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

Adam ajp at glocom.ac.jp
Fri Nov 7 08:23:16 CET 2014 

Board members are asked to attend 5 meetings/year:  3 ICANN and 2 retreats.  Business class (which not all accept) plus hotel, and I think they claim actual expenses not per diem.  All this x 5 a general minimum.  

Some other volunteers are allowed business, SO/AC/NomCom chairs are business, and some committees seem to be business.

Adam



> On Nov 7, 2014, at 2:20 PM, David Cake <dave at DIFFERENCE.COM.AU> wrote:
> 
> It says 'payments made to third party vendors such as hotels, restaurants, and travel agencies on behalf of Board Members'.
> 
> In which case it is worth noting for comparison that anyone who attends 3 meetings a year with travel support is probably over $10,000 ICANN costs in the equivalent, probably mostly in 'payments on behalf of' (though some would book their own travel and get reimbursed, so shifting it into the other column). For example, for my attendance at LA ICANN would have paid over $1600 in hotel costs (the ICANN room rate was $205, I was supported by ICANN for 8 days), and my flight costs would still probably be over $3,000. Add a fourth trip next year for the intersessional, and it is not unlikely that the cost to ICANN of my own participation might end up being over $15,000 a year (admittedly my costs tend toward the high end of participants, purely because I live in a particularly inconvenient place for most meetings (though my flights to Singapore will be cheap)). 
> And while some do receive modest per diems, the per diems really do mostly just cover the increased costs of food, local travel (taxi not cars), visa costs and such, so that doesn't imply anyone is 'making money'  - effectively this is just the base cost of supported volunteer work. 
> 
> Now, switch that up to business class (obviously ICANN only gives me economy, lucky I'm a fairly small and short guy, but I presume board members fly business), and that could easily be another $15,000 a year, just to attend meetings. 
> 
> It is worth paying attention to these numbers, especially the compensation columns, and the really extraordinarily high numbers in costs for some board members (presumably in part because they are attending additional meetings at ICANNs expense like IGF and IETF meetings, but possibly also because they travel in classier style than the rest of us). But it is also a useful reminder that the cost of what we regard as ICANN supported travel necessary for our full participation in ICANN meetings is actually pretty large. 
> 
> Cheers
> 
> 	David
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 7 Nov 2014, at 12:11 pm, Milton L Mueller <mueller at syr.edu> wrote:
> 
>> Hmmm. What are “payments _on behalf of_ Directors”???
>>  
>> --MM
>>  
>> From: ncuc-discuss-bounces at lists.ncuc.org [mailto:ncuc-discuss-bounces at lists.ncuc.org] On Behalf Of Timothe Litt
>> Sent: Sunday, November 2, 2014 7:36 AM
>> To: ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org
>> Subject: Re: [NCUC-DISCUSS] ICANN Audited Financial Statements for FY14 are published!
>>  
>> 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> 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>
>> To: ICANN Staff <icann-staff at icann.org>, "community-finance at icann.org" <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
>>  
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