Merge pull request #1 from better-ripe/more-content

Add more content

better-ripe/content/initiatives/ambassador.md

@@ -10,7 +10,9 @@ tags = ["index"]
 Major problem of RIPE community and RIPE NCC is low engagement of some regions, and countries. This can be solved by creating a network of ambassadors, that will be responsible for particular region, or country, or city. Ambassadors will be responsible for keeping community engaged, and informed about RIPE NCC activities, and RIPE community activities, and will be responsible for collecting feedback from community, and providing it to RIPE NCC. Ambassadors will be volunteers, and will be selected by RIPE NCC, or by community members, or by other ambassadors. Ambassadors will be rewarded with some benefits. Being RIPE Ambassador can be a good line in CV, and can be useful for future career, and honorary title.
 
 ## Common problems
+
 Each country, even sometimes region might have his own problems. I can underline several common problems that need to be solved:
+
 - Language translations of RIPE materials, articles, and news, software, and RIPE tools.
 - Spreading information about local professional news, events, meetups, and conferences, regulatory changes, and other important information. VERY IMPORTANT: keep the community engaged in RIPE NCC workgroups, mailing lists, and other activities, especially budget discussions, and other important topics.
 - Promoting RIPE NCC services and tools, especially how they can be useful for local network operators
@@ -21,49 +23,60 @@ Each country, even sometimes region might have his own problems. I can underline
 - A bit far fetching: RIPE NCC together with ambassadors can be enormous source of educational information for universities, schools, colleges, providing them guidance on how to teach up to date networking, can contribute to curriculum, and provide training materials, and other resources. Majority of children are not aware about history of internet development, role of RIRs and other organizations, students - not aware about importance of IPv6. This can be solved by RIPE NCC, and ambassadors. Regional ISPs can participate in such programs, promoting available resources (training materials, documentation) to their local educational institutions, provide coordinated opportunities for internships, employment.
 
 ## Local problems
+
 There is also local, community-specific problems that can be solved by local ambassadors too.
+
 - Promoting IPv6, RPKI deployment in the region in particular regions where it is low
 - Coordinating in matter of communication, payments, and other issues with RIPE NCC
 - Promoting local IXPs, and other local initiatives
 
-
 ## Feedback channel
+
 There is also return feedback channel from community to RIPE NCC, where ambassadors can collect feedback, and provide it to RIPE NCC.
+
 - Aggregating feedback from local communities and providing it to RIPE NCC
 - Legal, regulatory, and other issues, if knowledge of such is useful for RIPE NCC, or they might even help to solve some problems.
 - Emerging problems, and trends in the region, that might be useful for RIPE NCC, and community, for example surge in DDoS attacks in particular region, region-wide disruptions, and other problems.
 
 ## Inter-Ambassador communication
+
 Additionally there is:
+
 - Inter-amabassador communication, where they can share their experience, and best practices, create joint projects, and initiatives, and help each other.
 
 ## Responsibilities
+
 - Keep open all popular in region communication channels, whatsapp groups, telegram channels, facebook groups. To save time, setup proper notifications and filters
 - Don't post too much, but post regularly, and keep the community engaged. You need to have certain engagement metrics to have visibility
 - Avoid any topics that might split the community, extingush any conflicts, and keep the community united
 - Make a notes what resources each member might have, and how they can be useful for RIPE NCC, and community. For example some of members might have access to local media, or have connections for venues, or provide connectivity
 
 ## Requirements
+
 - Ambassadors should not have conflicts of interest that will cause harm or isolation of part of the community they take care of. Community members should be able to report such conflicts to RIPE NCC anonymously but with solid proof.
 - Ambassadors should not have any criminal record or CoC violations, and should not have any other issues that might harm RIPE NCC reputation
 
 ## Benefits
+
 - Active ambassadors program can serve as a university for future RIPE NCC Working Group members, Board members, where they can learn how to work with the community, get visibility, understand RIPE better.
 - Ambassadors can be rewarded with some benefits, like free training courses, free tickets to RIPE meetings, and other benefits
 - Being RIPE Ambassador can be a good line in CV, and can be useful for future career, and honorary title
 
 ## Career path
+
 There is also possible to have multiple ambassadors for region, if we have volunteers, and they can work together, or have different responsibilities.
 In future, if economic situation allows, we can have some budget, awards, and other incentives for ambassadors.
 
