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Re: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees



G’day George

 

I agree we should limit the scope of this discussion to the question of payment for remote-only meetings. Including other dimensions, such as hybrid meetings, will only confuse the issues and make a timely conclusion unlikely.

 

I will observe that requiring payment by everyone logging into a call is difficult to enforce unless we increase the access security levels, which has its own costs. That reality suggests we should focus enforcement to where it is practical. It is easy to require and enforce payment, because we have relatively accurate lists,  for those that:

  • Request credit via IMAT
    • We can post process the deadbeats
  • Vote via any of the voting tools
    • We can post process the deadbeats
  • Ask for the floor in any meeting
    • We could post process the deadbeats using the minutes
    • We could also ask before anyone speaks for teh first time whether they have paid

 

In only asking for payment for people in these categories, we are essentially aligning payment requirements with participation rather than attendance. The rest are essentially observers. Assuming the incremental cost to IEEE 802 of observers  is very low at a remote-only meeting, I would argue that the benefit to IEEE 802 of having people observe is greater than any marginal revenue from making them pay ; today’s observers are tomorrow’s participants. We also avoid having to chase ghosts!

 

Andrew

 

From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** <STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG> On Behalf Of George Zimmerman
Sent: Tuesday, 2 March 2021 8:24 AM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees

 

All – to be clear, this discussion was about enforcement for a modest fee for virtual meetings.  In my view, in-person meetings follow existing policy, and hybrid meetings are TBD.

 

I respectfully request that we keep the scope of the discussion to that limited issue. It is important that we make a decision on this in the March meeting cycle, if we are to implement it and begin offsetting expenses with the July meeting.

The discussion may raise other issues, but if we try to resolve future policy for as-yet-undefined hybrid meetings, future policy for in-person meetings, or creating a new ‘observer’ class of member in this effort, we will not make a timely decision and miss the opportunity, ensuring that we lose another $25k to $35k.

 

I did raise the possibility that we not enforce non-payment, but I do not support that path.  Attendees who pay for meeting participation do not generally consider it a ‘goodwill donation’, and I personally believe it is ill-advised and unfair to move forward with a policy where we overtly say “we are not going to enforce this”.

Regarding other groups, note that IEEE 802 collects no annual membership fee, as some groups do (US company members of the IEC, for example, pay over $1k per year to join, depending on company revenue).

Our existing rules for face to face meetings already dealt with the issue of holding the meeting outside of the plenary week – I do not recall whether we have simply suspended that rule or if we have yet amended it to account for electronic plenary sessions – but we need to make sure we amend it appropriately. (again, a topic for a separate discussion).

 

-george

 

 

From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** <STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG> On Behalf Of John D'Ambrosia
Sent: Monday, March 1, 2021 12:58 PM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees

 

Glenn,

I find this proposal to be fiducially irresponsible, and unfair to those participants who attend, and would get stuck paying additional money to support hybrid meetings either directly or indirectly. 

I would vote again hybrid meetings if the proposed registration fee is not enforced.

 

Regards,

 

John

 

From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** <STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG> On Behalf Of Glenn Parsons
Sent: Monday, March 1, 2021 3:16 PM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees

 

Folks,

 

In the discussion of whether we should charge for electronic versions of electronic plenaries, I offer several points for consideration.

 

In IETF that has started charging registration fees for their electronic plenaries, it has been widely observed that many WGs are choosing not to meet during the plenary week to avoid these fees.  Instead they schedule multiple interim sessions, sometimes in the week adjacent to the IETF plenary week.  The point is that the IETF electronic plenary attendance in paid format is significantly lower than it was when there was no registration.  Further there is an exponential growth in IETF interims that were quite rare pre-COVID.

 

In 802.1, we currently have two very active joint projects on TSN profiles with other SDOs – one with IEC and another with SAE.  The growth in attendance at 802.1 meetings (we had 130 attendees in November) is driven in large part by this work.  Those organizations do not charge registration fees for in-person meetings, let alone electronic meetings, so it was already difficult to justify the extra cost of in-person registration.  I would expect these groups to request extra interims to avoid a virtual plenary meeting fee.

 

For 802, an electronic meeting fee will add an overhead if there is to be any “deadbeat” enforcement.  The easiest is to audit/compare the registrants after the meeting and remove attendance credit for anyone who did not pay.  The most complex would be distributing webex passwords only to registered attendees.  Perhaps at the same level of complexity is to have multiple levels of attendee such that the chair of the meeting has to know if the speaker is a paid attendee or an unpaid observer.

 

As a result, I would propose that should we decide to charge a registration fee for virtual plenaries, that we do not enforce it.

 

Cheers,

Glenn.

