly, we understood that cooperation between businesses becomes essential for system resilience. And it's not only about internal cooperation between the branches of one business but between the competing businesses too. We have only one problem we are fighting and unity is the key to succeeding in this process.
And finally the visibility of these challenges is crucial for mobilising appropriate support. If we stop talking about them, the system might fail. If not today, then some months from now. And all of this requires coordination between the government entities that are able to create enabling regulations. Also the sectors actors and foreign supporters who can provide resources and their expertise, and of course the ISPs themselves who are ready to collaborate. So, as we conclude, I'd like to offer the three F test we apply here. We when leaving this room we should all consider three actions, to foresee, to forestall and to foster. All actors must anticipate the challenges in conflict zones and accordingly it needs preparation on all levels of communication between the market actors. The first stall fore sale sale he pleads no put the network crashes before they happen. The prevent I have measures should be implemented not on the day of facing the problem but right after you find out about the probability of its occurrence, and to foster resilience, building the networks, which are adaptable and which are decentralised is important for maintaining connectivity during emergencies. So, when the actor knows how to stay resilience resilient and has the support needed, he is like a warrior ready for a fight. So this fight will be victorious for him.
So, as I said in the great initiative, let's keep Ukraine connected not just for Ukraine's sake but because the lessons learned here have profound implications for ISPs all around the world. And the experience of Ukrainian Internet service providers offers valuable insight for any region which is facing potential disruptions. Whether from conflict, natural disaster or any other type of emergency.
So, we're here I'd like to thank you for your attention and if you have any ideas, you are welcome to share them whether offline or online.
SPEAKER: I think we might share the last page of the presentation.
SPEAKER: Thank you for perfect work and perfect presentation. And the RIPE community, today, I have special honour to invite you to the second NOG UA conference which will be held in Lviv from 16 to 17 November. Even in Ukraine, I don't know about this date, Ukrainian community don't know this date, that's why you are the first. And the date is symbolic for us because in Ukraine we have the holidays, professional holidays on 16 November with the liberate the day of radio, TV and electronic communications in Ukraine. And the Lviv is a safe and beautiful town, and this the success of last year's show that we are able and ready to host the international technical community in comfort and safety. And of course, an English translator throughout the event will be there. Representatives from the government, child provider, IS peers and point exchange companies will be present of course. You will receive new knowledge from the first hands, and of course Ukrainian will no one has hospital will be. That's why as fast as possible we will start the registration, and welcome to Ukraine. See you in Lviv. Thank you.
(Applause)
JAN ZORZ: Okay. Thank you. Are there any questions? No, okay. I have a question because this is a BCOP task force, we here we are to document the best practices. Are you planning to put all this information in the RIPE document style so we can go through it and publish it?
SPEAKER: We will continue our work. We have our official YouTube channel with subtitles in English. On the next NOG, we will continue to record new interviews and of course we will publish all of the materials which this great students to do.
SPEAKER: For from my experience we are collecting the, all the things. It's not finished and it's too early to document it in official style. We will do that a bit later because we have a lot of things to do in Ukraine right now.
JAN ZORZ: I am just checking on the status. That's all.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Is there any programmes with specific are are... is there any hardware in specific that has been difficult to get enough of or a hold of? ?
SPEAKER: We need a lot of fiber cables, we need splicers, we need ‑‑ but more of course fiber cable. It is more needed for, especially forefront lines on the ISPs, because now they reveal their networks and to underground from airlines. That's why we look for donors and will be very happy, please contact with me if you have some ideas. Thank you very much.
SANDER STEFFANN: I turned my badge over, so, I am currently speaking on behalf of the Global NOG Alliance with the keep Ukraine connected project. So, we have been collecting a lot of hardware, we are constantly in touch about what they need and then try to find people to donate it, but at the moment the biggest trouble is things like splicers and fiber optic cables, lines hundreds of kilometres of it, because Ukraine is not a small country, but those are things that are not left over, it's not like something somebody says oh I have a router that's a few years old, you can have t but nobody says oh we have a spool of 50 kilometres of fiber cable that we have left over. So, that's usually the biggest problem. Things that are available on the second hand market a usually doable, with you but for other things like splicers and cable, the best way to get it is just to collect money and actually buy it, because they are don't do the second hand markets.