 ## Roadmap
+
 - Create a list of countries, regions, and cities where we need ambassadors, especially countries with low engagement
 - Create a list of responsibilities, and requirements for ambassadors
 - Create a list of benefits/incentives for ambassadors, roadmap, and career path
 - Assist with a list of communication channels, and tools that can be used by ambassadors in particular region
 - Keep timely communication with ambassadors, and provide them with necessary information, and support
 
 ## Selection process
+
 - Ambassadors should be active in RIPE community, and have good reputation
 - Ambassadors should have good communication skills, and be able to keep community engaged, it is important to be "people person"
 - Ambassadors should have good knowledge of local language, and English

better-ripe/content/initiatives/atlas.md

@@ -0,0 +1,59 @@
++++
+aliases = ["posts", "articles", "blog", "showcase", "docs"]
+title = "RIPE Atlas Project state"
+author = "Better RIPE Team"
+tags = ["index"]
++++
+
+## Introduction
+
+The RIPE Atlas project is a global network of probes that measure Internet connectivity and reachability. The probes are distributed around the world and are hosted by volunteers. The project is operated by the RIPE NCC, one of the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) that manage the allocation of IP addresses and AS numbers.
+
+## History of project
+
+The RIPE Atlas project was launched in 2010. The project was created to provide a global, distributed, and open platform for Internet measurement. The project was designed to be easy to use and to provide a wide range of measurement capabilities. The project has grown rapidly since its launch, at 2023 there are 12081 probes connected.
+
+## Project goals
+
+The RIPE Atlas project has several goals. The project is designed to provide a global, distributed, and open platform for Internet measurement. The project is also designed to be easy to use and to provide a wide range of measurement capabilities. The project is intended to help improve the security, stability, and resilience of the Internet. The project is also intended to help improve the performance and reliability of the Internet.
+But one of problems is that project doesn't add direct value to RIPE NCC members, so it's hard to justify the costs of the project. We believe with slight changes in project direction and more active community involvement we can make it more valuable and usable for the community.
+
+## Project architecture
+
+While source code is open, project architecture is not documented. This requires reverse engineering to understand how the project works. This is a significant barrier to entry for new contributors. We believe that documenting the project architecture would make it easier for new contributors to get involved and would help to grow the community around the project.
+
+## Project state
+
+[2015 Article](https://labs.ripe.net/author/paul_de_weerd/processing-ripe-atlas-and-ripestat-data-with-hadoop/)
+
+- Cloudera's Hadoop distribution
+- two clusters with 119 servers
+- HDFS 400TB, 3.5TB RAM, and peak cluster bandwidth of 80Gbit/s (~32GB ram per server?)
+
+## Initiative status
+
+- Research
+
+## Questions to answer
+
+- Last 2 years there is a lot of complaints about the project abandonment, lack of updates, and communication with the community. What is the current state of the project?
+- Some important questions in maillist left unanswered [link](https://www.ripe.net/ripe/mail/archives/ripe-atlas/2024-February/005698.html)
+- Github repositories have no updates for 1-2 years (state at 1 May 2024) [link](https://github.com/RIPE-NCC/ripe-atlas-probe-measurements) [link](https://github.com/RIPE-NCC/ripe-atlas-tools)
+- Github maintainers are not active, not reviewing PRs, not responding to issues
+- No communication about development process with community (roadmap, plans, weekly updates)
+- Project code is non-portable, visible legacy from Lantronix times, which limits the ability to run it on different platforms. With some upstreaming efforts we can get much greater coverage.
+- Choice of platforms quite exotic, while much more common platforms are available.
+
+## Discussion
+
+Short discussion in telegram about opensource, community-funded projects, and how they should be managed, and accountability turned into argument, that certain parts of typical
+opensource projects are not applicable to RIPE NCC projects, and that RIPE NCC is not a typical opensource project.
+> what you should remember is that a lot of the software the NCC develops is not typical open source projects, it is software specifically made for the NCC
+
+On [my](/team/nuclearcat) opinion if this is considered seriously and there is no intention to make process more transparent and project community-driven, then there is serious reason to fork Atlas initiative and make it community-driven, and opensource, and make it more valuable for the community and find proper sponsorship.
+By this reason i am not willing to publish project roadmap proposal, as situation might turn into fair competition between community-driven project and RIPE NCC project.
+
+References:
+- [RIPE Atlas project](https://atlas.ripe.net/)
+- [RIPE NCC](https://www.ripe.net/)
+- [RIPE Atlas wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIPE_Atlas)

