2021-06-02 Steering Committee Meeting Page - Plenary

Meeting Schedule

• June 2, 2021 12:00 PM Pacific Time -20:00 UTC
  (PAGE STILL IN PROCESS OF BEING UPDATED)

Attendees

Steering Committee Voting Members

• John Jordan (ToIP, ED - Province of British Columbia)
• Drummond Reed(Evernym)
• Jessica Townsend(Accenture)
• Steve McCown(Anonyome Labs)
• sankarshan(Dhiway Networks)
• Andre Kudra(esatus)
• Vladimir Zubenko(ETS)
• Wenjing Chu(Futurewei Technologies)
• Mike Vesey (IdRamp)
• Jim StClair  (Lumedic)
• Daniel Hardman(SICPA)

Also Participating

• RJ Reiser(for David Lucatch (KABN / Liquid Avatar - Steering member - non voting)
• Steven Milstein
• Steve Magennis
• Bettina Brunnhuber
• Judith Fleenor (ToIP, Director of Strategic Engagement)

Guest

Agenda 

Presentation/Documents

• Presentation - Agenda - PDF

Recording

• Link

Notes

Approval of minutes

• Minutes of the April 7, 2021 Plenary Meeting Approved.

Membership review and approval

• New ToIP individual and contributor members were approved.

• Jim St Clair pointed out that ToIP processes do not contain a procedure for SC members to disagree with the approval process and contest it.  This is something, as he recalls, that is structurally inherent in our Linux Foundation agreement, but it is something he thinks we need to be cognizant of as we go through the formality for approving companies.

  Judith Fleenor stated that based on the JDF agreement, if there is no consensus, then we would have to go to a vote with the voting members and there would need to be a supermajority. Drummond Reed agrees, that is how the JDF 5 agreement works.

Steering committee Elections - 1 yr term ended

Judith Fleenor explained that Voting Members of the SC are normally elected for a 3yr term, with ⅓ of the SC Voting members up for election each year.  Terms for the initial SC Members as stated in the ToIP Foundation Governance Policies are as follows:

First five >100 and first three <100 Steering Members: 3 year term
Second five >100 and second three <100 Steering Members: 2 year term
Final five >100 and Final 4 <100 Steering Members: 1 year term

Therefore 3 companies originally assigned a 1 year term need to be re-elected for a new 3 year term and 2 slots are open for new SC voting members.  The three companies up for re-election are: Anonyome Labs, Dhiway Networks, and Lumedic.  Boninfii having dropped out will be replaced by Liquid Avatar as a voting member.  Additionally, BrightHive having dropped out leaves a voting member slot open, which can be filled by Certizen Limited.

Judith asked if there were any questions.

Drummond Reed added information that the addition of Liquid Avatar and Certizen Limited are being slotted in based on the order they joined ToIP.

Judith Fleenor indicated that consensus had been reached and the following resolution was approved:

RESOLVED: ​that Anonyome Labs, Dhiway Networks, Lumedic and Liquid Avatar be elected as voting  members of the Steering Committee for a 3 year term and that Certizen Limited be elected as a voting member of the Steering Committee for a 2 year term.

Governance Stack WR - Final Deliverable - Principles of SSI

Drummond Reed shared that The Governance Stack WG has approved the Principles of SSI as a WG Approved Deliverable. The GSWG Chairs have sent this deliverable to the SC for 7 day review.  After the 7 day review period, email will be sent to SC Calling for Consensus, by Judith Fleenor.  If there are no objections within 7 days, the following resolution will be considered as passed by consensus.

RESOLVED:  That the “Principles of SSI”  Working Group Approved Deliverable submitted by the Governance Stack Working Group be hereby approved by the Steering Committee as a Trust Over IP (ToIP) Approved Deliverable.

Update - Good Health Pass - Update

Drummond Reed reviewed the six week process that the working group embarked on that has now resulted in a single 180 page document that includes a 33 page glossary with over 200 terms, and 9 categories of recommendations.  An explainer deck the “Visual Guide to Good Health Pass Interoperability Blueprint” has been prepared for use with Industry consultations that are underway this week.

Judith Fleenor reminded everyone that all comments during the review period must go through the comment form, so that we can capture the Non-member agreement information for those making comments.

Monday June 7th will be the announcement of a public review period.  Followed by a Good Health Pass Working Group call for consensus.  The Steering Committee call for consensus is expect at the end of June.

