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Tuesday 3 September, Intercontinental The Grand Hotel, New Delhi, India

Draft Minutes

Meeting commenced: 6:35 pm

Total attendees: 17

Presenters: Sunny Chendi and Sanjaya, APNIC

Sunny welcomed the attendees and introduced them to ICONS. He explained that ICONS was developed a few years back with the objective to pass ICONS onto the members to manage content. Members' feedback from the APNIC 20 meeting indicated that members wanted some cosmetic changes, which have since been implemented.

He then explained what type of content is located under the various tabs and gave attendees an overview of ICONS navigation. He noted that ICONS originally ran as a forum, but since obtaining member feedback it now runs as a blog.

Sunny introduced APNIC Services Area staff members Sanjaya and George Kuo and briefly told the attendees what role these staff members have with ICONS. He noted that at present most of the content on the site was posted by APNIC staff members, but that APNIC hopes that members will soon contribute more to content.

Attendees were asked to look over the ICONS site to consider the way they would like to see it, and to provide feedback to APNIC staff. Attendees took some time to look over the site.

Questions and discussion

  • Sanjaya asked the attendees what countries they came from. There were diverse nationalities from across the Asia Pacific in attendance (IN, PK, BD, Palau, ET, AF).
  • Sanjaya asked how the attendees exchange technical communications with fellow ISPs in their respective countries, despite the fact that they compete with one another.
  • There was a comment that for formal communication, many use the SANOG platform on the South Asia level, but there are other local forums at universities that are used for discussion. In addition, students commonly use mailing lists at the University. There are primarily 2 universities that provide this service. Discussion is more at the university level and not on the ICONS level.
  • An attendee noted that her colleagues normally use exchange platforms with PACNOG and PITA, and that there is also a platform in Hawaii that is more on the University level, called Bitemarks, and that this portal is commonly used to post concerns.
  • Sanjaya suggested that APNIC could place links to ICONS on these university sites in these countries.
  • The attendees from these regions agreed that this would be a beneficial thing to do.
  • There was a comment that an attendee uses ISPAI as a platform and participates in discussion on their mailing list.
  • It was noted that ISPAI has 2 aspects of discussion, the technical committee and the policy committee, and that the government does not monitor these platforms, as ISPAI platforms are private.
  • There was a comment that the ISPAI discussions have a formal structure, however, presently there is no other less formal set up to exchange information.
  • Sanjaya asked how many ISPs were in India.
  • An attendee noted that there are about 450 licenced ISPs and that 250 of these are really operational.
  • Another attendee noted that there are 10-12 ISPs in operation in Bangladesh, and that there is not presently a formal method of communication mailing list, but that ISPs do communicate via email.
  • Sunny explained the benefit of sharing across the Asia Pacific community and not just the regional level.
  • An attendee expressed her interest in ICONS, but stated that she had not previously heard about it, as ICONS was not actively advertised. She suggested sending mails every 6 months to encourage people to participate.
  • Sanjaya asked the attendees if they felt the information on ICONS would be helpful
  • Sunny explained the RSS feed and its purpose. Sanjaya added the benefit of passively receiving information via the RSS feed function.
  • Sanjaya asked how many attendees were subscribed to NANOG and which community they were from.
  • One attendee from the ARIN region responded that he was a subscriber.
  • Sanjaya asked if any attendees monitored the European mailing list.
  • There was no response.
  • Sunny explained that the purpose of a forum did not benefit users as there was not enough traffic on the ICONS site, therefore the site moved to a blog style.
  • Sunny explained that he could integrate forums into the mailing list and how this could integrate discussion on the ICONS platform.
  • Sunny informed the attendees that ICONS has a link on SANOG, APRICOT and AfriNIC, who have also joined ICONS. He added that APNIC would commit to publicise ICONS more to get the word out about its usefulness. He also mentioned a monthly digest feature that can be sent to members, which can be integrated into the forum/mailing list option.
  • An attendee asked if there was a wiki on the site. He suggested that we could build something together using a wiki platform.
  • Sanjaya mentioned an issue in our community about writing, that there is not much 'driving' community members to 'write'.
  • An attendee said that some of her colleagues and herself do make notes and do write and that they share it with friends but not with the public, not because they do not want to share, but she cannot think why anyone would want to read it.
  • She also noted that her colleagues know the people that they share their writings with and know how they may react, whereas they are afraid of the reaction that may be received when sharing with the public.
  • An attendee said that she had tried a lot of things, but did not get a good response and this is not enough. She would like to get a good response, not just junk. She did not know if she would get a good response on ICONS. She further commented that she can mail SANOG and will also put it on ICONS too and hopefully someone will reply. She noted that if she and her colleagues knew from experience that someone would reply, they would use ICONS.
  • Sanjaya pointed out that these are good comments, but we are still looking at it from a problem-solution view, he suggested that perhaps this is not what ICONS will become.
  • The attendee stated that she needed to have faith that there will be a response. She then asked why should I join ICONS?
  • Another attendee answered this question by stating that people on NANOG post reasonable posts to a widespread audience and sometimes the reason to post is because you want to show you know something, if someone asks questions and you give responses then your name becomes known, and this can help with employment prospects. He further commented that NANOG also houses students who like to show what they are learning, although there are some who go over the top in spouting on about things.
  • Sanjaya suggested that if you have a problem (regardless of how you got the problem) you could post the problem and the solution on the ICONS wiki.
  • An attendee stated this is already practiced on SANOG.
  • Attendees agreed that it would be a good thing to post the problem and the solution on to ICONS
  • An attendee also stated that she would like to know that she is not going to be spammed on ICONS.
  • Sunny told members to express their interest to the email address. He let attendees know that George would review the minutes and implement some of the suggestions. Sunny thanked the attendees and introduced George Kuo as he has inherited the management of ICONS.
  • George let the attendees know that further information can also be provided at the services lounge on the lobby level outside of the Crystal Ballroom.

Meeting closed: 7:15 pm

Minuted by: Donna McLaren