The RIPE Chair Team Reports - June 2025

RIPE 90 feedback

First of all we would like to say thanks to everyone who filled in the feedback form after RIPE 90. A lot of positive comments were provided about the meeting organisation, the content of the presentations, and about the community as a whole. And there were a number of very constructive suggestions for improvements, which is always good to see.

This time around we also organised an online session specifically for newcomers to share what they thought about the event, having seen it with fresh eyes. I was particularly happy to hear that our community - you all! - are doing a fantastic job in making our newcomers feel welcome and included!

RIPE 91

Even as RIPE 90 is still fresh in everyone’s mind, you can already register for RIPE 91, which will take place in Bucharest, Romania in October 2025. We opened the call for presentations for plenary talks and the Working Groups are also starting to prepare their agendas. Please do not hesitate to contact the chairs of the working groups if you would like to bring up a topic.

RIPE Code of Conduct

I’m happy to report that we found another volunteer for the RIPE Code of Conduct: Florian Hibler. Florian has been added to the website and the onboarding has begun.

The CoC is also discussing possible clarifications to the existing Code of Conduct documentation. You will hear more about this in due time.

RIPE Policy discussions

There are a number of ongoing policy discussions in the Address Policy WG:

• IPv6 Initial Allocations /28 (2024-02)
• ASN assignment criteria revisited (2025-01)

There is also a new policy proposal submitted in the Routing WG:

• Revocation of Persistently Non-functional Delegated RPKI CAs (2025-02)

You can see details on each of the policy proposals including the deadlines for discussion on the Policy Proposals web page.

On the RIPE Database WG mailing list a proposal was made to create a new numbered work item (NWI) to "adjusting contact method requirements and adding new methods". In addition to that, the DB WG chairs suggested to retire the list of action items that exists in addition to the NWIs on the RIPE DB WG web page.

Draft RIR governance document

The feedback period for the Governance Document for the Recognition, Maintenance, and Derecognition of Regional Internet Registries (Draft RIR Governance Document) ended on 27 May. During the ICANN 83 Meeting in Prague, the Number Resource Organisation Number Council (NRO NC) spent significant time to go through the comments received and is now working on the next version of the document. The NRO NC hopes to publish a revised draft by September this year, after which they will open a fresh comment period.

RIPE NomCom

The RIPE Nominating Committee evaluated all the feedback gathered over the last few weeks and made a decision on the next RIPE Chair Team: I will continue to serve as RIPE Chair. Anna Wilson will join me as RIPE Vice-Chair.

I am very honoured and grateful that the community put trust in me to serve as its chair for another term and I am very much looking forward to work together with Anna and the whole community. The transition to the new RIPE Chair team will take place during the RIPE 91 meeting in October.

Industry Events

IGF-Ireland: Niall attended Ireland's first IGF event, held in Dublin on 22 May. Following a keynote presentation and an opening address by the Minister for Communications, the programme continued with panel discussions, each scoped around a particular domain, and reflecting the extent to which results had (or not) been achieved in each case. The quality of preparation by the keynote speaker and by the different panellist and moderators was excellent.

NL-IGF: On 5 June, I participated in the NL-IGF in The Hague. It was a great opportunity for the various stakeholders to come together, discuss ongoing Internet Governance issues, prepare for the upcoming IGF meeting and for the official Dutch IGF delegation to gather input. It was remarkable to see the multistakeholder model in practice with all stakeholders discussing important topics on an equal footing.

ICANN 83: During the ICANN 83 Meeting in Prague, I mostly participated in the working sessions of the ASO Address Council. I also attended the ICANN community discussion on the WSIS+20 review. A number of organisations, including ISOC and the RIPE NCC as well as government representatives made statements in support of the multistakeholder model and the continuation of the Internet Governance Forum.

TNC25: While Mirjam was at the ICANN Meeting, Niall attended TNC25, the annual conference of GÉANT, in Brighton, hosted by JISC, the UK's NREN. This year's TNC theme, "Brighter Together", was reflected in a variety of ways, with reference to shared values, common goals, availability and accessibility of infrastructure, ongoing collaborative work, and sharing of specific technical knowledge. Besides staff from GÉANT and its member NRENs, partners from different parts of the world also took part.

Some highlights for Niall were:

• Listening, over lunch, to the representative of the Ukrainian NREN describe the daily reality at home on a personal level
• Listening to a South African presenter describe a different reality, in which electrical power is systematically unavailable due to daily load-shedding lasting may hours
• The very interactive IPv6 Mostly BOF, animated by a presentation by Riccardo Stagni from the RIPE NCC
• The lightning talks given by the speakers selected in the Future Talent programme (similar to RACI at RIPE)
• A subtle, but significant, revision of terminology, proposed by the opening keynote speaker, a South African anthropologist, who objects to the use of "Global North/South" for its "intrinsic divisiveness", and prefers instead "Global Majority/Minority", which expresses a priority for those without privilege
• Another revision of terminology, using "Equity" along with "Diversity" and "Inclusion", rather than "Equality", in order to emphasise the support needed rather than a, perhaps ill-suited, standard accommodation.