Wenjing Chu asked where Steering Committee members could get a copy of the 180 page document.  Drummond Reed offered to send it to any SC member who provided him with their email address, or that you could ask either of the working group chairs for a copy.

Special Topic Meeting - Agenda Items discussion

Judith Fleenor opened the floor for discussion about what special topics.

Daniel Hardman suggested Layer 3 protocols for financial transactions and the ecosystem that might live above in Layer 4.  “There’s a whole other world of interesting stuff that relates to financial transactions, where verifiable credentials are not necessarily the most interesting aspect of layer three, money is and the question of how to govern the flow of money.”

Jim St. Clair added that he is a part of the Sovrin Financial inclusion committee working group and there they did a draft white-paper. 

Daniel Hardman further explained what he’d like to discuss and how it relates to ToIP Layer 2 in our stack.

Judith Fleenor asked for raised hands for who else would be interested in this topic . Four reposed yes.

John Jordan  - We have then focused on credential exchange and proofs, but there is a world of protocols that could be enable by confidential agent to agent channel and that’s something we are starting to explore in business contracts, supply chain trusted, and responsible sourcing of metals, which could be related to what Daniel is talking about.  

Thinking about the future, two years from now, we can think about the expansion of the model beyond verifiable credentials and the narrowly focused digital identity.  “What do we need to do to help the market understand how the Linux Foundation is contributing to the space, beyond the project we have today.”  “Are there more clear market signals that we could make by organizing ourselves in some way, expanding our message like Daniel is suggesting?”  Like we are trying to make contracts possible, from contracts to all business interaction.

Judith Fleenor - recapped there are two topics here for possible discussion.

1. Looking to the future, how ToIP and other organizations within this space and within the Linux Foundation and across organizations get the messages out, beyond verifiable credentials for identity.
2. A broader discussion of Layer 3 protocols that are beyond credential exchange.

Daniel Hardman volunteered to put together a 20 minute slide presentation when we are ready to have this as a special topic discussion.

Drummond Reed suggested another possible topic.  What happens beyond the Good Health Pass Collaborative (GHPC) Blueprint, as we move into the implementation phase?  Also, the Interoperability working group for GHPC could provide a sort of lesson learning in the GHP.

John Jordan added, How to bring back into the core working groups deliverables some of the processes and/or content of the work done in the GHPC working group and tasks forces.  And, also what happens to the Interoperability Working Group, does that continue or get wrapped into other core working groups.

Drummond Reed - Another aspect that is now receiving quite a bit of attention that we highlighted as required is the trust registry infrastructure, especially across domains.  Thus, a possible special topic meeting just on “Trust Registries”

Daniel Hardman - Added, not just the Theory of Trust Registries, but how to actually operate one because we are at an inflection point where we want to transition from having squares in a diagram, to actually running one so that Good Heath Pass succeeds, as an ecosystem.

John Jordan - His colleague Stephen will be presenting at the global forum next week on traversing the web of trust.  This is related to this topic of Trust Registries and John agrees that Trust Registries could be a good topic for a Special Topics Meeting.

Drummond Reed - A topic of Membership and Membership Plan.  How we grow our resource base at the foundation.  Both from a revenue perspective, but also getting contributing members that are contributing in a way that has an impact.

Judith Fleenor brought up two other topics.  First acknowledging the work Sumiran Garg has done interviewing members of the Steering Committee around revenue and business models. Attached to that is aligning the purpose and mission of ToIP with the message from a communications standpoint, so we are attracting the right members.   The second topic is the Info Graphic.

Judith Fleenor recapped possible Special Topics include:

1. How Financial Systems Use this technology. (A broader discussion of Layer 3 protocols that are beyond credential exchange.)
2. Helping the Market Understand. (How ToIP and other organizations within this space and within the Linux Foundation and across organizations get the messages out, beyond verifiable credentials for identity.)
3. GHPC Lessons Learned, and what’s next for the Interoperability Working Group.
4. Membership Plan (and reviewing business model suggestions.)
5. Infographic and Website redesign.

John Jordan sees a thread running through these and Judith Fleenor and John will work on a proposed suite of topics for upcoming meetings.  

Mike Vesey agreed, and added anything we can to do raise visibility to solving commercial problems 

John Jordan - We need to start talking less about how things work and start talking about why it matters, and so what.

Action items

•  Judith Fleenor and John Jordan to work on a proposed suite of topics for upcoming special topic meetings.
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