better-ripe/content/initiatives/engagement.md

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++++
+aliases = ["posts", "articles", "blog", "showcase", "docs"]
+title = "RIPE community engagement"
+author = "Better RIPE Team"
+tags = ["index"]
++++
+
+## Introduction
+
+Until recently there was understanding in the RIPE NCC that the community engagement is good and that the RIPE NCC is doing a good job in this area. But recent events around the budget have shown that it is not as good as it was thought. Problem got worse by the way how RIPE NCC handled the feedback from the community, and many community members felt that their voices were not heard, and worse in their opinion some of answers was sort of arrogant. Problem got gravely bad when some of RIPE NCC supporters step in and used certain insulting statements about "loud minority", which put final straw on the camel's back and divided the RIPE NCC with the community.
+Specifically it is important to highlight that with observation of malicious comments left by "supporters", whole situation looks like malicious misrepresentation of the community to the RIPE NCC management. This is a very dangerous situation, and it is important to address it as soon as possible.
+The RIPE NCC has to improve its communication with the community, and it has to be done in a way that will be beneficial for both sides.
+
+## Current state and forecast
+
+On current discussion phase we believe we reached certain understanding that problem exist, and that we need to work on it. Problem is that if traditionally one side downplays the problem, and other side just typically forgets about it, on next disagreement it will be brought up and rift between the RIPE NCC and the community might become damaging. So we need to create a plan, roadmap, and follow it.
+Also a lot of community engagement are done over "live" events, such as conferences, meetups, even online meetings (open house etc), while at same time "deffered" engagement that should be done over something like mailing lists, forums, etc, are not done as much as they should be. This is something that should be addressed.
+
+## Examples
+
+### Open house
+
+Open house is a good example of a live event that is done by the RIPE NCC. Technically as any online event it can be viewed as recording and watched later. But there is significant flaws in way how it is done. For example, i will take last CFP Open House at April.
+
+- There was no pre-published slides, so people can prepare questions
+- No presentation pre-recorded
+- No comprehensive information about the project, so people can review it before the event or even participate in the project (URL, software repositories, etc)
+
+All of these points are important, because it is impossible to ask any question, because nobody had enough time to prepare them. Also it is important to have comprehensive information, website, software repositories, etc, so people can review it before the event or even participate in the project. 
+
+- There was no "after event" communication, so people can ask questions. No forum, mailing list, etc.
+
+## Plan
+
+## Ideas
+
+- Anchors/key people in the RIPE communication channels (mailing lists, forum)
+- Opening hot topics for discussion to attract more people
+- Strict moderation against toxic and demotivating comments

better-ripe/content/initiatives/hiring_freeze.md

@@ -8,6 +8,4 @@ tags = ["initiative"]
 ## Introduction
 
 Reason of current fee increase is the inflexible operational costs of RIPE NCC that they can't reduce and its Netherlands hiring (FTE) that was increased to too high levels while it was obvious the budget will drop.
-It should not happen again and this should be fixed. If there are hard times, it means we need to be able to adjust salaries/etc, because even if it sounds bad, it is just a choice of RIPE adjustments, or members will be forced to pay more and lay off their own employees.
-Fortunately for current situation, we might have better and painless solution: extending RIPE activities with existing workforce to increase sponsorship and value of RIPE NCC membership.
-
+It should not happen again and even current situation should be fixed. It might be possible to increase earnings of RIPE NCC without increasing fees by more efficient programs that might be developed by current workforce and will attract new members and sponsors, also if RIPE NCC will create products that will add more direct value for members and sponsors.