JAN ZORZ: Okay, are interest any other questions, comments? No. The awed you a
SOLOMIIA YANEMENKO: It's not a question. It's just I wanted to add a detail. Although me Andy Lisa are legal professionals, not technical, but I would say that while we were examining these eight interviews which are obviously not enough to explain the whole details, but what we have noticed that one question that was posed to any interview voluntary was there anything that you need at the moment? And they were mostly talking about fiber optics. For instance, the Internet service provider from Donex, which is close to the frontline mentioned that after each shelling a cable might be sort of injured and if you take a glance at first glance, the cable looks very good, very stable, but then those little cuts that are made because of the pieces or debris of shelling actually turns the huge cable into something that doesn't work anymore, so even this little cosmetic I don't know shelling aftermath might damage the whole cable, and I mean even if part is damaged, then it's not possible to expose it properly. So, that's just what we wanted to add from the experience of examining interviews. Thank you.
JAN ZORZ: Thank you very much. Hi Benno, this is my co‑chair, he is doing it remotely.
BENNO OVEREINDER: Hello Lisbon, greetings from the Netherlands. I would say 12 points for Ukraine. Sorry for missing the session in the RIPE meeting. Jan is doing all the heavy work in front of the room, and I'm running the remote sessions, so, I I am still useful for you, Jan.
JAN ZORZ: Are there any questions on the this? Ben I think it's time to move forward right? Thank you very much.
(Applause)
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Now, Sander will talk about building NOG guidelines.
SANDER STEFFANN: Good afternoon. How do I get volunteered for all these presentings all the time?
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So, we have been talking with NOG organisers about best practices and things like how do you build a NOG, what different types are there, how do you build a community? Things like this. So we're basing this on work that Jan did years ago at a previous job where he gave presentations on this subject. Now, we are taking that as a starting point to start a document explaining what are NOGs, what type of NOGs do you have, what is the history, like, there is a case study from C NOG that Jan has personal experienced, we have a bunch much people in the room that also have experience with building NOGs, so we are using this as a starting point, but we really want to make this into a document so people who are thinking about starting a NOG but have no idea where to begin can actually get a bit of a guidelines on how, okay, how do you start? What should you focus on? I didn't ideas work or don't work? And stuff like that.
So, this is a very short presentation because this is basically the punchline: If anybody has experience with setting up a NOG and running a NOG, please talk to us, talk to Jan, talk to Benno or me, and so we can take this starting point and actually turn it into a good document and of course I will share this document on the mailing list really soon now.
JAN ZORZ: Can you go one slide back? Okay. Are there any suggestions how to organise this document? Is there anybody that would like to help with this document, to write the document? To document the whole stuff?
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Let's do it, I can volunteer.
SANDER STEFFANN: You understand, if you volunteer, we have to have it on record, right?
JAN ZORZ: Thank you for volunteering. There anybody else or just have comments, how ‑‑ what we should change here or what thud should we add? Are there any aspects of a NOG that are critically important that needs to be added here for the future reference?
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: There was a discussion about legal entities for NOGs to be able to get money. That's certainly an aspect that should be should be somehow there I guess.
JAN ZORZ: Very true, thank you. To so this would be, what would this be called? Sustaining a NOG?
SANDER STEFFANN: Well
JAN ZORZ: Financing a NOG.
SANDER STEFFANN: We need to cover those aspects, you are right. Diverse nature, yeah.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: This is Olaf from ICANN speaking for myself. I would say more case studies. I think NOGs are very diverse and C NOG although very nice meeting is, you know, only one of several and I think there is, you know, other types of NOG meetings that I would see, like to see done a case study of.
JAN ZORZ: I have the deep understanding of how far we did C NOG, that's I didn't put it in my presentation because I could explain the whole process. But it would be also good to hear from other NOGs and maybe add their story to the document because we don't have a word limit, I think.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: He will ex: First of all, the legal entities is very important, I agree, but it's also necessary to emphasise that NOGs should be an inaudible thing. Because it's really easy to get somebody to grab this NOG under their activity and use for some own purposes. So, it should be a balance between, you know, this sustainability and neutrality, and another aspect to be covered and for different NOGs I saw that it's important to have a balance between offline and online activities. And a lot of NOGs that started, you know, ad hoc chats and instant messages or something, to be able to communicate between, between meetings, for example, and that's important part of that. So it's really useful to think from the day zero about such balance between offline and online communications.
JAN ZORZ: Yes, but there is a difference between a hybrid meeting and just live meeting with Internet and chat. There is a big difference. But, yeah, it needs to be considered. Any other comments? Come on we usually don't byte.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Alex, we have a small difference between NOGs because for example, as we speak about NOG UA, we send even e‑mail with address of the hotel, the place where we will hold the conference, because security issue. And the second one, that online, it is a great things, but we are afraid that some session should be secret, or online for the world but inaudible. It just LIR registration and the check participants who can connect to our sessions. Some difficult.
