[governance] PIR Case/or the .org sell

[Ayden Férdeline]

> I suppose it's possible a strongly worded letter to ISOC will convince
> them not to cash that $1.1B check.

Probably not. But Article 9 of the Articles of Incorporation on file with the Pennsylvania Department of State [1] for the Public Interest Registry state that upon its dissolution (i.e. changing status from a 501c3 to a B-Corp or whatever new legal structure it takes), all assets must be disposed of by the courts. Or at least that is my reading of the provision. And that sounds consistent with what ISOC's CEO said last Friday, that the Orphans Court in Pennsylvania could put a halt to the sale, and seeming to imply that ISOC/PIR would be petitioning the court to grant the sale.

I'd love to read a more thorough legal analysis on this topic, if someone could offer one, as I might be misunderstanding options here.

> But assuming it's a fait accompli might it be more productive to
> request a seat on the PIR advisory board (from PIR) and perhaps for
> support from ISOC (from ISOC) for whatever civil society (&c)
> aggregate podium people here are speaking from?

PIR does have an advisory council, as does ISOC (which has at least two that I'm aware of), neither of which were consulted before this major decision was made. I'm not sure what the point of these councils is, given that, so having representation on them may not be as impactful as we might hope. No harm in asking though - perhaps we can reform them - so I think your suggestion is a very good one. Thanks for suggesting it.

Best wishes,

Ayden Férdeline

[1] PDF available here: https://www.docdroid.net/q5ZBsKb/tsc191202131012.pdf#page=4

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On Monday, 2 December 2019 22:02, <bzs at theworld.com> wrote:

>
>
> I suppose it's possible a strongly worded letter to ISOC will convince
> them not to cash that $1.1B check.
>
> But assuming it's a fait accompli might it be more productive to
> request a seat on the PIR advisory board (from PIR) and perhaps for
> support from ISOC (from ISOC) for whatever civil society (&c)
> aggregate podium people here are speaking from?
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>         -Barry Shein
>
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