<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">[much snipped]<br class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class=""><p dir="ltr" class="">
SO: ... (Now please don't ask me where "there" is ;-) )</p></div></blockquote><div><br class=""></div>Perhaps this is a significant contributor to the difficulties of these discussions.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Allow me to digress into an example from one of my other fields… As many of you know, I am a pilot. I fly small airplanes, often in clouds, for fun.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>I enjoy the mental challenge of navigation and situational awareness while deprived of visual reference.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>There are three fundamental components to any problem of navigation.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>Where am I?</div><div>2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>Where do I want to be?</div><div>3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>How do I get there.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Unless one has a clear answer for questions 1 and 2, it is absolutely impossible to come to any meaningful or useful conclusion on question 3.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Note I use the word clear rather than precise. Precision is not necessarily required.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Example, if I know that I am in the San Francisco Bay Area and that I want to be in Oregon, I can provide a useful answer to question 3 comprised</div><div>of “head 340º” and know that I am flying towards my destination while I develop more precise answers to 1 and 2.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>This represents the relatively simple case of a single pilot navigating a single craft to a single destination.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Coming back to AfriNIC, we are faced with a much more complicated problem. First, it is clear to me that various members of the community</div><div>are both in a multitude of places in terms of what they believe to be the current AfriNIC status. Second, there is an even wider dispersion among</div><div>the community of “where do we want to be?”.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>I believe that the board’s efforts with respect to publishing the minutes and other improved and expanded transparency efforts will help with question 1.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Given that, however, I think it may well be worth taking some time to examine question 2 in more detail and attempt to develop a community consensus</div><div>around something like a 5 year plan. I don’t know if there is an existing strategic plan for AfriNIC or not. Clearly, if there is, a review of its goals and</div><div>objectives with the community may be in order and it may be appropriate to modify it based on community feedback. Perhaps this can be one of the</div><div>first tasks for the governance committee, to develop and execute a process by which that can occur. Perhaps the board should tackle this directly.</div><div>I will leave that decision in the capable hands of the board.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Only when the community has come to some level of consensus about where we want to be can we begin to come together in a more useful dialog</div><div>about how to get there.</div><div><br class=""></div><div>Owen</div><div><br class=""></div><br class=""></body></html>