SANDER STEFFANN: I think in your case you are really showing the diverse nature of NOGs.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Hello. I think it is also important to think about neighbouring NOGs or other countries that are besides your country, I would not say peering, but on a more cooperate level to say despite there maybe a language barrier, it helps to each other on both sides of the border to contribute and exchange ideas on that level.
JAN SORZ: Yes, like we are doing it with HR NOG and in September we are doing Slovian NOG, there will be a travelling day on the 17th for people from Ljubljana to Zagreb. Thank you. Erik.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Eric, Speaking here from Belgium. I don't read the document but do you have someplace there where you can find who will be participating in it, the target audience and what kind of topics, is it only for instance service provider but also economies or topics are part of it?
SANDER STEFFANN: We don't have that yet. So basically this document is just a conversion from Jan's presentation that we used as a starting point and we're really at the beginning of the process now. So that is definitely something that we have to include.
JAN ZORZ: Would you like to help?
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: No time. I said no name, right, you don't know me.
JAN ZORZ: Yes, Erik, thank you. Okay. I think we reached a point where we say let's take it to the mailing list. You got enough of the feedback?
SANDER STEFFANN: I think I already got enough for a Version 2 and then I will, I will make the adjustments and send it around and we can discuss further.
JAN ZORZ: Thank you very much. While you are there, you wanted to do the consensus or will I do it?
SANDER STEFFANN: You do it.
Okay. So somebody got creative here. Which started this work at the last meeting, and we asked the community if the documenting the consensus process in RIPE community would be a good idea. We got some mixed feedback, some people were really excited, some people were like, if we document it, then we need to follow it. But nevertheless we started a document, admit meantime we got a little busyier than we expected so we did some work, we wish we could do more work. So, if anybody is interested in helping out with this document, you are more than welcome.
So, this was the first version. We started putting in the headlines basically, the titles of the chapters and we started with this. Actually explaining what is the rough consensus, then it's the significance of feedback in different phases, and then it guidelines for declaring consensus. This would be Chair's guidelines for declaring consensus, that's a typo, auto correct.
Then, mire Mirjam did some work, our RIPE Chair and she posted the whole addition to what we started, thank you Mirjam, I think she is link to the ICP2 now, but I think Niall will proxy or thanks to her. And then we joined basically the two versions. So the whole thing has now sort of the introduction do it, the target audience where we explain who is the target audience for this consensus document, then we explain what is consensus. Where is consensus used in the RIPE community? And then we go into the difficulty difficult bit to explain how to build consensus. Then the second part of the document is about the different roles in a consensus building, who are the proposer, who is participants, and some guidance for the Working Group Chairs, because these are three basically parties that are involved in the whole process. Some of somebody is proposing the policy document or whatever document, we have participant in the room and you have the Chair that is supposed to guide, steer the discussion and call the consensus at the end and that's a the difficult part.
And then we go into the significance of feedback in different phases. We have a discussion phase, review phase and concluding face phase. So, this is how far far we came. Sander, we have for each of these we have some text, we already have some meat, right?
SANDER STEFFANN: Yeah, so this is the table of content. We actually wrote the contents as well. It's currently living as a Google Docs document, but I will export it from there and also post that to the mailing list. The reason we started with the topics you saw at the beginning is because those are the things that from our own experience there is some confusion about. For example, like, what, what power does the Working Group Chair have, and well Jan always said the Working Group Chair is the least important person in the room. He is serving the community. He shouldn't puss push his own agenda. So, from that point of view, as a working group Chair, you still sometimes have to make difficult decisions. Like, if you were trying to close a loophole, of course the people abusing the loophole will complain and disagree with that. So how do you balance the need of the community versus the consensus process? So these are the topics we focussed on at the beginning, but then Mirjam has put a lot of time in giving us good feedback. So that's why we now have a much more extensive document since the last time. And again I'll share it on the mailing list, but I'm really curious what your ideas are, like, what ‑‑ where should we take this? Like of course there is already training material on the RIPE academy about how to be a good Working Group Chair, like what do you think this community needs to make it clear of how people are shows supposed to operate in this whole process.
JAN ZORZ: These are the researches that we are basically using when building the document and getting some content from, and you mentioned the Working Group Chair training session. Then it's the IETF on consensus and humming. Then we have IETF working group Chair training, then we have some ITU stuff, then we have the brokering standard by consensus, this is different stuff, right. So...
