Re: The IANA ByLaws - transparency is still "bathroom glass"

[John Gilmore <gnu@toad.com>]

The bylaws do not provide for public attendance or observation of any
IANA activities such as board meetings, committee meetings, or
deliberations of Supporting Organizations.  They provide that the
calendar of meetings be public, and that minutes be published, but
minutes seldom tell the real story of what is happening.

I propose that a sentence be added to Article IV (Transparency),
stating: "All meetings of the Board, Committees of the Board, Advisory
Committees, and all meetings of Supporting Organizations shall be open
to public observation, including meetings held by telephone or
electronic mail.  Records or recordings from such meetings that are
available to IANA will be made available to the public for copying at
cost, and will be published freely on the IANA Web Site whenever
possible.  Portions of such meetings may be closed only with prior
notice and for reasons permitted for nondisclosure of minutes in these
Bylaws."

In addition, the provision permitting the Board to nondisclose
whenever it wants to should be amended.  In this Article IV, replace
"matters that the Corporation is prohibited by law or contract from
disclosing publicly and other matters that the Board determines are
not appropriate for public distribution." with: "matters that the
Corporation is prohibited by law from disclosing publicly.  The Board
expressly does not have the power to contract with any party to keep
information secret."

	John