2021-01-20 All Members Meeting Notes

Agenda 

• Recording
• Presentation - Link
• Presentation (PDF):

Notes

Remarks from John Jordan

• 2021 is an important year for Trust over IP, and for all global actors trying to establish real trust online.
• We are well positioned to help bring key pieces together for this change to occur, and also bring people who may not currently be included in this process to our community.
• Our aim should be to align the things we all do in the world already with the rules that govern how credentials will be used in the digital realm.
• Our focus needs to remain on our priority deliverables that allow us to send clear signals to the market (e.g. technical specifications).
• Members will all benefit from contributing to, ad being part of, this foundational work.

Priorities - ToIP in 2021

• David Luchuk invited members to share thoughts on priorities for the coming year.
• Nicky Hickman observed that 2021 should be about delivering impact for people and organizations that can benefit from the Trust over IP model. Crucial problems for businesses, as demonstrated in the on-going COVID crisis, include understanding the human experience of trust and using trust metrics to drive adoption. She identified the possibility of developing a Net Promoter Score (NPS) for digital trust.
• Karl Kneis emphasized the importance of communications and educational efforts to “convert the unconverted” so that the Trust over IP model and message resonate widely. Many misconceptions exist in the market and need to be corrected.
• Further, he identified the challenge of merging and harmonizing “brownfield” ecosystems with the frameworks being developed for digital trust.
• Drummond Reed discussed a set of inter-connected priorities identified by the Steering Committee, and observed that the “Big 5” deliverables for Trust over IP had not yet been completed and released.
• The focus of our efforts needs to be on converting initial elements that triggered the creation of the Foundation into these 5 distinct products - target: complete by end of Q1.
• Drummond Reed also cited examples of existing or emerging trust ecosystems that are either in development or operational. He emphasized the work of the Ecosystem Foundry WG in supporting the emergence of these kinds of ecosystems.
•  Jim St. Clair recognized the importance of high-profile topics such as work toward a global interoperable health pass as issues that should shape our activities.
• Paul Knowles cited the EU Data Governance Act as a new piece of framing legislation that will affect all emerging ecosystems.
• Karl Kneis invited all members to reach out the Ecosystem Foundry WG to get involved.

Working Group Updates

• Leads for all Working Groups provided updates on current activities, deliverables and key challenges.

Governance Stack

• Drummond Reed emphasized the importance of completing the Governance Stack TSS and Design Principles, which are this group’s contribution to the Big 5 along with helping update the Foundation Whitepaper.
• With the GitHub process and deliverables portal in place, our focus needs to be on using these processes to publish and release our deliverables. He encouraged all members to be part of the public review of these products.
• Scott Perry added that the Working Group has established a concrete roadmap for action that includes consistent communication with other Groups.

Technology Stack 

• Dan Gisolfi advised that all priorities of the WG are reflected in the repos that have been created for deliverables in GitHub. He issued an open call-out for volunteers to get involved and help advance the work.
• Saturn V will be the first instance of a complete technical architecture based on the fundamental elements of the Trust over IP model, including the Big 5 deliverables.
• To achieve our objectives, we need members to get involved.

Utility Foundry

• Andre Kudra indicated the WG continues to be focused on helping others be able to jump-start utility projects by sharing approaches and lessons-learned from utilities already in place.
• Upcoming work will include educational sessions based on the experiences of existing utility operators.
• Finally, he reiterated the need for volunteers and member contributions to this work.

Ecosystem Foundry

• Karl Kneis identified key deliverables that are contained in the Ecosystem Foundry “Solution Pack” as well as a variety of White Papers under development.
• The WG is focused on expanding its engagement with members and other WGs, and encouraged members to bring use cases forward for discussion. These are fuel for the work.
• He recognized the leadership of Karen Hand in establishing the White Paper Taskforce which is intended to play a coordinating role among WGs and orchestrate messaging to stay focused on our “north star” as a Foundation.
• Key challenges include staying focused by only retaining as many taskforces as are required to meet objectives and produce deliverables. He also emphasized the on-going need to foster cross-WG collaboration.
• RJ Reiser was welcomed as new co-Vhair of this WG.

Inputs & Semantics

• Paul Knowles explained that the structure of this WG was recently modified to focus separately on data puts, on hand hand, as opposed to semantics on the other. This will allow the WG to define specifications and best practices that bring cohesion to the distinct data capture and semantic domains.
• He emphasized that the WG has a vertical (e.g. requirements for healthcare ecosystems) as well as horizontal focus, and identified KERI as an important ledger-agnostic solution in the Inputs domain.

Concepts and Terminology

• Drummond Reed indicated this WG is working as fast as possible on tooling required to put a common glossary in place.

Human Experience

• David Luchuk advised that the Charter for this new WG is in the process of being formally adopted under a new approach from Linux Foundation that will make it simpler for members to join.
• This WG is currently soliciting proposals from other WGs on possible projects to work on once the Charter is formally in place.

Wrap Up

• David Luchuk indicated, in response to a member comment about shared calendars, that he is working with Linux colleagues to install a calendar plug-in for the wiki.