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Francis Lichtblau. Just to stop on the point that you actually make, I would auto like to again publicly disagree on your version of how important/non‑important a Chair is, because you are right, the Chair should actively impose power but by sheer visibility of the role you have a lot of implicit power and if you don't realise that as a responsibility and frame your actions in that context, because this is where actually the building, active building of consensus comes in, if you phrase it this way, and this is what I would argue against phrasing it in a document like that, people may get the wrong impression by the role they are actually holding.
JAN ZORZ: This should be a chapter err in the document. Do we have this recorded? Yes we do. Thank you. This will become a chapter err in the documents. Can you write it for us? Thank you. Lovely.
NIALL O'REILLY: I think there are one or two things ‑‑ well first of all, what Franziska said, the role of the Chair is crucial here, it's a role both of service and of the exercise of authority, and the exercising the authority in the right ‑‑ with the right mindset is crucial, and I think that's what Franziska was saying, but I think there are two things I miss here: One is the section what consensus is not. Because it's very easy to catalogue more or less machinistically all of this good stuff and come up with a document which is reductionist and a set of tick boxes where somebody can say: Look we did all this so we must have consensus. But this misses the point of where are the pitfalls? And this is what I was trying to highlight in the silent presentation that you so kindly gave on my behalf when I couldn't be there in Prague. You really have to look at the danger of confirmation by bias. We have done all these things so we must have consensus. The question is: Who are the stakeholders who somehow are systematically excluded, not maliciously but accidentally by the way the question is put? And that's the danger of focusing on process rather than focusing on principle. The question is: Which are the two or three principles which make a good consensus? Which are the two or three principles that protect us from making a bad consensus? And then the rest of it is all detail an case studies and how we would work through that. But if the Chair, at whatever level, Working Group Chair, BoF Chair, RIPE Chair, team member, hasn't got the right principles to start with, then the whole thing will take off in a wrong direction. And that's the section that I'm happy to help write, I have written it already but without words and in silence. So, I'll try and flesh that out.
JAN ZORZ: I pre‑Pete that your presentation word for word.
SANDER STEFFANN: Sob fair and credit to the RIPE NCC for the this one, the things of what is consensus, and what is not consensus, like, it's not about majority, it's about the content. All this, we happily stole from the RIPE NCC training material. The other one that I think is really important, and you mentioned that,ing a Chair is not a mathematical process.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER: Erik rink. This time with my background on punt point of you talk about the building the consensus but you may want to add the point declaring the consensus. Right?
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And maybe you need something called an appeal procedure somewhere.
JAN ZORZ: I see Niall going like this.
AUDIENCE SPEAKER:
SANDER STEFFANN: To be nature in the RIPE PDP process we have do have been an appeal process. The last call is the 7st phase where you get the confirmation that there are no over sites etc. I see Niall laughing but that's because he is one of the people who had some point blocked consensus by opposing it in last call. So... we learned a good lesson from you, thank you. But no, it's definitely important, but the appeals process I think belongs in the PDP and not necessarily this document.
JAN ZORZ: Okay. Any other suggestions? Comments? Questions? I am doing the chairing from the presenter's point.
SANDER STEFFANN: Am I chairing now?
JAN ZORZ: Yes.
SANDER STEFFANN: I think we covered everything. We already got a couple of people who we could volunteer. So, thank you for that. And favourite words "Let's take it to the mailing list "".
JAN ZORZ: Let's take it to the mailing list. Thank you very much.
Okay, what time is it for minutes left. Okay. Open Mic. Does anyone have any ideas or would like to volunteer to write some documentation on the best current operational practices? Anyone? Going, going, gone!
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I don't see people running to the Mike. All the people that would volunteer are at the ICP 2 meeting.
Okay, that being said, thank you very much ‑‑
NIALL O'REILLY: Since we have a gap, I want to say ‑‑ I'm not as tall as the last speaker I guess. I wanted to come back to the beginning of the session and to say congratulations to the two students and to ask owe lean a to give them my personal congratulations and I guess from everybody else as well.
(Applause)
JAN ZORZ: Okay. With that being said, we are concluding this version of the best current operational practices task force, thank you everybody for coming and thank you for all the great suggestions, we will move things forward. Cheers!
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LIVE CAPTIONING BY
MARY McKEON, RMR, CRR, CBC
DUBLIN, IRELAND.