better-ripe/content/initiatives/value-of-ripe-ncc-membership.md

@@ -0,0 +1,57 @@
++++
+aliases = ["posts", "articles", "blog", "showcase", "docs"]
+title = "Value of RIPE NCC membership"
+author = "Better RIPE Team"
+tags = ["index"]
++++
+
+## Introduction
+
+If we look at different RIRs, we can see that RIPE NCC is unique in many ways. RIPE NCC is the only RIR that invested significant amount of resources in additional tools and services, that are not directly related to registry management, and that are not required by policy. But as everything, each initiative have downsides, and upsides. We need to evaluate all these initiatives and see if in some cases we need to change something, or in worst cases, to stop some initiatives.
+
+## Common problems
+
+There are several common problems that need to be solved:
+
+### RIPE NCC funding use
+
+One of big concerns is that RIPE NCC is funded by membership fees, and traditionally such money used for solely registry management. Certain amount of funds traditionally used for community projects, but in recent years, RIPE NCC started to invest significant amount of resources in additional tools and services, that are not directly related to registry management. Major issue with all non-profit membership organizations is that they expect targeted use of funds, and if they see that funds are used for something that is not directly related to their interests, they might start to question the value of membership. Adding on top that membership in RIPE is not voluntary for those holding resources managed by RIR, and that RIPE NCC is the only choice, this might initiate very unfortunate sequence of events in case of dissatisfaction of members.
+
+### Value of projects for RIPE NCC members
+
+While many projects are done for "common good", and are available for free for whole world, we need to evaluate if they provide enough value for RIPE NCC members, and if they are worth the costs. 
+We have fundamental projects like RIPE Atlas, but ISPs cannot utilize it for his automated monitoring purposes as he will run out of credits. Or we have RIS-Live service, which is used worldwide, but tools that provide at least some value developed by **private** entities from ARIN region, like BGPalerter.
+
+### Language translations of RIPE materials, articles, and news, software, and RIPE tools
+
+Most of RIPE materials are in English, and this is a problem for non-English speaking countries. We need to translate all materials, articles, and news, software, and RIPE tools to all languages, and provide them to community. Due budget constraints, we can do it gradually, in community-driven way, and prioritize languages by demand.
+
+Services to review:
+
+- [Weblate](https://weblate.org/en/)
+- [Translations For Progress](https://translationsforprogress.org/index.php)
+- [https://translatorswithoutborders.org/](https://translatorswithoutborders.org/)
+
+Feel free to suggest more services.
+
+### Services and tools information spreading
+
+Spreading information about RIPE non-core services, and tools, and how they can be useful for RIPE members. This is very important, as most of RIPE members are not aware about all services, and tools that RIPE NCC provides, and how they can serve as sort of investment return.
+
+### Commercial abuse
+
+There are some cases of commercial abuse of RIPE NCC services, and tools, and we need to solve this problem, and prevent it in future. For example RIPE Atlas is sponsored by memberships fees, available for free for whole world, but some companies (often even non-RIPE members) are using it for commercial purposes, and worse, reselling it. We need to prevent such cases, and make sure that RIPE Atlas available in reasonable limits for RIPE members, on-demand for academic institutions, in limited way for non-RIPE members (that wont put strain on infrastructure), and for commercial purposes - for a fee.
+
+### Limiting scope of services
+
+Some services provide enormous amount of historical and/or operational data, that are rarely needed by majority of RIPE members, and we need to evaluate if we need to limit amount of data we store and process. We might need to introduce some fees for accessing historical data, or limit amount of data that can be accessed for free.
+
+### Project transparency
+
+We need to provide more transparency about how RIPE NCC budget is spent on such projects, and services, and how much resources are allocated to each project. Also, as most of projects are member-funded, we need to discuss that they should be opensource and community-driven, following best practices of open-source projects, such as transparent development, and decision-making, and open for contributions.
+
+## Active investigations
+
+We are currently investigating projects:
+
+- [RIPE Atlas](/initiatives/atlas/)