[NCUC-DISCUSS] ICANN Audited Financial Statements for FY14 are published!

Sun Nov 2 13:35:44 CET 2014

On 01-Nov-14 12:39, William Drake wrote:
> Hi
>
> Also may be of interest---board
> compensation. https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/fy14-board-payments-31oct14-en.pdf
>
>
> I'm sympathetic to the argument that hard working board members should
> receive some compensation for lost/deferred wages and opportunity
> costs more generally.  On the other hand, it's also true that the
> system is entirely dependent on volunteers being willing to put in
> significant pro bono blood, sweat and tears.  Maybe the community
> should track its hours of free labor for publication on both an
> individualized and aggregated basis?  :-)  
>
> Cheers    
>
> Bill
>
"Some compensation" - the amounts are more than many full-time high-tech
jobs in the U.S. -- not to mention less expensive countries or other
occupations.  I don't begrudge them the compensation - but it's a good
reminder that this is a non-profit *business*.  Like the Red Cross,
United Way, Public Broadcasting, ...  (Does ICANN belong to NPOC? :-)

I did see the :-) on tracking pro-bona time, but I do have a serious
reaction.

I'm not sure that expending the energy to tracking 'free labor' hours is
worthwhile.  These efforts tend to end up in a bureaucracy - do we then
start trying to value it?  Corporate manager types don't understand
volunteer hours unless they're turned into dollar equivalents.  Lawyer
hours, engineer hours, consultant hours?  Travel costs?  Computer
resources?  Valued at local billing rates, or in California dollars? 
Does a 1AM local time meeting get valued at overtime rates?  Do hours
count travel time, or just on-task time?  Are they audited?  I could go
on...

And don't forget the involuntary 'free labor', a.k.a. donations in kind
by those whose job responsibilities include, or informally require work
in this area.  One can argue whether the employee, employer or both are
contributing - but someone pays the bill.  Many of these people make
efforts to create influence policy for the common good - beyond the
narrow interest of their employers.  In any case, this is effort that
ICANN doesn't pay for.

While (most) everyone appreciates recognition for their efforts, before
the idea of tracking gains too much traction: what tangible benefits
would accrue?  Would these data move the needle on any issue?  Or
increase participation in any activity?  What could be accomplished with
the same amount of effort applied to the difficult issues that we face?

Oh, and the law of unintended consequences: Would anyone look at his
data and say "Wow, I'm spending THAT much time on this.  Better
re-prioritize..." :-)  Before giggling too hard, note that I've done
that with some activities that I really enjoyed.

It's probably sufficient to estimate the effort from easily available
data: how many hours of teleconference/webmeetings * # participants *
prep/follow-up factor.  All but the last should be available for the
asking from the vendors.  And I'm sure we could have endless hours of
discussion and employ multiple (expensive) consultants to come up with
the last item, before arriving at '2' :-)

For dollar value, multiply by the average board member's compensation
divided by the number of board meeting hours attended.

Seriously, it's worth remembering that the system lives on volunteer
efforts - in fact, the internet was largely built on them.  And it's
worth reminding everyone that the volunteer/pro-bona effort continue. 
But I'd need a lot of convincing before I'd agree to setting foot on the
slippery slope of tracking time.

Timothe Litt
ACM Distinguished Engineer
--------------------------
This communication may not represent the ACM or my employer's views,
if any, on the matters discussed. 

This communication may not represent my employer's views,
if any, on the matters discussed. 

>
>> On Nov 1, 2014, at 9:24 AM, William Drake <william.drake at uzh.ch
>> <mailto:william.drake at uzh.ch>> wrote:
>>
>> Hi
>>
>> It's that time of year again, ICANN's financial reports can make for
>> interesting reading.
>>
>> Best
>>
>> Bill
>>
>> As of June 30, 2014, 322 New gTLDs were delegated in the root zone,
>> $36,574,000 revenues from the fees.
>>
>>   
>>
>>> Begin forwarded message:
>>>
>>> *From: *"Xavier J. Calvez" <xavier.calvez at icann.org
>>> <mailto:xavier.calvez at icann.org>>
>>> *To: *ICANN Staff <icann-staff at icann.org
>>> <mailto:icann-staff at icann.org>>, "community-finance at icann.org
>>> <mailto:community-finance at icann.org>" <community-finance at icann.org
>>> <mailto:community-finance at icann.org>>
>>> *Date: *October 31, 2014 at 8:47:18 PM GMT+1
>>> *Subject: **[community-finance] ICANN Audited Financial Statements
>>> for FY14 are published!*
>>>
>>> Dear all,
>>> The audited financial statements for FY14 are available on our
>>> website! Please feel free to share the news and let me know if you
>>> have any questions.
>>> https://www.icann.org/news/announcement-2-2014-10-31-en.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> Xavier
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Ncuc-discuss mailing list
>> Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org <mailto:Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org>
>> http://lists.ncuc.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ncuc-discuss
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ncuc.org/pipermail/ncuc-discuss/attachments/20141102/d9e75269/attachment-0002.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: smime.p7s
Type: application/pkcs7-signature
Size: 4942 bytes
Desc: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature
URL: <http://lists.ncuc.org/pipermail/ncuc-discuss/attachments/20141102/d9e75269/attachment-0002.bin>