 

 

From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** <STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG> On Behalf Of Jon Rosdahl
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2021 9:33 AM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees

 

Greetings.

I have been monitoring WebEx reports vs IMAT reports.

For a Plenary or Interim week, I found that there are many that show up as "observers" (seen on Webex, but not on IMAT).

I also found many that claimed credit for attendance that did not show up on the Webex Report (IMAT recorded, Webex absent).

Now it can be argued that "getting attendance" credit to claim voting rights is important enough to mark IMAT even when not on a call is not a "big deal".

We had this same issue debated when we had in person sessions, and we audited the attendance counts vs IMAT reporting.

In that case, some were embarrassed, and then claimed that we should take their money and give them credit toward voting rights.

The leadership at the time were accused of treating them like school children, requiring them to mark attendance accurately.

 

so if we have Electronic, in person, or hybrid sessions.  We have the same issue to cope with.

Some will want to attend without paying the price, whether it is as simple as IMAT recording, or some monetary value.

 

As for follow up on the "Deadbeats", we have to note them when it occurs...

In the in person meetings, seeing people without a badge in the meeting rooms or participating in the F&B, we make note of it and follow-up.

do we "catch" 100%...no, but we do Audit the hotel registration for those claiming to be in our group and ensure that they are registered and paid the meeting fee.  We audit those claiming attendance and ensure they are registered and paid the meeting fee.

 

For Electronic meetings, I would expect no different. 

If you are on Webex, then you should have paid a registration fee (if one applies). 

If you are claiming attendance, then you should have paid a registration fee (if one applies).

 

It should also be noted that "Deadbeats" also pay the onsite registration (the highest rate).

This includes folks that "forgot" to pay earlier....Jon Rosdahl and Paul Nikolich included (at least once each).

 

So enforcement will require an audit report from the WG chairs on who was present and who requested attendance credit to compare with those that paid the agreed upon meeting fee.

That is within the rules that George pointed out, and is what the Treasurer and Exec Secretary do in general.

 

Regards,

Jon

 


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Jon Rosdahl                             Engineer, Senior Staff
IEEE 802 Executive Secretary   Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.
office: 801-492-4023
                  10871 North 5750 West
cell:   801-376-6435                   Highland, UT 84003


A Job is only necessary to eat!
A Family is necessary to be happy!!

 

 

On Mon, Feb 22, 2021 at 7:36 PM Andrew Myles (amyles) <00000b706269bb8b-dmarc-request@listserv.ieee.org> wrote:

G’day George,

 

I fully support the concept of using existing policy to enforce meeting fees for virtual meetings. The fees should not be very high anyway  because no cookies are included. 😊

 

You raised the issue of individuals ‘ghosting’ the meeting not paying a meeting fee. I don’t have a problem with such people. Indeed, I like the idea of lots of observers because they may become participants in the future.

 

However, I would prefer that they registered their attendance in IMAT so that we know who is observing. Maybe we specify that observers

  • Shall record their attendance in IMAT
  • Shall not obtain attendance credit
  • Shall not present (unless requested to do so by the Chair)
  • Shall not speak (unless requested to do so by the Chair)

 

In the context of the rules, the registration policy for observers would be “no fee”

 

Andrew

 

From: ***** IEEE 802 Executive Committee List ***** <STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG> On Behalf Of George Zimmerman
Sent: Tuesday, 23 February 2021 12:26 PM
To: STDS-802-SEC@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: [802SEC] Using the existing 'deadbeat policy' for virtual meeting fees

 

All –

As suggested by David at the last meeting, and with his help, I think that we should consider just using the existing policy for enforcing virtual meeting fees.  The existing policy can be found in  subclause 5.4 of the IEEE 802 Operations Manual <https://mentor.ieee.org/802-ec/dcn/17/ec-17-0090-24-0PNP-ieee-802-lmsc-operations-manual.pdf#page=13 >.

 

The policy itself is a variation on the ‘no attendance credit and no voting’, where ethe voting rights would be revoked after the meeting (and period to cure).  The policy also allows for the Treasurer and Executive Secretary to implement, and I believe we could allow for a reasonable grace period for individuals to pay.

 

There is the corner case of individuals ‘ghosting’ the meeting by not logging into IMAT, voting or otherwise, but then again, they are not getting attendance credit or exercising voting rights anyways.  It’s probably not worth spending a huge amount of effort on these ‘observers’.

 

Please look at the existing policy in preparation for our discussion at the next EC meeting.

 

George Zimmerman, Ph.D.

President & Principal

CME Consulting, Inc.

Experts in Advanced PHYsical Communications

george@cmephyconsulting.com

310-920-3860

 


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